Bradford West
2010 Results:
Conservative: 12638 (31.15%)
Labour: 18401 (45.35%)
Liberal Democrat: 4732 (11.66%)
BNP: 1370 (3.38%)
UKIP: 812 (2%)
Green: 940 (2.32%)
Others: 1683 (4.15%)
Majority: 5763 (14.2%)
Notional 2005 Results:
Labour: 14359 (39.6%)
Conservative: 11779 (32.5%)
Liberal Democrat: 6659 (18.4%)
Other: 3472 (9.6%)
Majority: 2580 (7.1%)
Actual 2005 result
Conservative: 11544 (31.7%)
Labour: 14570 (40.1%)
Liberal Democrat: 6620 (18.2%)
BNP: 2525 (6.9%)
Green: 1110 (3.1%)
Majority: 3026 (8.3%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 14236 (37.1%)
Labour: 18401 (48%)
Liberal Democrat: 2437 (6.4%)
UKIP: 427 (1.1%)
Green: 2672 (7%)
Other: 197 (0.5%)
Majority: 4165 (10.9%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 15055 (33%)
Labour: 18932 (41.5%)
Liberal Democrat: 6737 (14.8%)
Referendum: 1348 (3%)
Other: 3496 (7.7%)
Majority: 3877 (8.5%)
Boundary changes: changes to take account of war boundary changes. The seat loses part of Bowling and Barkerend and a large part of Little Horton to Bradford East, and a small part of Queensbury to Bradford South. It gains part of City and part of Manningham from the old Bradford North, part of Clayton and Fairweather Green from Bradford South and a large chunk of Heaton from shipley.
Profile: One of three seats in the West Yorkshire city of Bradford. Bradford West is a diverse seat, stretched from the city centre itself and the student population of Bradford University, through the deprived areas of Toller and Manningham which have some of the most overcrowded and run-down housing stock of the city and are largely Pakistani and which were the sites of rioting in 1995 and 2001, all the way out to the semi-rural outskirts of Bradford Clayton, Thornton and Allerton.
Bradford West was held by the Labour party throughout the 1980s, but is now a Conservative target. In 1997 when the Labour party swept the rest of the country, Bradford West was one of the few seats where the Conservatives advanced, possibly due to sectarian reason – the sitting Labour MP, Marsha Singh is a Sikh representing a largely Muslim seat, while his 1997 Conservative opponent, Mohammed Riaz, is Muslim.
There is some history of success for minor parties, in 2005 the BNP managed 6.9% of the vote, in 2001 the Greens pushed the Liberal Democrats into fourth place.
Current MP: Marsha Singh(Labour) born 1954, Punjab. Educated at Belle Vue Grammar and Loughborough University. Formerly a development manager with Bradford Health Trust. First elected as MP for Bradford West in 1997 (more information at They work for you)
Zahid Iqbal (Conservative) Educated at Preisthorpe Comprehensive and Leeds Metropolitan Polytechnic. Contested Bradford North in 2001.Marsha Singh(Labour) born 1954, Punjab. Educated at Belle Vue Grammar and Loughborough University. Formerly a development manager with Bradford Health Trust. First elected as MP for Bradford West in 1997 (more information at They work for you)
David Hall-Matthews (Liberal Democrat)
David Ford (Green) Bookseller. Bradford councillor 2000-2007.
Jason Smith (UKIP) Administration supervisor and IT co-ordinator. Contested Bradford South 2005.Jenny Sampson (BNP) Arshad Ali (Respect) Neil Craig (Democratic Nationalists)2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 97913
Male: 48.8%
Female: 51.2%
Under 18: 29.1%
Over 60: 15.5%
Born outside UK: 23.8%
White: 52.6%
Black: 1.5%
Asian: 43%
Mixed: 2%
Other: 0.9%
Christian: 39.5%
Hindu: 1.8%
Muslim: 38%
Sikh: 1%
Full time students: 11.1%
Graduates 16-74: 15.6%
No Qualifications 16-74: 38.4%
Owner-Occupied: 65.5%
Social Housing: 18.6% (Council: 11.3%, Housing Ass.: 7.3%)
Privately Rented: 12.3%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 26.3%
HH
I fear you might be right.
If the political leaderships had sense (which I doubt) they would be willing to support people like Davies to show that their party had not lost touch with their ordinary voters.
If people suspect that their party has lost its ‘heart’ then they are more likely to be attracted to minor parties.
Absolutely.
Under the new system the boundaries will change every 5 years, giving the party leaderships a massive ability to push out troublemakers at every election.
The new system will make the problem of domination by politicos and sycophants even worse.
I think there should be open primaries for all seats so that the party members rather than party HQ can select who they want. This would diminish the power of central casting and put the power back to the people without any interference from above.
But who choses the candidates?
Ideal CCHQ candidate list:
Banker from Wandsworth
Lawyer from Kensington
Media person from Fulham
Consultant from Westminster
Social worker from Haringay (defector from LibDems)
Only 1 white male allowed and working classes need not apply.
