In a true blue idyll, rumours abound of a revolution

The wealthy village of Bolton Percy is a tiny North Yorkshire idyll with one bus and where the post office is open only once a week, during a four-hour window on Wednesdays. It is a place where residents have neat gardens and fancy cars, and the friendly local church, which will celebrate its 600th birthday next year, is the social hub. In other words, it is exactly the kind of place the Tories could normally rely on for an abundance of support.

- Robyn Vinter

With the Selby and Ainsty MP, Nigel Adams – a Boris Johnson ally – having resigned this month after being snubbed for a peerage, a byelection has been triggered.

It should be cut and dried. Since the constituency was created in 2010, it has been solidly Conservative. Adams had 60% of the vote in 2019, a proportion that had increased with every general election.

But on a sunny day last week, it was clear that something had changed. Residents spoke in hushed tones about abandoning the Tories, keen to air their views but unwilling to be named or pictured for fear of those views being exposed to neighbours.