It was the by-election at which Bill Rodgers, a future Cabinet minister and member of the "Gang of Four" of senior Labour politicians who defected to form the SDP, entered Parliament.

In the circumstances it is not without irony that Rodgers remembers future Liberal leader David Steel, then not yet a Member of Parliament (MP), loudly booing the result of the election at Stockton from the floor of the count.

Macmillan was a former MP for Stockton-on-Tees and returned to the constituency to campaign for Coles, the first time since before the Second World War that a serving prime minister had been seen on the streets of by-election supporting his party's candidate.

[10] The Conservative and Liberal candidates spent much of their time engaging in argument over whether Blackpool North and Orpington were flashes in the pan or the manifestation of something more permanent in British politics.

As a consequence, Macmillan reshuffled his cabinet removing seven ministers, including Chancellor of the Exchequer, Selwyn Lloyd who was held responsible for the unpopularity of the pay pause policy.

[16] It also led to one of the best political quotations of the era from future Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe when he commented: "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his friends for his life".