283 Responses to “Brentford and Isleworth”

1. Joe James B

   An odd seat because the demographic trends are somewhat contradictory.
   Hounslow seems to be an area where the Conservatives can win significant support amongst Asians.
   The loss of Hounslow Heath where I think the Tories and LDs were hammered in 2010 will help them slightly but I agree Labour could regain this seat without too much difficulty should the government falter.

   September 14th, 2011 at 12:16 pm
2. Jason Harcourt

   L Bernard – I’d say the key demographic shifts have been, particularly in Hounslow, towards North/East African (particularly Somali) and, like many other areas, with a vast increase in the numbers of people from Poland and Lithuania.

   One thing I think could work in the Conservatives’ favour in this seat, aside from the slight notional increase from the loss of Hounslow Heath, will be the first-time incumbency factor of an MP who has both busied herself locally and is, to my knowledge at least, well thought of by the powers that be.

   That said, I foresee this being a very hard-fought seat to win in 2015.

   September 14th, 2011 at 12:45 pm
3. Barnaby Marder

   There will be some first-time incumbency for Mary MacLeod, but I think there’s plenty of evidence that Ann Keen was unusually (though hardly surprisingly) unpopular for a sitting MP, and such a factor will be therefore less evident since many LD voters and abstainers, and even a few Tory voters, will be likely to return to the fold in her absence.

   September 14th, 2011 at 3:48 pm
4. A Cairns

   I agree, this really should be quite an easy gain for Labour in 2015 even with the Tory vote holding firm.

   September 14th, 2011 at 4:17 pm
5. LBernard

   Thanks Jason for explaining the demographic change here. Demograhic change seems to be really hindering Tory chances in many Outer London seats. It is not unimaginable to see a London which is overwhelmingly Labour surrounded by a ring of solid Tory seats as people move out the city.

   October 5th, 2011 at 10:21 am
6. Tim Jones

   ‘It is not unimaginable to see a London which is overwhelmingly Labour surrounded by a ring of solid Tory seats as people move out the city.’

   It’s already happened hasn’t it

   With the housing benefit cap you see inner London – and not just Kensington, Chelsea and Fulham – becoming increasingly Conservative, and outer London becoming increasingly more Labour, as Tory voters move either inwards or out of the conurbation alltogether to the home shires – which in today’s world are solidly Conservative

   October 5th, 2011 at 12:23 pm
7. LBernard

   It hasnt happened to the extent that places like Romford, Old Bexley and Bromley are Labour targets which make the Tories still competitive in the Capital but if population changes keeps taking place as fast as it has done then these may one day become marginals like Eltham, Ilford North and Enfield North.
   You do make a good point Tim about the housing benefit cap – I wonder what effect this will have on voting in London as while I can see those outer seats becoming more Labour I cannot see many Inner London seats turning blue apart from the ones that are already Tory held.

   October 6th, 2011 at 7:23 am
8. Tim Jones

   ‘I cannot see many Inner London seats turning blue apart from the ones that are already Tory held.’

   Of course we are talking 20-30 years time but look at say the Isle of Dogs where gentrification has had a big political effect in local elections – where you usually see a full slate of Tory councillors in a place that used to favour the likes of Communists and the old National Front as well as Labour

   I don’t think it’s unquestionable that places that are quite Labour-inclined at the moment largely because of diverse ethnic mix and differing income levels, like say Islington, becoming exclusively preserves of the wealthy, which would surely make them more Conservative

   It’s already happened (or is happening) in places like Battersea, Fulham, Balham etc

   October 6th, 2011 at 9:32 am
9. Barnaby Marder

   Your point is a good one LBernard, but it’s worth remembering that Bexley & Romford (though not Bromley for the most part) do have a Labour heritage, Bexley being won in 1945 (by a remarkably large margin) and held in a 1946 by-election before being gained by a guy called Ted Heath, and Romford being (albeit on different boundaries) held by Labour for decades, then lost when the boundaries changed in 1974, regained in 1997 then spectacularly lost in 2001 in what was probably Labour’s worst result of that otherwise very successful general election. The Tory hegemony is in other words relatively new in these places, though clearly there are other very longstanding Tory strongholds in the suburbs which still are so today, such as Ruislip/Northwood and the present Croydon South as well as the aforementioned Bromley.

   October 6th, 2011 at 9:47 am
10. LBernard

    I do understand what you’re saying Tim and I do agree with you in part, but my main gripe is that I can see outer London going red quicker than I can see Inner London turning blue. I think the rate of change in outer London is happening much faster which is why we are now starting to see dwindling majorities in many tory held seats on the edge of the capital.

