St Albans

[Admin Twaddleford]

NOC - LD minority administration
Elects by thirds
Current composition: LD 25, Con 23, Lab 6, Grn 1, Oth 3

[Pete Whitehead]

Slightly under a third this year as this is the fallow year in both the two member wards (Colney Heath and Sandridge)
Of the 18 seats up for election, the Conservatives are defending 7, Lib Dems 5, Lab 3, Ind 2 (1 of which elected as Lib Dem) and Green 1
The Lib Dems need five gains for an outright majority and this should be achievable.
The easiest gain should be Marshalswick South where the last remaining Conservative councillor is defending (and indeed the last Conservative councillor in the city of St Albans itself)
St Peters ought to be a Lib Dem gain too as Simon Grover held on by a whisker in 2016 and the Lib Dems won massively last May, though he will enjoy a sizeable personal vote so it is not entirely nailed on.
There is also the final Labour seat in Sopwell where the Lib Dems have been well ahead over the last few years and this should be fairly routine too.
More unpredictable targets include Batchwood which was won last May much more narrowly and where Labour have the benefit of incumbency this year and Park Street. Here the Lib Dem councillor elected in 2016, David Yates, has gone Independent. If he stands again you couldn't rule him out or alternatively he could let the Tories in. If normal services is resumed the Lib Dems are well placed for another gain here, though the ward has somewhat been trending Tory, at least relative to the district as a whole. Nevertheless the Lib Dems gained an open Conservative seat there last May.

If they don't make all the five gains they need from the wards above, there are other opportunities in wards which have been Conservative held for many years now but where the Lib Dems showed a strong recovery last May - principally Harpenden East and Wheathampstead.
Redbourn is an easy hold for Independent Tony Swendell if he stands again but if he retires it becomes an interesting seat - a Tory gain is most likely then but a Lib Dem gain not impossible.

The only other prospect of a Consevative gain is at Labour's expense in London Colney which is often close but I would not make them favourite, especially if incumbent Dreda Gordon is standing for Labour

[Deleted]

Mal says Mary Maynard promised Grover a free run in St Peters in exchange for his support. When Simon voted for the Lib Dems mum asked him why and he told her he got everything he wanted...

[Pete Whitehead]

Jan 2, 2020 21:48:31 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Mal says Mary Maynard promised Grover a free run in St Peters in exchange for his support. When Simon voted for the Lib Dems mum asked him why and he told her he got everything he wanted...

Bizarre

[Deleted]

We've been petitioning this weekend to save Hixberry Lane Respite. If there are any herts residents or anyone who works in herts on this forum that would sign it would be much appreciated

democracy.hertfordshire.gov.uk/mgEpetitionSignatureList.aspx?PageNo=1&ShowAll=1&Id=54&Type=0&RPID=1734003

[Deleted]

Draft of tge boundary review was published in Feb.

Biggest changes is a new ward called Bernards Heath and Sandridge & Colney Heath. A few wards have lost cllrs:

Redbourn
Wheathampstead
Marshalswick West
Sandridge & Colney Heath lost 2

This will hurt the tories most. The above wards all have tory councillors at the moment. Bernards Heath is a bit of an unknown. It could be an opportunity for Labour outside the seats they currently hold but just as easily could return Lib Dems. There are still a few Tory roads there even without the others

Edit:

MW does not have Tories. In total there are 5 cllrs being taken away and 3 being added. Of the 5 it could potentially be any of the 8 tories in those seats 4 lib Dems or 1 independent

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 15, 2020 21:17:43 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Draft of tge boundary review was published in Feb.

Biggest changes is a new ward called Bernards Heath and Sandridge & Colney Heath. A few wards have lost cllrs:

Redbourn
Wheathampstead
Marshalswick West
Sandridge & Colney Heath lost 2

This will hurt the tories most. The above wards all have tory councillors at the moment. Bernards Heath is a bit of an unknown. It could be an opportunity for Labour outside the seats they currently hold but just as easily could return Lib Dems. There are still a few Tory roads there even without the others

Edit:

MW does not have Tories. In total there are 5 cllrs being taken away and 3 being added. Of the 5 it could potentially be any of the 8 tories in those seats 4 lib Dems or 1 independent

Redbourn and Wheathampstead each lost a seat but the area covered by Sandridge, Colney Heath and Marshalswick NOrth (broadly speaking) retains the same number of seats but configured in a very different way.
There was some detailed discussion on the local government boundary changes thread here:
vote-2012.proboards.com/post/907737/thread

[Pete Whitehead]

Btw I don't see any prospects for Labour in Bernards Heath. Sure it will be better for them than Marshalswick South but they were never very close there and the Lib Dems have that sewn up now (albeit Richard Curthoys has had a stay of execution for another year). The new boundaries will make it more or less a banker for them. Assuming we have all up elections on these boundaries next year, Labour's only hope outside of London Colney will be to cling on to one or two seats in Batchwood (and at a push Sopwell). As I discussed on the other thread, the new boundaries utterly wreck their chances in Ashley now.

