Croydon Central
2010 Results:
Conservative: 19657 (39.51%)
Labour: 16688 (33.54%)
Liberal Democrat: 6553 (13.17%)
BNP: 1448 (2.91%)
UKIP: 997 (2%)
Green: 581 (1.17%)
Christian: 264 (0.53%)
Monster Raving Loony: 192 (0.39%)
Independent: 3377 (6.79%)
Majority: 2969 (5.97%)
Notional 2005 Results:
Labour: 18679 (41.1%)
Conservative: 18362 (40.4%)
Liberal Democrat: 5862 (12.9%)
Other: 2519 (5.5%)
Majority: 317 (0.7%)
Actual 2005 result
Conservative: 19974 (40.8%)
Labour: 19899 (40.6%)
Liberal Democrat: 6384 (13%)
Green: 1036 (2.1%)
UKIP: 1066 (2.2%)
Other: 598 (1.2%)
Majority: 75 (0.2%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 17659 (38.5%)
Labour: 21643 (47.2%)
Liberal Democrat: 5156 (11.2%)
UKIP: 545 (1.2%)
BNP: 449 (1%)
Other: 408 (0.9%)
Majority: 3984 (8.7%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 21535 (38.6%)
Labour: 25432 (45.6%)
Liberal Democrat: 6061 (10.9%)
Referendum: 1886 (3.4%)
Other: 885 (1.6%)
Majority: 3897 (7%)
Boundary changes: Minor changes to bring the constituency in line with ward boundaries. Part of Selsdon & Ballards, Croham and Waddon to Croydon South and parts of Broad Green and South Norwood to Croydon North.
Profile: This is central Croydon in political term if not in geographical terms (while it contains the commercial and shopping centre of Croydon, it is really the eastern part of the borough). Politically though it is half way between the safe Conservative Croydon South and what must now be considered the safely Labour Croydon North.
Croydon Central itself has sharp contrasts within it. Most of the seat is semi-detached, middle-of-the-road suburbia, places like Shirley and Heathfield, although to the north of the constituency is more ethnically mixed. At the southern end of the constituency is the large council estate of New Addington, a somewhat isolated development on the very edge of London that that has traditionally provided Labour with the core of their support in this seat, although in the most recent council elections they saw some support drifitng to the BNP.
Croydon Central was won by the Conservatives in 2005 with only a wafer thin minority, with subsequent boundary changes making it notionally Labour. The incumbent Conservative MP Andrew Pelling had been suspended from the party following his arrest on an allegation of assault and two adverse articles in the ‘News of the World’ and “The Mail on Sunday”. No charges were pressed and Pelling sued the Mail on Sunday successfully for libel. He contested the 2010 election as an Independent (one of four MPs at the election who stood against their former parties as independents), finishing fourth but saving his deposit. The former Labour MP for the seat, Geraint Davies, defeated in 2005, is now MP for Swansea West.
Current MP: Gavin Barwell (Conservative) Educated at Cambridge University. Former Conservative party director of operations and head of the party`s target seats campaign. Former Croydon councillor. Selected for Sutton and Cheam prior to the 2005 election, but withdrew due to family illness. MP for Croydon Central since 2010.
Gavin Barwell (Conservative) Educated at Cambridge University. Former Conservative party director of operations, now heading the party`s target seats campaign. Croydon councillor. Selected for Sutton and Cheam prior to the 2005 election, but withdrew due to family illness.
Gerry Ryan (Labour) Telephone engineer. Croydon councillor. Contested Croydon South 2001.
Peter Lambell (Liberal Democrat) Educated at Reigate Grammar and Oxford Brookes University. Business analyst. Surrey councillor
Bernice Golberg (Green) Teaches at King`s College London. Contested Croydon Central 2005
Ralph Atkinson (UKIP) European Parliament researcher. Contested Dulwich and West Norwood 2005. Contested London region in 2004, 2009 European Parliamentary elections. Contested London list in 2008 Assembly elections.
Cliff Le May (BNP) Postal worker. Contested Londonwide list in 2004 GLA elections. Contested Uxbridge 2005. Contested Londonwide list in 2008 London elections.
James Gitau (Christian Party) Born Kiambaa, Kenya. Educated at Kamusinga High School. Pastor. Briefly became one of the first black members of the BNP before defecting to the Christian Party in 2010.
John Cartwright (Official Monster Raving Loony) born 1968. Educated at Trinity School and Royal Holloway College. Perennial candidate in Croydon local elections and by-elections. Contested Ealing Southall by-election 2007, Bromley & Chislehurst by-election 2006, Croydon Central 2005, 2001. OMRLP shadow minister for chocolate. 
