Castle Point
2010 Results:
Conservative: 19806 (43.99%)
Labour: 6609 (14.68%)
Liberal Democrat: 4232 (9.4%)
BNP: 2205 (4.9%)
Others: 12174 (27.04%)
Majority: 7632 (29.31%)
2005 Results:
Conservative: 22118 (48.3%)
Labour: 13917 (30.4%)
Liberal Democrat: 4719 (10.3%)
Other: 5048 (11%)
Majority: 8201 (17.9%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 17738 (44.6%)
Labour: 16753 (42.1%)
Liberal Democrat: 3116 (7.8%)
UKIP: 1273 (3.2%)
Other: 883 (2.2%)
Majority: 985 (2.5%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 19489 (40.1%)
Labour: 20605 (42.4%)
Liberal Democrat: 4477 (9.2%)
Referendum: 2700 (5.6%)
Other: 1301 (2.7%)
Majority: 1116 (2.3%)
No Boundary Changes:
Profile: Castle Point is a South Essex seat on the Thames estuary, consisting of Canvey Island and the nearby towns of South Benfleet, Thundersley amd Hadleigh. The area expanded rapidly after the second world war as people moved out of London and it is a solid slice of owner-occupied, middle class commuterland (it has the highest rate of owner-occupation of any seat in the country). Canvey Island is a seaside resort, attached to the mainland by bridge. To the west of the island there are oil and gas terminals, but this too is now largely residential.
The seat is normally rock solid Conservative and the Tories enjoyed a majority of over 30% in 1992. It fell to Labour in 1997 on a massive swing but they held it for only a single Parliament, with Bob Spink managing to retake it in 2001, one of very few Tory MPs defeated in the 1997 landslide who managed to regain the seat they lost.
Current MP: Rebecca Harris (Conservative) Former special advisor to Tim Yeo.
Rebecca Harris (Conservative) Former special advisor to Tim Yeo.
Julian Ware-Lane (Labour) IT consultant and former civil servant. Local football referee. Contested Rayleigh 2005.
Brendan D`Cruz (Liberal Democrat) Educated at Plymouth University. Head of business and computing department at the University of Wales.
Philip Howell (BNP) Butcher.
Bob Spink (Independent Save our Green Belt) born 1948, Worth valley. Educated at Holycroft Secondary Modern and the University of Manchester, with a doctorate from Cranfield University. Former engineer, management consultant and director of Bournemouth airport. Essex county councillor 1985-1992 for the Conservative party. Conservative MP for Castle Point 1992-1997 and from 2001. Spink has a reputuation as a plain spoken, Yorkshireman who had taken a consistently right wing, and often controversial line. He is a supporter of the death penalty and opposed to Britain`s membership of the European Union. In 2005 he was criticised by political opponents for publishing an advert on immigration in his local party saying “What bit of `send them back` don`t you understand Mr Blair?”. Spink faced discord with his own local party, surviving a deselection attempt in 2005, accussing a local councillor of being a conduit for an illegal donation in 2007 and clashing with the local Tory council in 2008, finally leading to his departure from the Conservative party in March 2008. For a period he was described as a UKIP MP, though it is unclear whether he ever formally joined the party.2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 86608
Male: 48.9%
Female: 51.1%
Under 18: 21.9%
Over 60: 22.9%
Born outside UK: 2.8%
White: 98.2%
Black: 0.2%
Asian: 0.7%
Mixed: 0.6%
Other: 0.3%
Christian: 75.7%
Full time students: 1.6%
Graduates 16-74: 8.9%
No Qualifications 16-74: 33.2%
Owner-Occupied: 88.5%
Social Housing: 5.6% (Council: 4.3%, Housing Ass.: 1.3%)
Privately Rented: 4.4%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 3.4%
Part of the trouble is political correctness and dotty regulations are so intertwined with the country now
that the Tories seem to lack confidence dismantling it.
If we could make a real difference cutting the costs for the squeezed middle,
and those running businesses,
and get rid of more regulations (much of it EU) Tory inclined
people would feel there was a tangible difference.