[Deleted]

Mar 16, 2020 8:18:18 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Btw I don't see any prospects for Labour in Bernards Heath. Sure it will be better for them than Marshalswick South but they were never very close there and the Lib Dems have that sewn up now (albeit Richard Curthoys has had a stay of execution for another year). The new boundaries will make it more or less a banker for them. Assuming we have all up elections on these boundaries next year, Labour's only hope outside of London Colney will be to cling on to one or two seats in Batchwood (and at a push Sopwell). As I discussed on the other thread, the new boundaries utterly wreck their chances in Ashley now.

I think it depends on what happens in the next year. St Albans is somewhere where someone like Keir Starmer would go down well. I suspect if we don't improve our polling by next year we'll hold Batchwood but lose Sopwell. The former was a close contest the latter not.

If we do turn things around and amazingly we're anywhere the numbers we had in 2011, 2012 & 2014 I think we'd do better in Bernards Heath than anywhere else outside the current three wards Labour have councillors. Labour had about a fifth of the vote and second place in Ms 2012 and 2014. Given how poor our showing would have been on the otherside of the ward I'm tempted to think we may well have been getting between a quarter and a third of the vote in Bernards Heath.

The Lib Dems do have it sown up at tge moment but if there was a swing to Labour in the national polls and a Keir bounce it would be places like this I'd expect to see most remainers coming over

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 16, 2020 8:56:28 GMT @priceofdawn said:

Mar 16, 2020 8:18:18 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Btw I don't see any prospects for Labour in Bernards Heath. Sure it will be better for them than Marshalswick South but they were never very close there and the Lib Dems have that sewn up now (albeit Richard Curthoys has had a stay of execution for another year). The new boundaries will make it more or less a banker for them. Assuming we have all up elections on these boundaries next year, Labour's only hope outside of London Colney will be to cling on to one or two seats in Batchwood (and at a push Sopwell). As I discussed on the other thread, the new boundaries utterly wreck their chances in Ashley now.

I think it depends on what happens in the next year. St Albans is somewhere where someone like Keir Starmer would go down well. I suspect if we don't improve our polling by next year we'll hold Batchwood but lose Sopwell. The former was a close contest the latter not.

If we do turn things around and amazingly we're anywhere the numbers we had in 2011, 2012 & 2014 I think we'd do better in Bernards Heath than anywhere else outside the current three wards Labour have councillors. Labour had about a fifth of the vote and second place in Ms 2012 and 2014. Given how poor our showing would have been on the otherside of the ward I'm tempted to think we may well have been getting between a quarter and a third of the vote in Bernards Heath.

The Lib Dems do have it sown up at tge moment but if there was a swing to Labour in the national polls and a Keir bounce it would be places like this I'd expect to see most remainers coming over

That's true but you have to remember that it is being replaced by all that part of Clarence west of the railway line which is hardly a rich source of Labour votes itself and is massively Lib Dem.
You're right of course there could be a Starmer bounce in St Albans. I'd think actually the redrawn Clarence ward (ie the current ward less that area and plus all the grotty bits of Ashley) might be a better prospect than BH but still a big ask

[Deleted]

Mar 16, 2020 9:32:13 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Mar 16, 2020 8:56:28 GMT @priceofdawn said:

I think it depends on what happens in the next year. St Albans is somewhere where someone like Keir Starmer would go down well. I suspect if we don't improve our polling by next year we'll hold Batchwood but lose Sopwell. The former was a close contest the latter not.

If we do turn things around and amazingly we're anywhere the numbers we had in 2011, 2012 & 2014 I think we'd do better in Bernards Heath than anywhere else outside the current three wards Labour have councillors. Labour had about a fifth of the vote and second place in Ms 2012 and 2014. Given how poor our showing would have been on the otherside of the ward I'm tempted to think we may well have been getting between a quarter and a third of the vote in Bernards Heath.

The Lib Dems do have it sown up at tge moment but if there was a swing to Labour in the national polls and a Keir bounce it would be places like this I'd expect to see most remainers coming over

That's true but you have to remember that it is being replaced by all that part of Clarence west of the railway line which is hardly a rich source of Labour votes itself and is massively Lib Dem.
You're right of course there could be a Starmer bounce in St Albans. I'd think actually the redrawn Clarence ward (ie the current ward less that area and plus all the grotty bits of Ashley) might be a better prospect than BH but still a big ask

I hadn't noticed that.

I've done a bit of doorknocking in both Clarence and Ashley. There is subdued support for Labour in parts of Clarence; where I grew up on Glenferrie Road and the roads either side. Around Morrisons and where I went to School, St Albans and St Stephens. Even surprisingly Beaumont Avenue. It tends to be squeezed by the Lib Dems and the 'Labour can't win here'.

Labour did poll quite well in the late ninetees and early 2000s. Again around a fifth of the vote and second place but once the Greens started standing we started losing about quarter of our vote to them and it wasn't long before they started out polling us.

It's not impossible. During the 1990s and the 2010s the seats vulnerable to Labour were Lib Dem seats so maybe Clarence could become one. But there's a liberal tradition in Clarence and Fleetville before it in a way the rest of St Albans didn't have when it wasn't enamoured by the Liberals like it is today.

It would require overturning the deep rooted 'Winning Here' that has existed here from before i were born and I don't know if there's the organisation for that. At least with Bernards Heath we have an active branch