Eltham
2010 Results:
Conservative: 15753 (37.54%)
Labour: 17416 (41.5%)
Liberal Democrat: 5299 (12.63%)
BNP: 1745 (4.16%)
UKIP: 1011 (2.41%)
Green: 419 (1%)
English Democrat: 217 (0.52%)
Independent: 104 (0.25%)
Majority: 1663 (3.96%)
Notional 2005 Results:
Labour: 16431 (42.2%)
Conservative: 13257 (34.1%)
Liberal Democrat: 6528 (16.8%)
BNP: 911 (2.3%)
Other: 1777 (4.6%)
Majority: 3174 (8.2%)
Actual 2005 result
Conservative: 12105 (34.3%)
Labour: 15381 (43.6%)
Liberal Democrat: 5669 (16.1%)
BNP: 979 (2.8%)
UKIP: 1024 (2.9%)
Other: 147 (0.4%)
Majority: 3276 (9.3%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 10859 (32.1%)
Labour: 17855 (52.8%)
Liberal Democrat: 4121 (12.2%)
Green: 706 (2.1%)
Other: 251 (0.7%)
Majority: 6996 (20.7%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 13528 (31.2%)
Labour: 23710 (54.6%)
Liberal Democrat: 3701 (8.5%)
Referendum: 1414 (3.3%)
Other: 1075 (2.5%)
Majority: 10182 (23.4%)
Boundary changes: Loses part of Woolwich Common and a small part of Glyndon to Greenwich & Woolwich and part of Plumstead to Erith and Thamesmead. Gains part of Middle Park & Sutcliffe, part of Eltham West (including the Ferrier Estate), most of Kidbrooke with Hornfair and an insignificant part of Shooters Hill from Greenwich & Woolwich.
Profile: A south-east London seat in the borough of Greenwich. Eltham is the more Conservative part of Greenwich – in fact it was a Tory seat from 1975 when Peter Bottomley won a by-election in the then Woolwich West until 1997. Parts of the seat like New Eltham are largely suburban commuterland with more in common with areas like Bexley. There is also a large amount of open green space here, such as Oxleas Wood, Shooters Hill and Avery Hill park, now a campus for the University of Greenwich.
The suburban parts of the constituency though are balanced out by the large proportion of council estates such as Middle Park, Page, Horn Park, Coldharbour and the horrendous Ferrier estate, currently being emptied of residents prior to its eventual demolition and planned replacement.
Current MP: Clive Efford(Labour) born 1958, London. Educated at Walworth Comprehensive. Former London taxi driver. Greenwich councillor 1986-1998. Contested Eltham 1992. First elected as MP for Eltham in 1997 (more information at They work for you)
David Gold (Conservative) born 1972. Educated at Royal Holloway. Development director at Brighton College, former business consultant and aide to William Hague. Contested Brighton Pavilion in 2001, then the first openly gay Conservative candidate selected in a winnable seat.Clive Efford(Labour) born 1958, London. Educated at Walworth Comprehensive. Former London taxi driver. Greenwich councillor 1986-1998. Contested Eltham 1992. First elected as MP for Eltham in 1997 (more information at They work for you)
Steven Toole (Liberal Democrat) Born Ashington. Educated at Newcastle University. Liberal Democrat advisor on environmental and transport issues. Contested Erith and Thamesmead 2005.
Arthur Hayles (Green) Retired civil servant.
Ray Adams (UKIP)
Roberta Woods (BNP) Educated at University of Greenwich. IT analyst. Contested London assembly list 2008. Contested London in 2009 European election.
Mike Tibby (English Democrat) Andrew Graham (Independent)2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 87579
Male: 47.7%
Female: 52.3%
Under 18: 23%
Over 60: 20.7%
Born outside UK: 12.3%
White: 86.7%
Black: 5.8%
Asian: 3.7%
Mixed: 2%
Other: 1.7%
Christian: 66.7%
Hindu: 1.2%
Muslim: 2.8%
Sikh: 1%
Full time students: 5.7%
Graduates 16-74: 19%
No Qualifications 16-74: 30.6%
Owner-Occupied: 59.3%
Social Housing: 32.8% (Council: 27%, Housing Ass.: 5.7%)
Privately Rented: 5.6%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 8.4%
2010 was like London in 1970.
Labour won the following seats which the Conservatives won in 1959 – Acton, Barons Court, Holborn & St Pancras South, Wandsworth Central, Willesden East.
They also won 6 seats normally won by a Conservative government -
Brenford & Chiswick, Dulwich, Ealing North, Lewisham North, Putney, Woolwich West
The Conservatives did gain – Croydon South (Central), Hornchurch, Clapham, Hampstead, Romford and Uxbridge
Not Romford. That didn’t go Conservative till 1974 when Harold Hill was excised. Shows how some things have changed. That Romford with Harold Hill would be a Conservative banker now.
And the LDs have Willesden West
In terms of 1970, the Conservatives won a plurality of votes in London, if not seats (taking London to have the same boundaries back in 1970 as it does now). Figures are
Con 1,658,218 (46.7%)
Lab 1,626,089 (45.8%)
Lib 246,708 (6.9%)
Oth 21,545 (0.6%)
The result of the next census for each london constituency will be very interesting in terms of ethnic diversity. You can get estimates from large-scale surveys run by ONS and this includes a measure of the proportion of adults aged 16+ from an ethnic minority. This is only an estimate and subject to sampling error, so some caution is needed, but some of the individual results are very interesting in terms of what happened in the election. Take for example -
Ilford North (41.5% from an ethnic minority in 2009) – Much higher than I would have guessed and a swing (at 3.7% towards the Conservatives) well below the national average and average for seats the Conservatives gained in 2005. Makes me wonder whether Ilford North is on the same long-term journey as Ilford South (with 66.7%).
