Tories hand out brollies to save voters from Storm Doris

THE Conservatives are planning to provide a door-to-door umbrella service to ensure that Storm Doris does not affect their chances of winning the Copeland by-election today.

Senior Tories are concerned that Storm Doris, which is set to hit parts of the west Cumbrian constituency, will deter voters from casting their ballot in a seat the party hopes it can win.

Labour is defending a majority of 2,564 in Copeland, making it the tightest by-election for the party since Jeremy Corbyn became leader in 2015.

More than 100 activists will be working in the constituency – one of the largest and most remote in England – to help get out the vote.

Twenty MPs are travelling up from London to join the effort, while Cabinet ministers are expected to man a telephone call centre at Conservative Campaign Headquarters.

Theresa May, the Prime Minister, and Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, manned the phones at a call centre at CCHQ on Tuesday evening.

Andrew Stephenson, the Tory MP running the Copeland campaign, said activists with umbrellas would provide a door-to-door service for elderly voters so they could get to the polling stations.

He said: “The key thing is for people to turn out. We do get very quick changes of weather up here and it can be quite unpredictable.”

Voters are also going to the polls for the Stoke-on-Trent Central by-election. Both by-elections were triggered by the resignations of Labour MPs.

The result in Stoke is expected to be announced before 2am tomorrow, with the winner in Copeland declared before dawn.