And it would appeal to a lot of floating voters aswell.
One tangible thing we have done is people have been caught, prosecuted, and jailed for the London riots.
I have not the slightest doubt that a Labour or Lib Dem Home Secretary excuses would have been made for it and the Courts would not have been “reminded” of the existing powers available to them.
(John Reid excepted).
If Tories really start to think that “political correctness” is the main problem facing this country, or that their party isn’t right-wing enough, then they will be in really serious trouble. Right-wing policies can succeed in certain circumstances, but your area LBernard isn’t typical and trying to surmise that what has worked, for example, for Andrew Rosindell will work in most of the rest of the country would be a mistake.
We need to improve technical skills – the Apprenticeships go some way towards this.
It’s not the main issue of course (PC)
but the disease of over regulation
and constantly trying to trip up those who only want to do the right thing in business, or contributing in other ways
does need to be dealt with.
It is one of the reasons the economy has become so unbalanced
and why some areas have very few businesses in them – just Tescos and a bloated public sector.
Funny that a seat that was Labour in 97, albeit for a single term, should have the highest vote for the Right in 2010
The 76% Right wing candidates got in this seat is greater than that polled by candidates in seats like Rayleigh, South Holland and Maldon
Yes, there’s definitely potential for UKIP to get 15-20% here at the next election if they were to target it seriously (which they probably won’t).
Perhaps more of a populist seat and had the highest NO to AV vote IIRC.
Can’t see Labour exceeding 25% here with EM as leader.
I can’t see the tories getting 60+% here (more likely 50-53%) but my hunch is that they could increase their vote even further above 60% in S Holland.
‘Perhaps more of a populist seat and had the highest NO to AV vote IIRC.’
There were quite a lot of seats with the highest no to AV vote that fit the populist pattern you describe in the Kent/Essex area that fit this pattern – Epping Forest, Rayleigh & Wickford, Maldon, Broxbourne (Herts but very Essex in nature), etc
They also had some of the highest Tory majorities at the last election
However, elsewhere there were big No to Av votes in places like North East England, West Midlands and parts of the North West – which certainly aren’t anywhere near as Tory-inclined as the aforementioned seats
I don’t knoiw whether the Tories could beat their majority oin South Holland at the last election.
John Hayes might be an embodiment of what some people dislike about the Tory party, but there’s no denying that he achieved a superb result at the last election – possibly the best Tory result given this area as a whole hasn’t been previously know for being THAT Consrervative
Although it is the sort of place that is swinging most forcibly to the Tories and equivalent places in America – seats in the great plain states for example – have long been Republican by the sort of % majority enjoyed by Mr Hayes here
The resuts at the last election certainly confirmed what the likes of Pete Whitehead, H Hemelig and Barnaby had been arguing before it actually took place
I think this is a constituency I’d be very happy living in! And not a Liberal Democrat to be seen either!!!
Heaven is a place on Earth
Careful what you wish for Shaun – you could sell up (if you own your own home in Stoke), buy a place in S.Benfleet or wherever, and find your next-door neighbour is the only active Lib Dem in the area.
Gah! The horror of it!
Its not so bad up here after all. Not too many Lib Dems around in the West Midlands generally, and particularly not round here in Stoke South.
There, you’re finally to feel sorry for me about something Shaun. It’s worse even than usual here since there is a council by-election in my (marginal) ward where the LDs are only narrowly behind the Conservatives, and we are as always being bombarded by LD leaflets. I often wonder whether they’re exceeding spending limits. They are however not pushing Paddick all that much, clearly knowing he has no chance. At least my little corner of the ward is free of LD activists, being, apart from my fortress of course, a Tory area par excellence. It’s odd that in an area where there are many “intellectual” voters their leaflets seem to think we’re all stupid.
I think the Benfleet area, or part of the mainland here, did vote Lib Dem in the 1993 County Council elections, but was regained easily by the Tories even in May 1997.
I think this sub-region would be the safest place to sell up and move to if you wanted to be totally safe from Lib Dems.
