York Central
2010 Results:
Conservative: 12122 (26.08%)
Labour: 18573 (39.96%)
Liberal Democrat: 11694 (25.16%)
BNP: 1171 (2.52%)
UKIP: 1100 (2.37%)
Green: 1669 (3.59%)
Monster Raving Loony: 154 (0.33%)
Majority: 6451 (13.88%)
Notional 2005 Results:
Labour: 19410 (49.2%)
Conservative: 9292 (23.5%)
Liberal Democrat: 7957 (20.1%)
Other: 2832 (7.2%)
Majority: 10118 (25.6%)
Actual 2005 result
Conservative: 11364 (24.4%)
Labour: 21836 (46.9%)
Liberal Democrat: 10166 (21.8%)
Green: 2113 (4.5%)
UKIP: 832 (1.8%)
Other: 286 (0.6%)
Majority: 10472 (22.5%)
2001 Result
Conservative: 11293 (23.5%)
Labour: 25072 (52.3%)
Liberal Democrat: 8519 (17.8%)
UKIP: 576 (1.2%)
Green: 1465 (3.1%)
Other: 1055 (2.2%)
Majority: 13779 (28.7%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 14433 (24.7%)
Labour: 34956 (59.9%)
Liberal Democrat: 6537 (11.2%)
Referendum: 1083 (1.9%)
Other: 1336 (2.3%)
Majority: 20523 (35.2%)
Boundary changes: the unitary authority of York was reviewed separately at the review and given two seats. Rather than an East/West or North/South split York has been divided into inner and outer parts, resulting in an unusual `doughnut-shaped` seat that entirely surrounds this seat.
Profile:
Current MP: Hugh Bayley(Labour) (more information at They work for you)
Susan Wade Weeks (Conservative) born 1957. Educated at Cheltenham Ladies College, University de Lille and St Andrews University. Freelance copywriter in advertising. Former Chichester councillor. Hugh Bayley(Labour) (more information at They work for you)Christian Vassie (Liberal Democrat) born 1958. Educated at Archbishop Holgate`s Grammar and SOAS. Film and television music composer. York councillor since 2003.Andy Chase (Green) Charity administrator.Paul Abbott (UKIP)Jeff Kelly (BNP)Eddie Vee (Official Monster Raving Loony) 2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 90603
Male: 48%
Female: 52%
Under 18: 19.6%
Over 60: 20%
Born outside UK: 5.5%
White: 97.7%
Black: 0.2%
Asian: 0.9%
Mixed: 0.8%
Other: 0.5%
Christian: 70.2%
Muslim: 0.7%
Full time students: 9.7%
Graduates 16-74: 23.9%
No Qualifications 16-74: 26.5%
Owner-Occupied: 62.4%
Social Housing: 21% (Council: 17.1%, Housing Ass.: 3.9%)
Privately Rented: 13.2%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 12%
Not very generous odds on the Conservatives from Shadsy, who’s also offering 6/1 on a IMO much more likely win in Darlington.
I think if they win here the Conservatives will be over 400 seats nationally.
York will have a Tory MP, but this is more likely to be York Outer than York Central.
How much of the 1983 – 1997 ‘York, City of’ constituency is part of York Outer, and is any of York Central made up a seat other than ‘York, City of’ – such as Ryedale or Selby?
Most of York Outer was in Ryedale between 1983 and 1992.
I think this constituency is very similar to what was York at that time and which the Conservatives only just won when they had a majority of over 100.
Is Cllr. James Alexander’s ward (Lab candidate for York Outer) in this seat?
On the face of it , Conservatives had a disappointing result in the recent Heworth council by-election, polling 591 votes which represents around 26 % of the low turnout. Heworth is perhaps the strongest Labour ward in the seat, embracing the Tang Hall estates mentioned earlier on this site.
Many core Conservative voters were away over the summer and, crucially, at the time of the election, as were half our activists who would at any other time have been available to work the seat.
Conservatives in Heworth came in 17 votes behind the Lib Dems.
Frustratingly, a percentage of our declared committed voters in Heworth chose this by-election to vote ” tactically” ( their words not mine) for UKIP and the Greens, though all those identified have pledged to vote Conservative at the General Election.
Lessons have been learned.
Incidentally the “greater local Government strength” of the Lib Dems in York Central may well work against them at the General Election. The perception of the Lib Dem council locally is disastrous, according to those contributing to my market surgeries.
