Barrow and Furness
2010 Results:
Conservative: 16018 (36.3%)
Labour: 21226 (48.11%)
Liberal Democrat: 4424 (10.03%)
BNP: 840 (1.9%)
UKIP: 841 (1.91%)
Green: 530 (1.2%)
Independent: 245 (0.56%)
Majority: 5208 (11.81%)
Notional 2005 Results:
Labour: 17505 (45.1%)
Conservative: 12669 (32.7%)
Liberal Democrat: 6907 (17.8%)
Other: 1721 (4.4%)
Majority: 4836 (12.5%)
Actual 2005 result
Conservative: 11323 (31%)
Labour: 17360 (47.6%)
Liberal Democrat: 6130 (16.8%)
UKIP: 758 (2.1%)
Other: 922 (2.5%)
Majority: 6037 (16.5%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 11835 (30.3%)
Labour: 21724 (55.7%)
Liberal Democrat: 4750 (12.2%)
UKIP: 711 (1.8%)
Majority: 9889 (25.3%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 13133 (27.2%)
Labour: 27630 (57.3%)
Liberal Democrat: 4264 (8.8%)
Referendum: 1208 (2.5%)
Other: 1995 (4.1%)
Majority: 14497 (30.1%)
Boundary changes: gains Brougton and part of the Crake Valley from Westmorland & Lonsdale.
Profile:
Current MP: John Woodcock (Labour) Advisor to Gordon Brown, former Special Advisor to John Hutton.
John Gough (Conservative) John Woodcock (Labour) Advisor to Gordon Brown, former Special Advisor to John Hutton.
Barry Rabone (Liberal Democrat) born 1947, Croydon. Educated at Falmouth Grammar and Cardiff College of Educatation. Schoolteacher. Contested Barrow and Furness 2005 and 2001.
Chris Loynes (Green)
John Smith (UKIP)Mike Ashburner (BNP)Brian Greaves (Independent)2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 91694
Male: 48.8%
Female: 51.2%
Under 18: 22.8%
Over 60: 23%
Born outside UK: 2.3%
White: 99.2%
Asian: 0.2%
Mixed: 0.3%
Other: 0.2%
Christian: 80.8%
Full time students: 1.8%
Graduates 16-74: 15.6%
No Qualifications 16-74: 31.1%
Owner-Occupied: 77%
Social Housing: 11.7% (Council: 9.8%, Housing Ass.: 1.9%)
Privately Rented: 8.2%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 23.6%
Barrow should be won by the Labour Party, although in 1983 they lost it badly mainly because of the defence policy. In 1992 it sprung another unpleasant surprise on it’s MP with the Tories losig it back to Labour on a 6.8% swing – large for 1992.
John Hutton is a Cabinet Minister somewhat to the right of the Labour party and should be safe, although rather like Copeland, it is a Tory long shot.
Labour lost in 1983 partly down to boundary changes which transformed the safe compact urban Labour ‘Barrow in Furness’ into ‘Barrow & Furness’ bringing in much Conservative hinterland and increasing the acerage by several times.
Copeland, like Barrow, remains a long shot through the inclusion of parts of the Lake District – but these areas are heavly outpolled by Whitehaven (Copeland) and Barrow.
4836 isn’t that much. I reckon that if the tories get in, this one falls, if not it stays labour
This is a seat which the Tories might win in one way and one way only: a truly abysmal turnout in Barrow itself, coupled with an 80% turnout in the rural areas, giving the Tories a tiny majority. I don’t think it will happen, personally. John Hutton seems to be a reasonably popular politician.
I think this could be an outside bet for a shock. John Hutton /is/ popular, but there’s a lot more of Cumbria’s rural hinterland in this seat now – it looks like a lobster claw, at the northern part – and if a general urban anti-Labour mood couples with the natural Tory leanings here, simplistic assumption forsees a closer run than the figures suggest here.
But don’t make the mistake that Labour’s support only comes from the Barrow parts – they are also strong in Ulverston, whereas the Lib Dems are starting to get some spillover effect from Westmorland & Lonsdale in the rural parts – Lower Furness ward is Lib Dem.
Actually, the notional figures do make it look a bit more in range for the Tories, but I suspect John Hutton will be re-elected – seems the most likely result.
Going back, there was a actually a swing to Labour in 1979 in the more compact Barrow. The 1983 boundaries, as others have explained, made Labour’s job harder, but there was still a direct swing of around 10 per cent.
The local council elections have been quite good for us lately, with us now one seat away from overall control. Does the Parliamentary boundary differ greatly? I think there is a good possibility of a gain here
The local election totals for each party in this parliamentary seat were :-
Con 11111 Lab 6282 LibDem 1102 Green 316 Others 3356 .
There is a good chance of a Conservative gain here , much more likely than in Carlisle which is in fact less marginal .
Labour has been doing badly in local elections in Barrow for many years, not least because of Jim Hamezeian’s defection and creation of his local party. I suspect most of their voters would probably back Labour in a Parliamentary election, so the situation may not be as bad for Labour as Mark Senior thinks it is.