    Islington is a strange one as you would assume that being so close to the city, with the period properties and trendy bars/shops that the Tories would be making serious inroads there, yet they have not.

    October 6th, 2011 at 9:55 am
11. Tim Jones

    ‘my main gripe is that I can see outer London going red quicker than I can see Inner London turning blue.’

    Absolutely

    What I’m describing is likely to be in place in the next 20-30 years – and only if the housing benefir cap comes in – whereas what you’re describing is already happening

    You couldn’t imagine places like Brent North, Ealing North, Harrow West electing Tory MPs in today’s world – let alone places like Streatham, Walthamstow and Lewisham – yet they used to be part of Tory surburbia

    The North Eastern section is different – where voters seem to have more in common with the Essex electorate (with all social classes voting Conservative) than the London one

    For the immediate future, Tory prospects in London look almost as grim as those in the industrial North and Scotland

    October 6th, 2011 at 11:51 am
12. akmd

    Lbernard, trendy areas like Islington, south Camden and North Lambeth tend to be the preserve of left-leaning middle class as the significant crime problems and poor schools there and in other similar places usually put off more conservative minded voters.

    I certainly believe that outer London will become increasingly more Labour sooner than inner London becoming more conservative and the latter will only really happen if the housing benefit reforms do have an impact on demographics of the inner city.

    October 6th, 2011 at 12:36 pm
13. LBernard

    “For the immediate future, Tory prospects in London look almost as grim as those in the industrial North and Scotland”

    Very True infortunately.

    AKMD – While I know that those places are the home of the ‘Champagne Socialist’ it seems odd that whileTory fortunes in places like Wapping is growing which away from the High St and the river is still fairly tatty, places like Islington/North Lambeth have managed to dodge the City type Tory brigade. Peoples patterns of movement in London is very odd and this oddness will simply increase if the housing benefits cap goes ahead.
    I understand the schools and crime point which must play a part in where Tory voters move to in London.

    October 6th, 2011 at 12:58 pm
14. Tim Jones

    ‘it seems odd that whileTory fortunes in places like Wapping is growing which away from the High St and the river is still fairly tatty, places like Islington/North Lambeth have managed to dodge the City type Tory brigade. ‘

    perhaps – but the Tories failure to win a majority had more to do with their failure to win back middle class voters from urban areas who had desserted them for Labour or the Lib Dems in the 90s

    They did well in working class counties like Kent and Essex but that was always on the cards

    Perhaps a better indicator was their relative success in the industrial parts of the West Midlands where they polled well in places like Walsall, Rowley Regis, Newcastle Under Lyme and Cannock – far from natuiral Tory areas

    And look at the South West – the Labour vote held up okay in middle class Exeter yet they lost out to the Tories in working class seats like Plymouth Devonport, Swindon (North & South) and Cambourne & Redruth

    Cameton might seem like the leader least likely to get these types of voters to the polls to vote Tory, but the ewvifdence suggests otherwise

    October 6th, 2011 at 2:43 pm
15. Pete Whitehead

    “You couldn’t imagine places like Brent North, Ealing North, Harrow West electing Tory MPs in today’s world – let alone places like Streatham, Walthamstow and Lewisham – yet they used to be part of Tory surburbia”

    And if you go back further to before WW2, places like Brixton and Stoke Newington were Tory suburbia. They declined as new suburbs further out developed and the process we see now is a continuation of that. The new suburbs are outside the Greater London boundary though (just as they were outside the LCC boundary then). If poor people move out of inner London into outer London and better off people move from Outer London into the Home counties, the effect is fewer seats in Inner London and more sats in the Home Counties which does much to offset Tory losses in London. Before WW2 there were as many seats in Tower Hamlets as in Berkshire and Buckinghamshire put together (7 each – now 2-15). There were 9 seats covering the present day borough of Southwark (now 2 and a half) and 9 covering Sussex (now 16). There are still milions of Tory voters in London and if they move elsewhere they vote elsewhere and swell the electoral resgisters elsewhere thus creating more seats. WHile London’s population may not decline, much fo the new population will be foreign nationals many of them inelgible to vote, especially when individual voter registration gets rid of so many of the ghost voters in places like Newham and Tower Hamlets. The next boundary review after this one may see a large cull of inner London constituencies and will certainly see another boost to the Home counties.

