Dover
2010 Results:
Conservative: 22174 (44.01%)
Labour: 16900 (33.54%)
Liberal Democrat: 7962 (15.8%)
BNP: 1104 (2.19%)
UKIP: 1747 (3.47%)
English Democrat: 216 (0.43%)
Independent: 82 (0.16%)
Others: 200 (0.4%)
Majority: 5274 (10.47%)
Notional 2005 Results:
Labour: 21979 (45.4%)
Conservative: 16918 (34.9%)
Liberal Democrat: 7652 (15.8%)
Other: 1901 (3.9%)
Majority: 5061 (10.4%)
Actual 2005 result
Conservative: 16739 (35%)
Labour: 21680 (45.3%)
Liberal Democrat: 7607 (15.9%)
UKIP: 1252 (2.6%)
Other: 606 (1.3%)
Majority: 4941 (10.3%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 16744 (37.2%)
Labour: 21943 (48.8%)
Liberal Democrat: 5131 (11.4%)
UKIP: 1142 (2.5%)
Majority: 5199 (11.6%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 17796 (32.8%)
Labour: 29535 (54.5%)
Liberal Democrat: 4302 (7.9%)
Referendum: 2124 (3.9%)
Other: 443 (0.8%)
Majority: 11739 (21.7%)
Boundary changes: only minimal adjustments to take account of ward boundary changes. This affected the wards of Little Stour and Middle Deal.
Profile: a diverse seat with a political tradition which includes coal mining, seaside resorts, a major port and some desirable surrounding countryside. The strong Labour presence in the centre of Dover itself made this Labour`s best target seat in Kent well before the 1997 election and in a county of ultra-marginals it is Labour`s safest seat. The seat consists of the towns of Dover, Deal and the surrounding countryside.
Current MP: Charlie Elphicke (Conservative) Educated at Felstead School and Nottingham university. Partner in an international legal firm, specialising in taxation. Research fellow at the CPS. Contested St Albans 2001.
Charlie Elphicke (Conservative) Educated at Felstead School and Nottingham university. Partner in an international legal firm, specialising in taxation. Research fellow at the CPS. Contested St Albans 2001.
Gwyn Prosser(Labour) born 1943, Swansea. Marine engineer in the merchant navy, who worked as a chief engineer on Sealink ferries prior to his election. Dover councillor 1987-1997. Contested Dover in 1992. First elected as MP for Dover in 1997 (more information at They work for you)
John Brigden (Liberal Democrat) Car rally organiser. Sevenoaks councillor.
Victor Matcham (UKIP)
Dennis Whiting (BNP) 
Mike Walters (English Democrat)
David Clark (CPA) Born Petts Wood. Worked in the merchant navy.George Lee-Delisle (Independent)2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 91637
Male: 48.2%
Female: 51.8%
Under 18: 23%
Over 60: 23.9%
Born outside UK: 5%
White: 98.5%
Black: 0.2%
Asian: 0.4%
Mixed: 0.6%
Other: 0.3%
Christian: 76.4%
Full time students: 2.3%
Graduates 16-74: 13.4%
No Qualifications 16-74: 31.7%
Owner-Occupied: 71.3%
Social Housing: 15.9% (Council: 11.3%, Housing Ass.: 4.7%)
Privately Rented: 9%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 8.4%
This seat swung viciously against the last government, almost to the point of it not being marginal, is there a realistic chance it could swing back equally so in the future or is it one of those constituencies that was willing to back Blair but not Labour.(On current boundaries), Peterborough, Pendle, Stafford, Ribble South, Rossendale and Darwen etc.
Local knowledge far greater than mine would be appreciated
I think I didn’t predict a Tory gain here partly because I didn’t want to get lumped together with Gloy Plopwell.
I certainly couldn’t bear it if it was my name.
There were quite a lot of programs about this seat in the Tories disastrous year of 1995, and I suppose it was a bit hard to see that unravelling.
To answer Richard’s point about the large swing in Kent (which Pete also predicted) I am not entirely sure.
It probably does have a large working class population of swing voters,
but much of it is a bit different to other places of that nature, so I expected Labour to hold up a shade better.
It seems like the Eastern side of the country in the south and Anglia were poor for Labour this time.
In other areas, their vote often stood up better than expected.