Carlisle is a different prospect – the city of Carlisle is not big enough for its own seat so it always has to have surrounding areas added to make up the numbers. These areas are overwhelmingly Conservative-voting.
John Gough is the Conservative PPC
I think this seat is making a long-term, if limited, shift to the right. The Tories could previously only win it in landslide years, now it looks more like a “bellweather”.
Not really a bellwether. The swing required for Labour to lose here if replicated nationally would mean a 10% Tory lead over Labour. So Labour could lose nationally big time & still win here.
carrier programme will create jobs here, or at least safeguard them, so there is that to play on for Labour.
I think it would be wrong to write the Tories off – it’s not one of the seats where they’re vote has continued to fade after 1997, and there is a slight air of unpredictability with both main parties on the end of shocks from time to time.
But I would still expect Labour to hold on for some time to come.
It’s definatley on the long term trend to the Conseravtives.
The Conservative victories here in the 1980s were caused by the Labour defence policy of that time and were rather in advance of the basic demographic factors.
Good results here for the Conservatives – especially given that the Tory strong areas are in Furness rather than the Town which comes under South Lakeland. Conservatives won all but one ward in Furness and are the largest party on Barrow (Labour down to just 8 seats and it would probably have been two fewer if the Conservatives had stood a full slate).
Con: 41 Lab: 27 LD: 11 Ind: 16 Other: 5
If we ignore the independent vote – Con 49 Lab 32 LD 13 Oth 6 – a real winning margin methinks. (And note the Lib Dem decline again!)
What LibDem decline ??? From 2 councillors who were elected as Conservatives but defected to the first directly elected Libdem councillor ever in Barrow . I agree Conservatives are narrow favourites for the bext GE but I confess I had this down as a banker for them to take overall control of the council this year .
Everyone acknowledges that Lib Dems do better at locals – so from 18% down to 11% is a decline in anyones book.
Mark’s post is desperate.
This seat looks as though it will probably be close.
Good news for the shipbuilders of Barrow today
ASC,
You say ‘ignore the independent vote’. Do this at your peril. I know the constituency fairly well, enough to know that the massive independent vote is due to the proposed new monolithic Academy that will be formed from merging most of the non-sectarian comprehensives in the area. Many of the independents were elected in opposition to this development (admittedly, voter apathy played a part as well), and they and their supporters are an inherrently unstable and unpredictable group that may yet have a role to play. This can’t help Labour, and I can only hope that it will assist the Lib Dem, since the protest votes over the issue were working-class votes in a town where a decent education is vital for opportunity and advancement.
ASC , your comparison is ludicrous the LibDems only contested 3 of the 14 wards in Barrow itelf , a comparison of the GE vote share and overall local vote share is therefore meaningless . The Conservative performance in the Furness wards this year was good but the Barrow results clearly not as good as everyone myself included expected . The Independents who you wish to ignore clearly made inroads into both the Labour and Conservative support .
It would be a surprise if an independent candidate secured 16% of the vote at the general election, but the main question is where do their votes go when we’re choosing a government.
Hence the reason for ignoring those votes. In effect this assumes they distribute according the the strengths of the main parties. If they are former Labour votes then the most likely GE outcome is that they return to Labour. However, I believe that a fairly even distribution is most like which points to a likely Conservative gain especially given the weakness of the Lib Dems here.
In 2003 and 2004 the LibDems fought just 1 Barrow and just 1 Ulverston ward totalling around 3% of the vote , it did not stop them polling 17% in the 2005 GE . A comparison of the 2005GE and CC results indicate that here the Independents and LibDems take more votes from the Conservatives than from Labour .
Turnout was disappointing here in 2005 – falling further against 2001, against the national trend of some improvement.
Partly because of these this, John Hutton should be able to knock up some people who haven’t been voting.
But I suspect the Tories could come very close, maybe even overtake, which I’d thought unlikely before.
My prediction – too close to call – Hutton’s high profile may save him in a suit that sould otherwise by predicted as a Conservative gain with a majority of less than 1000
I quite like John Hutton actually.
I’d assumed he would hold on, but the situation in 2008 does make it look very close.
A bit of history here, not that it’s relevant.
There was a swing to Labour here in 1979, before the very large swing (around 10%) in 1983 in the redrawn seat.
Also, there was a swing to Labour in the 1977 County Council elections, compared to the 1976 district elections – this was apparently significantly against the national trend.
It may be relevent. It does show that this seat can behave in a contrary way. It was illustrated again this May when the results were rather mixed for the Conservatives and they failed to take majority control of the council when they had the opportunity thanks to rewarding. I know Mark Senior likes to engage in partisan point scoring when he can, but he does have a point in this case. I dont know if this tells us much about how the seat will go at the general. Its capable of delivering an above average swing I think, but its history does suggest it may not oblige
Boundaries in 1974 and 1979 Barrow-in-Furness
%
February 1974 1979
Lab 46.1 53.2
C 34.3 35.1
Lib 19.6 11.7
There was a swing to Labour in 1979 despite the fact that the Con vote did increase slightly and the Lib vote only fell by 2%. Not much change in the shares, in contrast to what happened 1983.