    October 6th, 2011 at 2:43 pm
16. Andy JS

    In reply to Tim’s point:

    I’ve been reading Bob Worcester’s election book and one of the most striking figures is this:

    Conservative support by social class:

    AB: 39%
    C1: 37%
    C2: 37%
    DE: 31%

    October 6th, 2011 at 3:15 pm
17. Andy JS

    In 1992 (when the Tories won 43%) these were the figures according to MORI:

    AB: 56%
    C1: 52%
    C2: 39%
    DE: 31%

    October 6th, 2011 at 3:17 pm
18. Tim Jones

    As Andy’s figures show over the last 20 years it’s the middle classes who have fallen most out of love with the Tories although I am surprised that the amount of C2s voting for them hasn’t increased

    The figs also suggest the era of class-based politics is coming to an end

    I’d be interested to see the figures for other 2 parties – especially the Lib Dems as they are always the ones wjho have played up the notion of a classless party

    October 6th, 2011 at 4:22 pm
19. Andy JS

    The Tories have a particular problem with middle-class women aged 25-44 where they came third with 29% according to MORI’s figures, the so-called “mumsnetters”. Cameron was supposed to change that when he became leader but didn’t succeed although of course the Tories may have done even worse among that group with a more traditional leader.

    October 6th, 2011 at 4:37 pm
20. Joe James B

    These trends are happening but that doesn’t mean they’ll necessarily continue beyond the medium term or continue as rapidly.
    I can see a situation where some areas in the outer east of London that have been swinging to the Tories start to stall and possibly even drift back a bit to Labour as demographic trends spread even there.
    But London is a very large area.
    Not everyone can commute from Home Counties.
    It’s very expensive and remains so, so can’t see all the suburbs becoming different areas, but the trends are there yes.

    October 7th, 2011 at 12:09 am
21. richard

    “As Andy’s figures show over the last 20 years it’s the middle classes who have fallen most out of love with the Tories although I am surprised that the amount of C2s voting for them hasn’t increased

    The figs also suggest the era of class-based politics is coming to an end”

    Many C2s are voting for rightist parties.

    What those numbers show is the fallacy of the Cameron Project and Conservative strategy as a whole.

    In effect they were running up a down escalator when to the side was another escaltor already going up.

    October 7th, 2011 at 7:41 am
22. richard

    “For the immediate future, Tory prospects in London look almost as grim as those in the industrial North and Scotland”

    That depends on what you mean by the ‘industrial North’. If the northern cities then you’re right but if you mean the parts where the factories and mines are then no.

    They’re different places. A mistake often made by southern public school boys. Including Cameron and Osborne.

    October 7th, 2011 at 7:55 am
23. Robin Hood

    Anthony has kindly produced a full set of notional 2010 results for the new boundaries, and for Brentford & Isleworth it looks like this:

    Mary Macleod (Con) 18,704
    Ann Keen (Lab) 15,772
    Andrew Dakers (Lib Dem) 11,637

    This basically means that the removal of Hounslow Heath Ward has increased the Tory majority by almost exactly 1,000 – or 2%.

    For those of you who like your data raw and uncooked, this means that Ann Keen polled a projected 2,292 votes in Hounslow Heath, against 1,318 for Mary Macleod and 1,081 for Andrew Dakers.

    Interestingly, Ann Keen’s projected vote in this ward is higher than that which was won by one of the Labour council candidates standing in Hounslow Heath in the local council elections held on the same day (though lower than the other two).

    Conversely, Mary Macleod’s projected vote in this ward was higher than that won by two of her party’s council candidates, though lower than the strongest one.

    This would suggest that Ann Keen performed about as well as a new Labour parliamentary candidate would have done (or possibly slightly worse, though not enough to be decisive). Essentially, whatever personal vote she may have had as an incumbent MP was more or less cancelled out by unfavourable publicity surrounding her expense claims.

    It’s also worth mentioning that Mary Macleod had the advantage of being funded by Lord Ashcroft (although this is something which we in the Labour Party did our best to turn to her DISadvantage). Her Ashcroft funding, plus a £10,000 donation from Tory peer Lord Laidlaw (among others) helped to ensure a continual flow of glossy election literature in the months and years running up to the election.

    It is possible that this high-profile projection of Mary Macleod may have actually given her a slight personal vote even before she was elected. (It was certainly true that Ann Keen had accrued a small pesonal vote through her vigorous campaigning in 1987 and 1992, even though she ultimately failed at each of these elections).

    Some on this thread seem to be speculating that the absence of Ann Keen will result in lots of lost Tory and Lib Dem voters returning to the Labour fold next time. However, the fact that the Tories out-polled Labour in this seat in the May 2010 local government elections would seem to suggest that this is a false prospectus.