The fact that the Lib Dems amazingly managed to avoid taking second place from the Tories in the iraq election of 2005 means that they are highly unlikely to do so next time. I also think they’ll lose York Outer as well.
Is it me, or do Susan Wade Weeks’ comments seem more than slightly sinister?
I’ve got images of Tory activists bringing out thumbscrews to deal with wayward Conservative voters who were foolish enough to be away on holiday or to change their vote. Lessons might have been learnt, but who is the teacher, and who the student?
Thank you Philip! It’s a novel experience for me, being described as sinister. I am amused and flattered, though you could not be more wrong.
What really WAS sinister was the hacking into and corruption of my email and Twitter accounts and my website that over-enthusiastic Lib Dems in York indulged in last year. Not quite Yorkshire cricket I felt.
(www.susanwadeweeks.co.uk)
With an 11%+ swing to the Conservatives in the North reported this week, the “thumbscrews” you dream of would be quite unnecessary.
I have a particular horror of coercion of any kind, as it happens. I trust the people to vote in the best interests of the country. York people are strongly patriotic.
Does anyone actually have a map of York showing which areas fall into each of the new constituencies?
Rereading earlier posts re: my “southern” and “toff” (!) credentials – I would just like to remind readers that Hugh Bayley himself came up to York from Camden when selected and was educated at Haileybury…
Agreed… Bayley is a toff, Wade Weeks is a toff; and the previous Tory MP, Gregory was a toff… York is a surprisingly middle-class dominated place… increasingly a dormitory town for Leeds since all the industry (chocolate and railways; sugar; glass) has evaporated; but yes, the Lib Dum council is universally despised and derided for their profligacy and stupidity.
Interestingly, York Central is one of the few places in the country where the Greens have plausible potential to become a credible opposition and one day deliver an MP – if they could only find a decent candidate without a ponytail or sandals [sigh]. UKIP have surprisingly never made an impact here; but the Brit Nats have taken root, and can find support in some traditionally Laboury parts of York: Tang Hall; Clifton; Groves; Acomb; but it’s a 4-way contest here with the main three + Greens, most likely IMO.
I think York (central) will return to it’s traditional volatile swing-seat status, as no party seems to arouse enough passion either for or against there.
Pete,
The boundary changes here are to Labour’s advantage.
Give the Conservatives won York in 1987 by only 180 votes, surely Labour would have won on the new York Central boundaries in 1987?
Do you know what the 1987 Labour maj would have been.
Assume around 500?
Yes perhaps slightly more. Its difficult because of ward boundary changes, but the area removed corresponds roughly t the old Micklegate ward (not to be confused with the new MIcklegate ward) and I reckon the Tories would have been ahead by around 1000 there in 1987. Safe to say I think that York Central would have been Labour with a majority under 1000 in 1987.
What about 1983 then?
Interesting to note that York has been described as both “surprisingly working class” (by ASC) and “surprisingly middle class” (by seal pup) on this thread! I think both are probably true depending on what part of town you’re in.
I recall the contrasting photos in the 1992 election report, presenting this as a gentile town and also a working class railway/ industrial town.
Update from York Central: small vox pop polls held regularly inthe seat suggest a small but enthusiastic Conservative lead. Poll numbers are small (around 200 a time) so not reliable, but are taken from sites around the constituency: our results match calculations from Euro results which when rebalanced still showed a small C lead in York Central.
Question: Gordon Brown or David Cameron for PM.
Anecdotal evidence, again a small sample: at a roadside stall we asked motorists in Fishergate to ‘Honk if you vote Blue’. 105 honks in 60 minutes: interestingly taxi drivers and bus drivers and small business vans especially enthusiastic.
If anyone on this site is in a position to conduct a valid impartial poll (2,000+) in York Central I would be delighted to hear from you.
http://www.susanwadeweeks.co.uk
Susan’s method polling seems HIGHLY unscientific to me!
Self selectig ‘panal’
No way of voting, or conting the votes, for any other party
“I recall the contrasting photos in the 1992 election report, presenting this as a gentile town”
Given that in 2001 the whole of the city of York area had fewer than 200 Jews out of a total population of 180,000 this would seem to be a fair description. Of course York was notorious as the site of one of the 12th Century massacres of Jews
Susan. Is “blue” the colours of the local Football team?
York City do ear some blue, but their predominant colour is red
“I recall the contrasting photos in the 1992 election report, presenting this as a gentile town and also a working class railway/ industrial town.”
