2015 Result:
Conservative: 20999 (47.9%)
Labour: 12613 (28.8%)
Lib Dem: 2400 (5.5%)
Green: 1854 (4.2%)
UKIP: 5644 (12.9%)
TUSC: 241 (0.6%)
Others: 53 (0.1%)
MAJORITY: 8386 (19.1%)
Category: Safe Conservative seat
Geography: Greater London. Part of Waltham Forest council and part of Redbridge council.
Main population centres: Chingford, Woodford Green.
Profile: A north-east London seat straddling the boundary between Waltham Forest and Redbridge. This is white, owner-occupied Tory suburbia on the edge of Epping Forest and alongside the Chingford reservoirs in the Lee Valley. The majority of the seat is made up of Chingford; Woodford is split between Leyton and Wanstead, Ilford North and this seat, with the part west of the Central Line coming under Chingford and Woodford Green.
Politics: A safe Conservative seat represented by former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith, but perhaps more associated with his predecessor for the Chingford portion of the seat, Norman Tebbit.
Current MP
IAIN DUNCAN SMITH (Conservative) Born 1954, Edinburgh. Educated at HMS Conway and Sandhurst. Former Army officer. Contested Bradford West 1987. First elected as MP for Chingford in 1992. Shadow social security secretary 1997-1999, shadow defence secretary 1999-2001. Leader of the Conservative party 2001-2003. Secretary of State for Work and Pensions since 2010. As a new MP Iain Duncan Smith immediately marked himself out as a right-winger and Eurosceptic by joining the Parliamentary rebellion against the Maastricht treaty. This would be one of the things that undermined his own position as leader a decade later. He became party leader in 2003, the first to be elected by the party membership. His leadership was short and troubled. He never had the full support of the Parliamentary party, his public speaking skills were derided and he was te victim of plotting within central office. Eventually he was ousted by a no-confidence vote of the Parliamentary party. On the backbenches he founded the Centre for Social Justice think tank, and returned as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions upon the Conservative partys return to office.
Past Results
2010
| Con: |
22743 (53%) |
| Lab: |
9780 (23%) |
| LDem: |
7242 (17%) |
| BNP: |
1288 (3%) |
| Oth: |
2053 (5%) |
| MAJ: |
12963 (30%) |
2005
| Con: |
20555 (53%) |
| Lab: |
9914 (26%) |
| LDem: |
6832 (18%) |
| UKIP: |
1078 (3%) |
| Oth: |
269 (1%) |
| MAJ: |
10641 (28%) |
2001
| Con: |
17834 (48%) |
| Lab: |
12347 (33%) |
| LDem: |
5739 (16%) |
| BNP: |
1062 (3%) |
| MAJ: |
5487 (15%) |
1997
| Con: |
21109 (47%) |
| Lab: |
15395 (35%) |
| LDem: |
6885 (15%) |
| Oth: |
1059 (2%) |
| MAJ: |
5714 (13%) |
Demographics
2015 Candidates
IAIN DUNCAN SMITH (Conservative) See above.
BILAL MAHMOOD (Labour) Born Woodford. Educated at Nottingham University. Solicitor.
ANNE CROOK (Liberal Democrat) Teacher.
FREDDY VACHHA (UKIP) Businessman and entrepreneur.
LISA MCKENZIE (Class War)
Links
IDS only 2% up in Chingford according to Datapraxis and therefore a squeeze could see a Labour gain.
Tom Newton Dunn of the Sun reporting Boris Johnson went to Chingford this afternoon to campaign with IDS. He thinks sending in the PM must mean IDS and CCHQ are worried about losing.
Unlike Wycombe, this is feasible for Labour. However, I think IDS will still scrape through.
Surely will if Ilford North is in danger.
I wonder when the last time the architect of Universal Credit actually went to a job centre?
I know you are joking, but IDS had the wherewithal to marry a woman from a very wealthy family. He must be a nice guy privately because he sure as hell isn’t my idea of a trophy husband.
I remember the old Wanstead and Woodford seat that used to consistently send Tories to Parliament with over 50% of the popular vote
Wanstead has since been paired with Leyton and is now monolithically Labour whereas this seat is very marginally Tory and has been so since its creation in 1997 so I wondering what happened to all those Tory voters . They can’t have all moved to Essex
Quite a few are in the cemetery.
I did IDS a dis-service actually as the Tories did get a couple of 5-figure majorities in 2005 and 2010
Could have a fight on his hands this time though now that Labour have selected a fashionable candidate