    True, us politicos may have known about Ann Keen’s expenses, but most electors in any constituency do not even know the name of their MP (let alone the details of their expense claims).

    I would therefore judge that this will be a tough nut for us to crack next time: we need a 3% swing against a newly incumbent Tory MP and I’m not sure we’ll even get that swing nationally.

    True, Hounslow Central, Hounslow South and Osterley are becoming more Asian, but this is counterbalanced by the fact that the three Chiswick wards are becoming progressively more gentrified. In fact, whereas the Hounslow end has more in common with neighbouring Southall, the Chiswick end has more in common with nearby Fulham. You therefore have, in effect, two constituencies merged into one.

    Will Seema Malhotra stand here in 2015? Her current seat is being abolished, and she has local roots in the borough. She would be unlikely to win a selection contest against John McDonnell (as he is well entrenched in the Hayes part of the new Feltham & Hayes seat) and given that Virendra Sharma will be only 68 by 2015 it’s unlikely he will stand aside to let her take on the new Southall & Heston seat.

    Anyone who has listened to the type of conversation you get in some of the pubs along Ealing Road Brentford will tell you that her ethnicity will be a drag on her performance (though constituency-wide, probably only a slight one) and so all in all this is not going to be an easy gain for her.

    Given her obvious abilities, she may decide to look for safer ground elsewhere. I’m not suggesting that she cannot win here (much will depend on the national state of the parties) but please let’s not delude ourselves into thinking that the absence of the Keen factor is going to make a significant difference: it will not.

    I hope if Seema DOES stand for the redrawn Brentford & Isleworth seat she will get more loyalty from certain Labour councillors than Ann Keen did.

    January 13th, 2012 at 1:08 am
24. H.Hemmelig

    I would have thought she would have a good chance of getting Feltham & Hayes. I’m sure the Labour party leadership would be glad to see the back of John McDonnell, who must anyway be getting on a bit now.

    January 13th, 2012 at 1:46 am
25. Pete Whitehead

    As I understand Labour party rules she would not be allowed to contest that selection, unless MacDonnell retired I suppose. I may not understand Labour rules correctly though – it may be different in a case where ones seat is effectively abolished and split three ways. Where’s Andrea when you need him

    January 13th, 2012 at 8:30 am
26. Barnaby Marder

    John McDonnell has only just turned 60 & is I think most unlikely to retire.

    January 13th, 2012 at 8:47 am
27. Jason Harcourt

    As I said on the Feltham & Heston thread when I (correctly) predicted she would stand there, I made the assumption that she would contest this constituency in 2015 given her roots and family living in this seat.

    I think Robin Hood may not give the populace of B&I much credit in terms of political knowledge. It was hard to miss a lot of the controversy – although it was noticeable that the local press switched hard left in the months leading up to the election, focusing on trying to discredit the minority coalition council at every turn (I wrote a letter – unsent – after they turned an 83% REDUCTION in compensation claims against the council into an anti-council rant – see link below), and there was a distinct softening in their stance towards the Keens.

    http://www.hounslowchronicle.co.uk/west-london-news/local-hounslow-news/2010/03/30/council-shells-out-850k-for-tripping-injuries-109642-26141940/

    This seat will be one to watch in 2015, although I think Mary Macleod will be a formidable competitor, already earning decent reviews centrally and being something of a “presence” in the HoC.

    January 13th, 2012 at 10:58 am
28. Robin Hood

    Barnaby makes a good point. I don’t see John McDonnell retiring, and having seen the new Feltham & Hayes seat on the map it looks to me very much as though the Hayes part dominates (at least in geographical terms).

    Regarding Jason’s comment, I’m not sure I entirely agree with the suggestion that the local press took on a left-wing bent. (By the way, Jason, very few people used to read the now-defunct local Times, so I assume you’re referring to the more widely-read Hounslow Chronicle?).

    I remember when they reported on a regional poll, they went with the headline “Expenses row MP to lose seat” – the implication being that Ann Keen’s expense claims was the main reason for the poll’s anti-Labour swing. However, as it was conducted across a number of constituencies, this was clearly not the case.

    This shows that The Chronicle did have a tendency to turn any issue relating to Ann Keen into an expenses issue. This led to some internal discussion as to whether we should “go nuclear” and distribute leaflets highlighting the fact that her expense claims were, in most years, less than average.