One would presume that a working class town was predominantly gentile since most Jews are from the professional and wealthy community. York is in fact 99.89% gentile.
York Central and York Outer to count votes on election night.
When the Tories were at their peak in the opinion polls a year or two ago, it did look as though an enthusiastic Conservative like Susan Weeks had a chance. But on a uniform national swing Labour would now easily hold this seat. It is difficult to see any local factor so special as to make one think the swing in this constituency will be so different as to change the result.
I doubt whether any individual candidate could afford to commission an independent poll within election spending limits. I suppose a uni or school might do a poll as an educational exercise, but I doubt whether they would supply the results preferentially to any one candidate.
Incidentally, there is clearly an active Conservative campaign, but data about a month ago published in “The Independent” suggested that the the LibDems also spent quite heavily in the two York seats combined in 2007 and 2008, and having got over 20% last time they are not totally out of it. On top of which there appears to be a serious Green presence, and this is the sort of seat they are targeting. The comparative performance of the parties, if not the winner, may depend on how active these parties are on the ground, and looking from outside it would be interesting to have local reports as to how they are doing.
I think it entirely possible that at some point the LDs could overtake the Conservatives here, never mind the Tories winning. It’s been brewing in local elections for a while. In the short term this will be a comfortable Labour hold.
Based on a York North/South split that follows the Ouse from Rural West York down to Fishergate, and then cuts across the East of the city past Heslington and Derwent, you would end up with two consituencies of almost exactly equal size (according to 2007 populations, a discrepancy of only 374) that respected natural boundaries.
I’ve done an analysis, basically using Electoral Calculus’ figues except obviously using different wards to form the final constituencies. I’ve uploaded it as a public document at https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AjwPP57SQKCPdDRybFlqZkhQRjViUjJmc1lXVWxJeWc&hl=en
What I got was two 3-way marginals that notionally would have voted Labour in 2005:
York North:
Labour 16,768 39%
Conservative 13,256 31%
Liberal Democrat 12,417 29%
Others 1,480 3%
Majority 3,512 8%
Total 43,921
York South:
Labour 15,804 36%
Liberal Democrat 13,580 31%
Conservative 11,948 28%
Others 2,039 5%
Majority 2,224 5%
Total 43,371
In terms of what will happen on May 6th, I predict a fairly comfortable Labour hold with the Tories second – in my opinion the Lib Dems have peaked in York, and will be busy scrapping it out with the Tories in Outer.
I’d be interested to hear the view of people living in York, what they think of the strange split of the city rather than an E/W or N/S
CHRISINTHENORTH – The Central / Outer (”doughnut”) split between the two York seats was the desired outcome from the Labour perspective. I was involved in representing the old Vale of York CLP at the Boundary Commission meeting. We wanted to have a safe Labour York Central seat and knew that we were likely to lose the York outer seat anyway. The North / South split would have left us with two marginal Labour seats that might both have been lost. The Boundary Commission held public meetings in York and took all comments into account in their final report, York people did influence the final result.
Hugh Bayley was the Labour candidate in 1987 when they just failed to dislodge Conal Gregory by 147 votes.
Lab Hold= 7,000 maj
Lab Hold
Maj 8300
Lab maj 3,500
Paul ABBOTT (UKIP)
Hugh BAYLEY (Labour)
Andrew CHASE (Green)
Jeff KELLY (BNP)
Christian VASSIE (Lib Dem)
Eddie VEE (OMRLP)
Susan WADE WEEKS (Conservative)
Full List
Standing as candidate for york central on behalf of the monster raving loony william hill party. Main objective to repeal the smoking ban which has been a disaster for the Uk economy.
I might have vote for Eddie Vee, but there have to be limits to lunacy, and bringing back smoking in pubs is just a bit too mad for this recovering nicotine addict.
Eve of poll and I still haven’t made up my mind between Labour to cock a snook at the flipping Tories, or Green to cock a snook at Hugh Bayley’s support for the bloody wars against Iraq and Afghanistan.
Had a pleasant weekend here. More Labour posters than any other party, surprising number of Green ones too. I wouldn’t be surprised if the LDs got 2nd here, but if the Tories keep that position it probably helps Labour more in the longer term.
Hugh Bayley is now one of two Deputy CWMs ‘pro tempore’ for the next fortnight or so serving alongside Haselhurst until the three new Deputy Speakers are elected. Who is the other temporary Deputy CWM?