A mum and son will both join the same council after being elected, but Emma Goodjohn's husband and Ewan's dad narrowly missed out on making it a full family affair.
Labour's Emma and Ewan Goodjohn each managed to get a seats in the Dyfan and Cadoc wards of the Vale of Glamorgan respectively. Emma’s husband and Ewan’s dad, Mark Goodjohn also ran for a seat in the Castleland ward, but narrowly missed out after coming third behind Labour’s Pamela Drake and Plaid Cymru’s Millie Collins but he said he was proud of everything the family had achieved.
Cllr Emma Goodjohn, alongside fellow Labour candidate, Belinda Loveluck-Edwards, took seats from Tory councillors Vincent Bailey and Leighton O. Rowlands in the Dyfan ward. Emma Goodjohn received 774 votes and Loveluck-Edwards got 740 votes.
Read more : The full results for the Vale of Glamorgan
Meanwhile, 18-year-old Cllr Ewan Goodjohn, understood to be Cadoc's youngest ever councillor, got 1,077 votes, and beat Tory candidate Rachel Nugent-Finn who had won back in 2017.
According to the politically-driven family it felt "amazing" to win two seats. Cllr Emma Goodjohn said: "This is the first time I’ve tried and been elected for the Vale of Glamorgan. I love it here and I feel blessed to represent such a good ward. It feels amazing that we’ve both won as a family. We weren’t expecting it - but we’ve worked extremely hard. There’s a lot of work that needs to be done in the Dyfan area, the residents and myself wanted to see honest politics being brought here.”
Like his mum, Cllr Ewan Goodjohn was not expecting to win but was relieved that he did. He said: "I’ve done so much canvassing - every day after college, I would go out with my leaflets. I was so sure that I was going to lose, but now that I’ve won, it’s good to see that all that work has finally paid off. We won’t take it for granted - we will work hard."
Emma added: "It’s Ewan that has really motivated us and told us that if we are not happy about something - go and change it, do something about it and that’s exactly what we’ve done. He’s brilliant and I’m so proud of him. He turned 18 just this February. It was so wonderful that we got to work together and got to do this as a family."
