Former Borehamwood councillor Beth Kelly has been left disappointed and disillusioned after her bid to be elected as a Euro MP failed.

Ms Kelly, who was a key player establishing Hertsmere Primary Care Trust, would have been the Eastern Region's second Labour MEP, but lost out when the party's share of the vote dropped by around eight per cent.

"In the long term I will find something else to do. There is a lot still to do out there."

She was annoyed that the Eastern Region's seven MEPs were now all men, leaving around 3million women without a female MEP.

Labour's campaign manager Richard Bingham said the vote had been part of a national trend away from Labour in the local elections, and had not been a reflection on the way the campaign was fought, or the candidates.

This year there were seven European Parliament seats allocated to the Eastern Region. The Tories took three, even though their share of the vote dropped by 11.9 per cent since the last European election in 1999.

Labour's share dropped by 8.9 per cent, leaving them in third place behind the United Kingdom Independence Party, with 19.6 per cent, 10.7 per cent up from 1999.

Labour's Richard Howitt was re-elected, but the UKIP took two seats, and the Liberal Democrats one. Stuart Gulleford, UKIP's political advisor to Jeffrey Titford MEP, said: "The traditional parties have stopped listening to people, and last night they paid the price."