Michael Castle (Independent)
Andrew Pelling (Independent) born 1959. Educated at Trinity School, Croydon and Oxford University. Former investment banker. Croydon councillor from 1982-2006, including 3 years as leader of the Conservative group. Member of the London Assembly for Sutton and Croydon 2000-2008. First elected as MP for Croydon Central in 2005. Was suspended from the Conservative Party Parliamentary whip and chose not to take back the party whip following his arrest in Sept 2007 on an allegation of assaulting his wife. He retained the Conservative Party whip at the London Assembly. In January 2008 it was announced he was suffering from clinical depression. He initially announced he would step down at the next election, but in 2010 confirmed he would stand as an independent and was then expelled from the Conservative Party.2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 107320
Male: 48.2%
Female: 51.8%
Under 18: 25.4%
Over 60: 16.8%
Born outside UK: 17.7%
White: 77.5%
Black: 10.2%
Asian: 7.1%
Mixed: 3.7%
Other: 1.5%
Christian: 65.8%
Hindu: 3.1%
Muslim: 3.9%
Full time students: 3.4%
Graduates 16-74: 21.9%
No Qualifications 16-74: 25.3%
Owner-Occupied: 64.3%
Social Housing: 21.5% (Council: 13.5%, Housing Ass.: 7.9%)
Privately Rented: 11.9%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 8.4%
Waddon and Croham – both currently in Croydon South – are proposed to be included in the new Croydon Central & St Helier seat, together with Fairfield from the current Croydon Central and Broad Green from the current Croydon North. 5 wards currently in Carshalton & Wallington are also proposed to be included in the new seat: Beddington North, St Helier, Wallington North, Wandle Valley and The Wrythe:
htttp://bit.ly/ohr9NY
I cannot see the link between Croydon and St Helier. Are these areas linked in any way? I am unfamiliar with Croydon. I have been to Coombe, Croydon…is that going to be in this seat as it looked like a very leafy part of London.
St Helier is on the far western edge of the proposed seat as you can see on the map I’ve linked to. Half of St Helier is in the borough of Merton of course.
There is quite a lot of overlap between Croydon town centre and the wards on the Sutton side of the boundary. Croydon Ikea is, or almost is, in Sutton, for example. Nevertheless it is an odd seat.
Coombe, depending on exactly where you went to, is split between this seat and Croydon East. Being in Croham / Sesdon and Ballards wards it is, as you say, in one of the Tory areas of Croydon.
‘Several wards from Carshalton & Wallington, plus one ward from Croydon North, one from Croydon Central and two from Croydon South.’
Thanks Hemelig – I did wonder what had become of the old Carshalton & Wallington seat – and where its liberal vote would be dispersed
The LDs will no doubt want Carshalton back in with Wallington and St Helier and a few wards jiggled around so it will be interesting to see what happens in the final review so they get notionally back ahead but it’s presumably a lost cause anyway.
Barwell seems secure in Croyson East as well.
Although the proposed Croydon East wouldn’t be that much safer than Croydon Central is at the moment, the positive thing for the Tories is that the Selsdon & Ballards ward is likely to experience less demographic change than the Fairfield ward which contains the centre of Croydon. Also turnout is liable to be relatively high in Selsdon & Ballards compared to the rest of the constituency.
Thanks HH – Coombe did look like a decent part of Croydon.
@ AndyJS
You’re right: Selsdon is much further away from the demographically changing north of the borough than is Fairfield.
Fairfield has changed a lot since the Falklands-influenced local election of 1982, when I canvassed the ward extensively on behalf of the SDP. Although we were crushed at the count by the Tories (they took 65%) we, the Alliance, did manage to come second (on 21%) ahead of Labour (on 13%).
So in that council election Tory votes out-numbered Labour votes by 5:1. Incredible, then, that Labour carried the ward in the 1997 general election, and again in 2001, and were even slightly ahead in 2005 (according to Labour’s extensive at-the-count sampling).
Broadly speaking, then, Fairfield pretty well reflects the relative party strengths in Croydon Central as a whole. Selsdon, on the other hand, is a whole new ball game: it will be the strongest Tory ward in the new Croydon East constituency (even surpassing Shirley Ward, I would say) and it replacing Fairfield will put the new constituency out of Labour’s reach unless something goes badly wrong for Cameron.
Bear in mind that most of the Pelling vote will go to the Tories (he has now joined the Labour Party) and Gavin Barlow will hope to build up something in the way of a personal vote as new MPs normally do.
Against that, it should be said that the north of the constituency is changing in Labour’s favour: Woodside has a rising black vote which resulted in the Tories narrowly missing out on a seat there in the 2006 locals (whereas in Woodside and in the now defunt neighbouring ward of Rylands the Tories were very competitive in the 1980s).
However, demographic change is happening too slowly. My reckoning: the contest for the new Croydon East seat is Gavin Barlow’s to lose.
NB: I was at the count in 2005 – and as a Labour teller it was absolute hell as we went through nine hours of counting and re-counting before losing by 75: our agent was in tears. Incidentally, he had informed the sitting Labour MP Geraint Davies that he would hold on by about 1,000 based upon our sampling. Geraint replied “But have you taken into account turnout, because the Fieldway estate only had a 40% poll?”. The answer was he hadn’t – he had instead assumed equal turnout across all polling districts. This really is a constituency where differential turnout punishes Labour.
How was the independent vote of 3377 here split between Andrew Pelling and Michael Castle?
Pelling took 3,239 of them.
I should say that he did recommend a vote for Labour in the local elections held on the same day, but my guess is that as the ex-Tory MP he would have taken more votes from the Conservatives.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2086321/Psychic-healer-stars-claimed-contacted-Princess-Diana-jailed-sexually-assaulting-client.html?ITO=1490
Mr Dare was a Cllr and 2010 Lewisam Mayoral candidate
From memory he was/went: Tory > LibDem > Veritas > BNP > English Democrats > Independent!
There was a faith healer who turned out to be fake.
He just asked people to lie down on some rickety old wall papering table.