Yes, Albert Booth was unfortunate. There was a 0.3% deviant swing in 1979, giving him a majority of 7741 (18.1%), only for him to lose four years later. Boundary changes didn’t help, but he still might have lost narrowly under the old boundaries, given that the notional swing against him in 1983 was 9.7%.
I wonder what happened to originally shore up his support so well?
“Boundary changes didn’t help, but he still might have lost narrowly under the old boundaries, given that the notional swing against him in 1983 was 9.7%.”
The boundary changes added 12,000 voters in the Lonsdale area. Its very doubtful that the entire Conservative majority coud have been built up in this area which does include some Labour voters in parts of Ulverston. It is possible that without the benefit of boundary changes the Conservatives may not have targeted what would have appeared an unlikely gain, but the nuclear issue was obviously decisive in 1983 nationally and particularly here. I dont know what the reason was for the pro-Labour swing in 1979.
When did the labour Government confirm Trident? – would that have accounted for the small swing to Labour in 1979?
Did the previous Labour government confirm Trident?
That’s interesting. I know they were pro nuclear, but just assumed that it was ordered in the early 80s.
Perhaps the seat reverted to type in 1992 when they said they would have Trident aswell.
Labour abandoned its policy of unilateral nuclear disarmourment in 1988.
Despite losing Barrow Labour managed to hold Copeland throughout their years of anti-nuclear loonyism in the 1980s, despite Sellafield being the major local employer. It must have been Jack Cunningham’s personal following.
Jack Cunningham is of course pro nuclear power.
Jim Callaghan’s government was actually quite moderate in terms of what it did as opposed to what it said.
For information:
I know some people who live in Barrow and since the local elections they have only received one leaflet, a rather poor cut and paste effort from the Conservative candidate. A bit of hard work and John Hutton will be out of Parliament, barely anyone knows who he is in Barrow
I loved the way that this seat went from being ‘Barrow in Furness’ to ‘Barrow & Furness’ in 1983.
The boudary changes only nearly halfed the Labour majority here in real terms, and did not actually cost Labour the seat -
1979 Lab majority 7741 (18.2%)
1979 Notional Lab majority 5427 (10.5%)
Its interesting how the addition of the rural Furness votes (4855 Tories and 2514 Labour voters in 1979) actually made little real impact.
Given the Conservatives won Barrow & Furness by 4577 in 1983 and held it by 3928 in 1987 – they would also have gained and held Barrow & Furness – albeit by smaller margins (at least by 1000 – 2500 in both cases).
Qball,
Do you mean a Labour leaflet?
As the polls stand, a seat which is Number 115 on the Tory Target list is very likely to change hands, and the Expenses scandal situation won’t be helping.
Put another way, Hutton and Labour would do exceptionally well, given where we are at the moment, to hold on here.
QBall’s report rather suggests that Labour are either resigned to their fate here or that their organisation is weak for a seat with a cabinet minister, either of which situations would be bad news from their point of view.
Apparently rumour is Hutton may be quitting Parliament. I don’t think Mr. Brown wants a by-election here.
Hutton is to stand down at the next election.
Could the tories be on course to pick up 5 out of 6 seats at the General Election.
It has to be said, John Hutton is a good chap, and probably one of the best people in the Labour Cabinet. His standing down I would have thought would be quite a blow.
I wish him well with whatever he is doing next.
I recollect that John Hutton says he is standing down for family reasons. Of course, in current political circumstances he would have had little chance or re-election if he stood again.
Could I raise, without wishing to imply that it applies to John Hutton, a cynical question. It is the case that in the past a number of ministers in the defence field have gone onto take jobs with defence-related companies. But usually there has been some delay, notionally to prevent ministers from taking decisions in office with a view to their subsequent employment. Now here comes my cynicism. If a defence minister stands down from ministerial office twelve months before the planned date of a General Election, does that mean that (s)he can get twelve months pay on the backbenches and then go straightaway into a well-paid job in the defence industry, instead of doing “gardening leave”? In the current political climate about expenses, I suspect ordinary voters might have views about that.
Obviously, the point is not specific to defence, it could be applied to many other ministries too.
I can’t think of examples off-hand, but my recollection is that in the past Cabinet Ministters who have announced their retirement from parliament have nevertheless continued to hold office until the General Election is called.
I agree with Joe James B’s comments about Hutton’s ability and likeability. But I hope whatever he does next is nothing to do with defence. And then I would comment that there are many of us in our fifties with a lot of qualifications and experience who need work and have little prospect of it. Why should ex-MPs be exempt from the economic conditions they have caused, particularly as they already have safe pensions? A question which, current election results suggest, is being asked by many people.
No AWS here – an open shortlist instead! Am a bit surprised tbh as no female Labour MPs in Cumbria!
“”The Times”, September 12, has reported that John Hutton is in talks with the French nuclear energy firm EDF about joining them as a senior advisor. The article discusses Hutton’s involvement in energy, aincluding nuclear, energy matters whilst a minister.
See my post on June 6th. for this seat and indeed readers’ responses to “The Times” article.