Ideally I would like to see the constituency associations choosing local people who are active in the community rather than CCHQ dictating who should be selected and where.
Does CCHQ still draw up the shortlist or was that a temporary measure in the run-up to the last election?
I think it depends on the status of the seat – in a “target” seat the rules can be a bit different. When I was on a selection panel our select from the approved candidates list or hold interviews but ensure that the final list contained equal numbers of men and women (though they had to drop that because no women applied for the seat)
I’ve managed to work out the notional result of this seat using the 2010 ward figures by using R&T’s method:-
Con = 42.65%
Lab = 38.24%
LD = 13.65%
Green = 3.50%
UKIP = 1.96%
The wards which consist of this seat are:-
Bingley Rural
Clayton
Heaton
Queensbury
Shipley
Thornton & Allerton
Toller
Demographically this could be the Tories best chance of holding the seat as they do have potential as historically they seem to be their strongest areas, although they have lost out to Labour in recent years. As for Labour this seat has changed beyond recognition with the removal of the largely Asian areas bar Toller into the new Bradford Central & East seat which were their strongest areas in this seat. It has already being said that Marsha Singh is to retire so Labour would have to select a new candidate, possibly their candidate in Shipley.
However expect to see radical changes to this seat in the appeals process as Philip Davies and the majority of his constituents do not seem to be happy at the removal of the historical name Shipley.
Rumours afoot for a by-election pending here.
Why McGann? What do you know?
I am aware Marsha Singh was too ill a couple of weeks ago to respond to the local Telegraph & Argus request for his views of what 2012 would bring, that’s the latest information I can find on him.
I heard rumours too in another forum. I’m also aware that he has been in and out of hospital, but thats all I know.
Of course if their were a by-election here, it would continue the trend of this parliament so far of by-elections in essentially safe or safish Labour areas that the party will hold with an increased majority.
Having failed to come close to picking the seat up following an unusually good Tory result in 1997, I suspect we would also be frustrated by any by-election here.
I agree.
Labour would probably select a muslim candidate, and see an increase in its vote share on top of the national swing due to this.
By the way Shaun, I saw your comments on ConHome yesterday about Cameron’s proposals to fully legalise gay marriage.
Although perhaps not so excised by the issue as you are, I have to admit I also feel pretty uneasy about it.
I just don’t understand why he’s doing it H.Hemmlig. Its another of those pointless totems that he supports as if deliberately because he knows most people in his party (and outside I have to say) are against it and thus it shows he is some great ‘modernising’ leader.
If not allowing gays to get married were discriminatory then fair enough, you could have the argument. But it isn’t. Its just a chattering classes issue isn’t it. Its one of those dog whistle policies for the liberal elite that run our government, our institutions and our state media. But it is completely any utterly out of touch with the ordinary voter in the country.
I just don’t understand why the people and the party are being railroaded in this direction that we don’t want to go. It was the same over Section 28 and reduction in the age of consent: polls showed massive opposition from the ordinary people and so the Blair government just did it all without referring to them at all.
I don’t want to come accross as rabidly anti-anybody. But perhaps a little more emphasis on politics that affects EVERYBODY and not just these little liberal elitist issues to please the Guardian readers, and we’d all be much happier.
Oh but back to Bradford West. I agree with H.Hemmlig. Labout would be foolish to select another Sikh candidate for any by-election given the hostility that Marsha Singh faced in his initial election.
In the 1997 landslide they got away with it and Singh then had 4 years to build up a personal vote. But in a by-election they would be less likely to get away with it-particularly if the tories choose a Muslim candidate as they surely would.
Indeed, I can think of few better Tory canidates than Mohammed Riaz, who did so well in singh’s first contest
“Indeed, I can think of few better Tory canidates than Mohammed Riaz, who did so well in singh’s first contest”
Riaz did very well indeed in Bradford East back in 2010 and he was only c2000 votes away from gaining the seat from third place. If there is a by-election then he would be the perfect candidate for the Conservatives.
Shaun-
My uneasiness about this is more practical than philosophical.
Despite the relatively high divorce rate these days, one thing you really do notice being in a heterosexual marriage is the degree of commitment involved and how difficult it is to break that commitment (which from society’s point of view is how it should be). Part of this is due to culture and family etc, also it is to do with one’s children, and the horrendous financial implications of divorce.
I have seen numerous gay friends and acquantainces enter civil partnerships, and one thing which sticks out for me is how much less seriously they are taken. They are seen less as a life commitment and more as a commitment to one’s partner at a particular time, with no stigma and little difficulty involved in breaking up that commitment whenever one partner feels like doing so.
Making civil partnerships into fully legal gay marriages will, in my view, spread this more selfish and consumerist approach inevitably into heterosexual marriages and lead to further increases in the divorce rate, which will be disasterous for children and family breakdown. It would be interesting to see whether IDS takes the same view (I suspect he does).
A by-election in the proposed Bradford West would have been very interesting indeed!