You could move to Tynemouth aswell.
Perhaps Derbyshire South is another one.
I agree
The Lib Dems are never going to appeal to the nationalistic, aspirational working class/lower middle class voters of South Essex, and it’s pointless them even trying to
It was also one of the firsy areas to fall out of love with New Labour after the parties success there between 1993-1997
UKIP have loads of potential here
I stand by what I said Barnaby, a more right wing government (and I’m not talking barking mad right) would be more popular with people then the current leadership which looks somewhat weak, confused and scared to offend.
It would certainly get us more publicity then harping on about eco-homes, green taxes, the human rights of terroists and other nonsense
Clearly it would be more popular with SOME people, no doubt including many where you live, but it would tip the balance for many others. What works in Castle Point or Romford won’t work in any number of other areas, for sure.
‘Clearly it would be more popular with SOME people’
Exactly
These people who argue the Tories would have done better if they pushed with the message the elecorate so strongly rejected in both 2001 and 2005, fail to answer why the Tories got their first lead in the polls for 13 years on the moment Cameron was elected leader at the end of 2005 – and this was waaay before the economic crash
It’s absolutely ludicrous and flies in the face of logic to argue that the Tories missed out on scores of the seats they held in the 80s because they weren’t right wing enough
Besides, it doesn’t matter – Cameron’s Tories managed a clean sweep of seats in Kent and Essex (except Colchester) so they could scarecely done better with these types of populist voters even if they tried
I completely understand that Cameron did not want to run the 2010 general election on a right wing stance bearing in mind our heavy losses in the previous 3 general elections. However since he has been PM there seems this worry to do anything which leans over to the right when many people in the country have shifted towards the right on crime and immigration especially.
It seems that the Tory party has one goal, and that is to try and attract the floating middle classes in the cities and large towns. The problem with this plan is that many of these people will not vote Conservative regardless of how many policies we bring out on the environment etc. Nor will such ideas excite voters in Scotland or Northern England.
If UKIP can become the third most popular political party in the UK (England?) then surely that shows that there has been a notable shift to the right? (since 210)
I have often said that we will never win all those seats that we won under Thatcher mainly due to demograhics followed closely by a shift in middle class attitudes.
I think my worry is that UKIP will exploit this weakness and pinch more Tory votes
‘However since he has been PM there seems this worry to do anything which leans over to the right when many people in the country have shifted towards the right on crime and immigration especially.’
With social issues I think you’ve got a point
It’s quite convenient for Cameron to have the Lib Dems in with him as it gives him an excuse for not matching his tough rhetoric on crime with action, but even on his own I don’t see him or those who surrund him prioritising toughening up the criminal justice system which would be supported by about 80% of the people in this country (including many who aren’t on the Right like myself)
However, in all other respects this is a pretty right-wing government
All Cameron’s environmental talk has come to nothing, the government has prioritised cutting the budget defecit over all else (which has a disproprtionately affects those most in need of such services – the poor), given a tax cut to their rich friends after proclaiming we were ‘all in it together’, wants to open up the health service to the private sector, is pressing ahead with its free schools program and exercised its veto in Europe
Surely anyone on the Right should be pleased about all of this
‘If UKIP can become the third most popular political party in the UK (England?) then surely that shows that there has been a notable shift to the right?’
Logic suggests that’s the case but rather surprisingly UKIP attracts votes from both Left and Right and still look unlikely to make any breakthrough at a general election – which they need to do to have any effective power
The country and the Tory party will be alot worst for it if the Conservatives seek to become more like the Republicans in the US and completely abandon the centre-ground – as advised by backbenchers on the Right
Benfleet is a nice area.
I said before, there was a Cabinet Minister in the 1980s who complained that he’d have to sell his country house in Benfleet when he retired from the Cabinet.
Pete
I don’t know how easy for you this is to do but …
… could you give a list of wwc constituencies.
Allowing for a definition of a wwc constituency to be 95%+ white and graduates + students to be less than 20%.
