Bristol West
2015 Result:
Conservative: 9752 (15.2%)
Labour: 22900 (35.7%)
Lib Dem: 12103 (18.8%)
Green: 17227 (26.8%)
UKIP: 1940 (3%)
Others: 296 (0.5%)
MAJORITY: 5673 (8.8%)
Category: Marginal Labour seat
Geography: South West, Avon. Part of the Bristol council area.
Main population centres: Bristol, Clifton.
Profile: Bristol West is focused upon the centre of Bristol, covering the city centre itself, the suburb of Clifton to the west and some of the inner city areas to the east of the city centre. It includes what were traditionally some of the more elegant and middle class areas of Bristol, with the large Victorian and Edwardian terraces of Clifton (now largely been broken up into flats), affluent leafy suburbs like Cotham, and some more deprived inner city areas like Easton and St Pauls which have suffered from drug and gang violence. It is very much the student seat in Bristol with around a quarter of the working-age population in full-time education. It is also the most ethnically diverse of the Bristol seats with a significant Afro-carribean community in the inner city wards.
Politics: Traditionally this was the Conservative seat in Bristol, containing its most middle-class areas. It was held by the party continuously for a century and was represented by a series of Conservative cabinet ministers including Michael Hicks-Beach, Oliver Stanley, Walter Monckton and William Waldegrave. A combination of boundary changes, a growing student population and the Tories woes in the 1990s (which saw them lose the previously safe seat to Labour) have seen the Conservatives replaced and eclipsed by the Liberal Democrats, who held the seat between 2005 and 2010. Following the Liberal Democrats own collapse, the seat has become a target for the Green party.
| Con: | 10169 (18%) |
| Lab: | 15227 (28%) |
| LDem: | 26593 (48%) |
| GRN: | 2090 (4%) |
| Oth: | 1268 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 11366 (21%) |
| Con: | 15429 (27%) |
| Lab: | 16859 (29%) |
| LDem: | 21987 (38%) |
| GRN: | 2163 (4%) |
| Oth: | 958 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 5128 (9%) |
| Con: | 16040 (29%) |
| Lab: | 20505 (37%) |
| LDem: | 16079 (29%) |
| GRN: | 1961 (4%) |
| Oth: | 1080 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 4426 (8%) |
| Con: | 20575 (33%) |
| Lab: | 22068 (35%) |
| LDem: | 17551 (28%) |
| Oth: | 1143 (2%) |
| MAJ: | 1493 (2%) |
*There were boundary changes after 2005
”I honestly don’t see why the Greens don’t form some kind of formal alliance with Lab where Lucas stands as a joint Lab/Green candidate and joins the shadow cabinet.”
Probably because it would have to involve Labour standing down for the Greens in some places even though Labour got more votes than the Greens everywhere bar Pavilion. Plus Lucas standing as a Lab/Green is starting to sound like effectively a merger of the two parties and I doubt most Green members want this.
Pepps
“Plus Lucas standing as a Lab/Green is starting to sound like effectively a merger of the two parties”
That’s is basically what I’m suggesting. Given that there are very few policy differences between the two parties and what differences there are (hard-line environmentalism, hard-line animal rights and a commitment to staying in the EU) are actually held beliefs by many in the Lab party including many in the PLP I really don’t see what’s separating us now other than tribalism.
The Greens might be suspicious that Labour won’t always have this political direction.
What might happen is what has happened in Scotland, where the Greens have unofficially become closely allied with the SNP, following the SNP line on the constitutional question, and barely even contested any seats on Thursday.