For Shaun Bennett,
I would not vote Conservative again and I think if the canadian spending cuts model is followed so will many thousands if not millions of others.
Your post was rude. Getting the country in to shape is all well and good, but sorry, how do the tories propose acheiving this whilst having to fork out for benefits for those who lose their jobs. Will the tories suggest we return to the workhouses of a 100 years ago. I really think if there are attacks on those who want to work but can’t because there are no jobs in the private sector not one’s that pay a living wage then I can quickly see the coalition come apart at the seems. Remember this, if that does happen and I think it will if Cameron pushes through a thatcherite agenda the coalition will end and a minority tory government will last five seconds. As for calling a further election and winning may be not.
For Barnaby I don’t like Labour for good reason, I suffered under their silly big brother laws and their vindictive way of the big brother state making individuals suffer, especially if you cross and cost contracts to housing chiefs that are friendly with Gordon Brown. So I got some satisfaction knowing Brown got pushed out , he clearly didn’t want to go.
I hope Cameron pushes a fairer way forward for cuts, if he doesn’t then I am afraid the tory hold on Dover and Deal will be brief !
Anthony has posted a thread concerning the proposed reduction in Westminster seats to 600, pointing out that Kent would stand to lose a seat.
It is difficult to see any redistribution of boundaries that would help Labour here. All the surrounding seats are Tory, and the swing in Thanet South was such that it is hardly even marginal now. In any case, any redrawing of boundaires in the Thanet direction would bring Sandwich into this seat, which would help the Tories rather than Labour, although it is conceivable that a core Thanet seat – losing Sandwich to this seat and hene Bay to Canterbury – could be Labour.
Danny Boy, this seat is not the least like South Ribble (where I used to live), or perhaps Stafford or Peterborough, with large numbers of modern semi-detacheds full of upper working class and lower middle class commuters who went for Thatcher, then Blair, then Cameron. Or come to that the Lancashire former mill valley seats like Pendle and Rossendale and Darwen. The Labour vote here largely comes from (ex-)industrial enclaves relating to mining and the port. Which Blair and Cameron let down badly by failing to understand the importance of industry. Not that the Con-Dems seem to be starting off any better.
This week’s “New Scientist” has a two page advertisement by Pfizer adverising jobs in vetinery research near Brussles. And what does that have to do with this site? Pfizer has huge laboratories at Sandwich which are are large scale provider of employment for this seat, and even more for Thanet South. I believe they are working largely below capactity. Pfizer is known to be unhappy about the bad transport links to East Kent- pressure to extend the high-speed service from Dover to Sandwich has not yet been taken on board, and the Eurostar service at Ashford has been greatly reduced. UK fares are huge compared to Belgium and there is no decent airport link. Morevover, the scicence offerings of the local universities are poor. Not least, Imperial College has shut the Agricultural College in nearby Wye – presumably in the hope that they can make a fast buck out of the land. This is a classic case of the sort of thing which is putting English voters on the dole and preventing economic regeneration. And the cut, cut, cut coalition don’t seem even to begin to understand the problem. They need to keep high tech international technology giants onside, and they won’t achieve this with laissez faire naiivety.
There was an interesting letter in “Kent on Sunday” this week concerning the economic problems of East Kent, including Thanet and Dover. it ended up by suggesting that Kent and other places on the South Coast should elect some regional independent MPs. Now tha Labour have failed here, and the Conservatives appear to lack economic answeres, there is a big political vacuum and plenty of time before 2010 for a new political force to fill it.
My views are far from those of the Flemish Nationalists, who made notable advances in recent Belgian elections. But as my discussion of Pfizer’s indicates, when it comes to Dover their politics are far from being on another planet.
It looks as though STV could well hand victory to the Australian Labor Party in today’s election, due to a sizable Green vote.
With our system Tony Abbott would be the clear favourite according to exit polls. Anyway, good luck to him.
On the contrary, it looks as though the big Green vote may have denied Labor their rightful victory.
If I may be permitted to wish Julia Gillard good luck!
Aus Labor would have won this election easily had they stuck with Kevin Rudd. I had emails from fellow Tories highlighting a speech made by Rudd on the subject of immigration basically saying “isn’t this guy talking a lot of sense”. Gillard’s party has sufferred from not realizing the value of someone with that kind of breadth of appeal.