A further split could be made between wwc constituencies which have more or less 67% owner occupiers.
I have these figures for England & Wales only, but that is probably ok as you have previously (in the manner of the GLC with the Irish) classified Scots as being kind of honorary ‘non-whites’. There are 195 constituencies in England & Wales which matched yout criteria on 2001 census fogures which is almost exactly a third of the total and some of them would be rather suprising. The last on the list is Orpington which just makes it on both counts (19.99% graduates + students and 95.2% White). Seats dominated by pensioners tend to be over-represented for obvious reasons, so that seats like Christchurch and Worthing West are in there. You may want to redefine what a ‘WWC’ constituency is?
I’m somewhat surprised by Orpington – AW gives a higher number of graduates there – but then it is on the far edge of London.
As the number is a third of the total it seems reasonable to start of with.
Do you have the split of the 195 between those with more or less 2/3 owner occupiers?
But great work Pete, I knew you’d have it on your spreadsheets.
So how many of the constituencies are ‘white middle class’, racially mixed working class’ and ‘racially mixed middle class’?
And how many of each type was won by which party?
I’m sure you’ll have much more fun working those out than watching the Olympic opening ceremoney
I agree this is interesting and we need to refine our categories, but let’s save Pete a lot of unproductive work, and wait for the 2011 census figures in the autumn.
It wouldn’t be unproductive as it would be all the more interesting to be able to draw comparisons
I’ve just checked the figures for Orpington and realised why there is a discrepancy – the figures I have for parliamentary constituency are for the boundaries before 2010 (Orpington would be a bit more working class because it included Cray valley West). Anthony clearly has figures for the current constituencies so you might have to ask him to do it, unless he is prepared to share his spreadhseet in which case i’d be glad to have a play with it
Here anyway is the top 20 ‘wwc’ seats ranked by lowest combined graduates and students (ranging from 9.5% to 12%)
1 Kingston upon Hull East
2 Doncaster North
3 Barnsley East and Mexborough
4 Pontefract and Castleford
5 Ashfield
6 Castle Point
7 Bootle
8 Great Yarmouth
9 Harwich
10 Basildon
11 Easington
12 Boston and Skegness
13 Stoke-on-Trent North
14 Rhondda
15 Liverpool, Walton
16 Blaenau Gwent
17 Sittingbourne and Sheppey
18 Hornchurch
19 North East Cambridgeshire
20 Blackpool South
8 of the 20 are (or would be) Conservative held seats, all of those being in the South and/or East of England
Most of these areas are very fruitful territory for UKIP as well, which is not a very surprising observation
An interesting list Pete, and it doesn’t surprise me (but it may surprise others) how many southern seats there are here. Also NE Cambridgeshire which I have posted on to similar effect in the last week! I promise I will post on an appropriate seat like this when the 2011 census results are in. I’d like to do an analyis on more than just the proportion of graduates, but have a look at the occupational categories as well. What represents working class is perhaps not as clear these days as it once was.
Having grown up in Ashfield, it doesn’t surprise me that it’s number 5 on the list.
What is a surprise is that none of its neighbours are on there….notably Mansfield and Bolsover. In general Mansfield is a rougher area than Ashfield.
Also it rams it home just how unrepresentative MPs are of their constituents. Many of that list are represented by Islington human rights lawyer types, or Tory A listers. None more so than number 2 on the list Doncaster North.
Bolsover would be 23 on that list and Mansfield 25
As Pete isn’t a sports fan I wondered if he was instead working on these lists of constituencies
I can post up the full list but it is as I say on the old constituency boundaries. It would take far too long to work out these things on the new boundaries. I am working on somne other things though. I don’t know if Richard ‘lurks’ at the new ‘other place’, but I have been doing some stuff on regional assemblies and currently doing Yorkshire which might interest him
Pete
Do you havea link to the ‘other place’, as I remember the site went all a bit funny.
The full list would be great.
