by Alan Smith, Mary Graham and Angela Cole

There were plenty of smiles on the faces of the Conservatives as seat after seat fell their way at the election.

Paul Carter, the KCC leader, declared himself "absolutely delighted" with the outcome of the county elections which saw his Conservative party retain control with an even bigger majority.

Speaking from the County Showground at Detling where the Maidstone divisions - including his own seat of Maidstone Rural North - were being counted, Cllr Carter said: "It has proved a good day for democracy and an especially good day for the Conservatives. The voters have not stayed away as some commentators were predicting - the turnout was comparable with previous elections."

Cllr Carter romped home in his seat with a 2,260 majority over the second-placed candidate, Gareth Kendall of UKIP, but the largest majority was achieved by newcomer Jenny Whittle, standing in Lord Bruce-Lockhart’s old seat of Maidstone Rural East. She had a 3,038 majority over second-placed David Naghi of the Liberal Democrats.

Cllr Whittle acknowledged that the size of her majority was in large part due to the strong opposition to the Kent International Gateway project which lies within her division and which she has been vocal in opposing. After her election, she promised: "People do not want KIG and I shall be working very hard and doing everything possible to to prevent KIG from happening."

Cllr Whittle also acknowledged that KCC had a problem with potholes, saying: "There are still too many and I will fight to get those fixed."

Maidstone’s Liberal Democrats had a reasonable night, taking one seat from the Tories in Maidstone Central and retaining their other two seats, but elsewhere they were twice beaten into third place by UKIP candidates.

Both the Tories’ prospective parliamentary candidate Helen Grant and the Lib Dem candidate Peter Carroll were at the count to congratulate their teams, but Labour party workers were hard to find. Labour came last in four of the seven seats they contested.

The National Front who fielded one candidate won 231 votes in Maidstone South.

The Conservatives nearly enjoyed a clean sweep of county council seats across Tonbridge and Malling and Tunbridge Wells.

Six out of seven seats went to the Conservatives, with the clear run only scuppered by the victory of Lib Dem candidate, Trudy Dean, for the Malling Central seat.

In Tunbridge Wells, they took every seat.

The Conservatives gained one seat at Malling North East with former Mayor of Tonbridge and Malling Peter Homewood taking the seat, which had been held by the Lib Dems.

Cllr Homewood, mayor in 2004-2005, who represents Blue Bell Hill and Walderslade on Tonbridge and Malling council.

He is pictured, wearing a rosette, with Tonbridge and Malling MP, Sir John Stanley.

He said: "I have had an absolutely wonderful team of campaigners.

"My main issue, and one I have had a lot of competition on from other parties, has been highways and the need to improve potholes and roads in Kent.

"I am also a governor at Tunbury Primary School, so I hope to make education one of my priorities."

He added: "I expected to get a bit of hassle on the expenses issue but I think in these elections people were more concerned with the policies on the ground, locally."

The other Conservative councillors elected to KCC are: Valerie Dagger - Malling West, Richard Long - Malling Rural East, Sarah Hohler - Malling North,

Godfrey Horne - Tonbridge and Chris Smith - Tonbridge.

The Malling Central seat went to Trudy Dean (Lib Dem).

The overall turnout across the Tonbridge and Malling borough was 39 per cent of 34,104 voters.

It was nearly a mother and daughter winning combination for Sarah and Alice Hohler. Sarah Hohler (Con) who has been a county councillor for 20 years, won the Malling North seat. Her daughter Alice (Con) stood for the first time in Malling Central, and came second with 1,122 votes, against Trudy Dean’s (Lib Dem) 2,486 votes.

The Conservatives swept to victory in Tunbridge Wells.

There were no surprises in the county council election results for the area, with the Tories taking all seven wards.

In Tunbridge Wells North, Roy Bullock was elected with 1,817 votes, with Trevor Poile (Lib Dem) taking 1,664 votes.

Other results were: Roger Manning elected for Cranbrook ward, with 3,020 votes; James Scholes elected in Tunbridge Wells South taking 3,203 votes; John King being elected in Tunbridge Wells Rural, with 3,411 votes; John Davies elected in Tunbridge Wells West with 2,716 votes and Melanie Thomas being elected in Southborough North with 707 votes.

For all the county's results, click here.

For more news on the county-wide picture, click here.