    We decided against this because it was thought it would simply increase the saliency of the issue in the minds of voters (rather than successfully persuade people that her claims had been reasonable), so the issue was ignored and we concentrated on her record as a junior health minister. (I’m not on this thread to either defend or criticise her expense claims, by the way, I’m just giving a retrospective insight into the strategy).

    Having said this about the Chronicle’s coverage, I still think that expenses were not on the minds of most core Labour supporters when they went to vote. The majority of electors are not politically minded: if they even look at the news pages of the local rag and see something adverse about Ann Keen, that information will not always be imprinted on their minds.

    Further more, in their election literature Labour and the Lib Dems by and large failed to ram the message home about her expenses. The issue may also have been obscured by the fact that there were local elections happening.

    On those occasions when electors did raise the expenses issue on the doorstep, I would counter with information about non-doms financing the Tory campaign (as well as raising the issue of the allowances claims of some leading Tory councillors).

    However, it has to be said that whilst it is true that the Lord Ashcroft factor did have some resonance with voters, somehow it was never quite as ‘toxic’ as the expenses issue.

    Regardless, I can tell you that Ann did better than she thought she would, and given that we were always likely to lose this seat it was as well that the sitting MP was the one to lose it (rather than let a new candidate blot his or her copybook with an early defeat).

    January 13th, 2012 at 4:13 pm
29. H.Hemmelig

    Robin Hood

    You will see from my posts on this site that I have also on occasion been quite critical of Lord Ashcroft and the Tories’ reliance on him. Not only is he a non-dom, but (allegedly) some of his business dealings have been shady and untransparent, and I believe it is wrong for a political party to give major positions such as a peerage and deputy party chairmanship to someone who chooses not to pay their income tax in the UK.

    Nevertheless it is true that Labour under Blair and Brown have also taken significant donations from non-doms, and gave or sold certain such people peerages. Therefore I believe it was foolish for Labour to try to campaign on this issue, based on the old saying “people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones”.

    Another old saying is “two wrongs don’t make a right”. This I think is what you are trying to do by equating Ann Keen’s expenses claims with Lord Ashcroft funding the Tories.

    I defer to your obviously very significant local knowledge, but I find it hard to believe that the Keens’ expenses were not very widely known and condemned in the seat. To be honest, who cares what the local press said, given that so few people read their local paper in London. Of far more significance was the massive coverage given to the story by BBC news (both local and national), and by national tabloids like The Sun.

    That’s not to say that expenses lost Mrs Keen the seat – which is pretty impossible to know. For whatever reason, a very large chunk of the Labour vote here wandered off to the Lib Dems between 2001 and 2010, and this is the primary reason Labour lost. What happens to this Lib Dem vote, which is surely going to collapse, will determine who wins the seat in 2015. I would have thought Labour have a pretty good chance.

    January 13th, 2012 at 4:32 pm
30. Jason Harcourt

    On the last comment, I certainly agree – while it may be something of political suicide (especially in quite a high profile case such as hers) to stay and fight, and lose, rather than bowing out and letting someone else take the strain, it does display a certain courage (or arrogance in some cases!). Jacqui Smith was another example.

    I was referring to the Chronicle, yes (as per my link in my post) – the Keens had been given something of a rough ride by the paper up until about a year before the election (or at least the time when it incorporated the Informer), where it became noticeable that a week wouldn’t go by without a thinly-veiled attack on the running of the council. As I said previously, it got so bad that when they criticised a “good news story” of compensation claims being reduced by 83%, I felt compelled to write to them, although in the end I dithered and neglected to send the letter.

    January 13th, 2012 at 4:37 pm
31. Robin Hood

    Yes, it’s an interesting link: rather like a sensationalist Daily Mail article, it’s only when you get well down into the text that it becomes apparent that the amount of compensation has been declining. Nonetheless, I hardly think The Chronicle could be described as being as politically left wing as the national titles from the same stable (e.g. The Daily Mirror).

    As for writing letters to the local press, I’m not sure how much difference it really makes. Nonetheless, the pro-Keen campaign in Brentford & Isleworth had a very well oiled letter writing campaign, a strategy which was based on the assumption that it could hardly do us any harm.

    January 13th, 2012 at 8:23 pm
32. Andy JS

    Robin Hood: I don’t want to keep pestering you about the by-elections video but if you ever find a way of copying them I gave my email address earlier on in this thread so you could contact me that way.

    January 13th, 2012 at 9:52 pm
33. Robin Hood

    @ ANDY JS

    Have emailed you.

    January 13th, 2012 at 11:58 pm

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