The old site never came back, but Kris Keane started a new one here http://vote-2012.proboards.com/index.cgi
My regional stuff is here http://vote-2012.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=offtopic&action=display&thread=752&page=8
As I recall I didn’t keep the list I generated previously, but its easily done again
I can’t find “the other place” anymore.
Perhaps it’s been elected on PR or something and sunk without trace.
2015
Malik (Lab) 14,535
Janman (UKIP) 14,479
*Harris (Con) 14,422
BNP 2,265
(LD) 1,037
LAB GAIN
Maj 56
Typical piece of Joeish fun – but I don’t think for a minute Labour would poll that many votes in this particular constituency. There isn’t even a Labour councillor in the seat at the moment, whereas when Christine Butler won in 1997 the local council was Labour-controlled and by a rather whopping majority as I recall. This seat is capable of exceptional volatility – perhaps because of the fact that it’s heavily white, heavily owner-occupied but certainly not remotely posh – but I don’t see Labour getting close for a long while yet.
Joe’s been at the real ale again.
Ed Miliband’s weediness and Hampstead socialism will go down like a bucket of cold sick here.
An exceptionally high UKIP vote is a strong possibility but if it happens it will take a lot of votes from Labour as well as the Tories.
Two predictions for 2015-
If Spink does not stand-
Harris (Tory)- 22, 373 (50.5%, +6.51%)
Labour- 14, 776 (33.3%, +18.62%)
Lib Dem- 3, 765 (8.5%, -0.9%)
Others- 3, 369 (7.6%, +2.7%)
Con hold.
Turnout- 44, 283.
Majority- 7, 597 (17.1%)
If Spink does stand-
Harris (Tory)- 17, 385 (38.8%, -5.19%)
Spink- 13, 943 (31.1%, +4.06%)
Labour- 7, 563 (16.9%, +2.22%)
Lib Dem- 2, 964 (6.6%, -2.8%)
Others- 2, 885 (6.4%, +1.5%)
Con hold.
Turnout- 44, 740.
Majority- 3, 442 (7.6%)
Swing- +4.625% From Con to Spink.
I don’t see why Spink would get a higher vote in 2015 than 2010. A lot fewer constituents in 2015 will know/remember who he was.
UKIP will anyway surely stand here, whether Spink stands or not.
Labour’s vote will surge back up if Spink does not stand in 2015.
I still don’t think that Labour’s vote will more than double as both TheResults (in seriousness) and Joe (in jest) are suggesting. It will rise all right, but I can’t see it exceeding about 11,000. Although Spink was, as an Independent MP, at times very generous to the Labour Party, I don’t think that anything like a majority of his 2010 vote would be likely to switch back to Labour. A pretty comfortable Conservative hold, but with a decent increase for Labour, and a strong UKIP showing. And it could be one of the very worst seats in the country for the Liberal Democrats, which would be saying quite a lot.
Is Janman in fact a supporter of UKIP? It doesn’t mention it in his Wikipedia entry.
I see he was on the committee of the Jordan is Palestine campaign – which is one of the pro-Israel groups which riles me the most. Many more moderate figures in the Jewish community find the activities of this group unhelpful at best, even including my cousin who is an Orthodox rabbi.
Basing my prediction on 2005 results:
Cons 56 (+8)
Labour 24 (-6) (I dont think Labour will be anything like 6 points down nationwide from 2005, but in this part of the country maybe)
UKIP 11
LD 5
Other 4
Very optimistic for the Tories.
I would be more inclined to put the Tories on 46-47 and UKIP on 20
I dont see UKIPs boost staying until the general election. 20 points would be an extraordinary result given that they didn’t break 10 points (from memory) in any seat in the 2010 general election.
Either way we both put Con + UKIP at 66-67 or so.
Plus eight in south essex or north kent from 2005 for the tories in many seats would represent a fairly poor swing from 2010 so I dont think it is very optimistic.
If UKIP even maintain half of the 15% or so that they are getting in the polls, it will mean that they get 20% plus in seats like this.
This seat is tailor made for a huge UKIP vote….not just demographically but a wet A-list Cameroon Tory incumbent in an exceptionally right wing seat.