Others of note include Hendon (39.7%),
Enfield North (29.7%), Harrow East (55.2%) and Brentford/Isleworth ( 41.3%).
Then take a look at some of the seats Labour gained in 1997, Croydon North (59.1%), Hayes and Harlington (60.1%), Brent North (63%), Ealing North (48.5%), Mitcham and Morden (42.8%). All marginals in the 90s, now confirmed Labour bankers it looks like, given the election results.
Should point out all those results are on the 2005 boundaries.
Thanks for those figures for London in 1970. I have the 1970 Times Guide but couldn’t find a breakdown in there.
The ONS survey figures are also very interesting. That Ilford North figure is very high but probably shouldn’t be surprising and explains how wards like Clayhall are moving away from the Conservatives. Enfield North also confirms what I suspected. I actually wrote quite a long piece on that thread a couple of nights ago in which I discussed how the wards in the east of that seat had made very unhappy reading for the Conservatives in the local election having been lost on big swings since 2006 (and actually I think a small swing to Labour compared with 2005). Unfortunately the site crashed as I posted it and I couldn’t be bothered to type it again. the theme applies here though probably just as well.
That surprises me about Ilford N slightly. A decade ago it was a very Jewish seat, now clearly a large segment of the Jewish population has been replaced by people mainly of Indian origin. The Labour candidate was criticized a lot & yet managed an above-average result which could bear out what David says, perhaps.
But are n’t we slightly missing the point about Eltham which is that there was a high combined BNP/UKIP vote in keeping with its characteristics and a lower BME population than the other seats mentioned where there was no such vote? If this vote had gone conservative, they might have won the seat.
The BNP, UKIP and EDP have all gained in comparison to 2005 in many seats.
IIRC the National Front did very badly in 1979 as the Conservatives promoted a hardline on issues like immigration.
Gay candidate or non-gay candidate, the Tories should have taken this seat easily. David Gold was selected in London’s first open primary for a PPC in July 2006, so it was the people of this seat that choose him to be the Conservative PPC.
I live in a neighbouring seat and my auntie lives in this seat so I know it well.
According to my auntie, the Tories have been working very hard on this seat for the past two years. She said since 2008 she’s received Conservative leaflets through her door at least once every 2 or 3 weeks. During the Election campaign she said she recieved Conservative leaflets through her door literally every day and only received about 7 or 8 leafets from Labour in total during the Election campaignly about 2 or 3 before the Election campaign. So obviously Lord Ashcroft’s cash has been poured into this seat. She also said you couldn’t go out without spoting Conservsative activists trying to persuade people to vote blue. Also, Boris paid a visit to speak to shoppers on Eltham High Street so that should have boosted the Tory vote as well. However, despite all this the Tories did not take the seat.
Yes, Clive Efford is a fantastic local MP but considering how unpopular Labour and Gordon Brown was nationally and the well-run local campaign, this should have been a walk in the park for the Tories. The result here goes to show that Cameron just hasn’t sealed the deal with all of the electorate.
Is there any particular reason the Conservatives did so much worse here than in the other Greenwich and Bexley seats?
Speaking of demographic change I remember being shocked at how non-white areas like Thornton Heath, West Ham and Willsden were in the mid 90s.
The last place that surprised me on this issue was Retford – literally zero non-white people.
Yes, there is a specific reason for Conservatives doing worse than expeted in Eltham.
The local Labour team ran a very strong campaign which divided people’s opinions and probably impacted voting patterns. The campaign was based on slightly bubious tactics, eg. children and parents being handed leaflets outside school gates telling that their school might be closed if the Tories win, housing association resisdents being sent letters using letter heads that looked like real letters from the HA telling that their rents would go up if Tories win etc. I was in the receiving end of some this and I can imgine that many people would have been scared into voting Labour.
Mf Efford has also been very active in local council estates (nothing wrong with this) and I would imagine that the turnout among DE social class voters was high as also indicated by the huge increase in BNP vote.
I wonder if this is a case where the notional result may have been wrong and where in fact Labour would have been further ahead in 2005 than suggested by them. I did have a brief discussion about this at the beginning of the thread and am not claiming any kind of vindication, but it is notable how much better the swing to the Conservatives was in Greenwich & Woolwich. This seat gained 7,000 voters net from that seat and the effect according to both the notional results here and T&R’s figures were to reduce Labour’s 2005 majority. Perhaps in reality Labours lead and therefore the swing required was larger. No doubt the other factors all played a part – the popularity of the sitting MP, the ineffectiveness of another A-lister who replaced the local councillor who fought the seat last time, possible demographic (ethnic) change. Any or all of these could have been factors, but perhaps also boundary changes made the task a little harder than it seemed.
I would also not that this was one of a number of London seats which the Tories held quite narrowly in 1992 (with Tories and Labour both on 40%+) and which Labour then gained in 1997 with huge (20%+) majorities: Hayes & Harlington, Brentford & Isleworth, Edmonton, Mitcham & Morden also notionally Croydon North and Ilford South. Of these the Conservatives only gained Brentford & Isleworth in 2010 and that fairly narrowly with the gift of an ‘expensesgate’ mired MP. The others are all very safely Labour now.