Post by londonseal80 on Apr 11, 2020 13:53:15 GMT
A slice of the London commuter belt in North East Surrey, this contains the borough of Epsom and Ewell and parts of the borough of Reigate and Banstead and the district of Mole Valley. The current MP is Chris Grayling, first elected as MP in 2001 having previously served as a councillor for nearby Merton he has consistently had five figure majority throughout his reign here. The constituency was created in 1974 from Epsom and Ewell part the old Epsom seat and the semi-rural Banstead part of the old Carshalton county constitutency. Boundary changes in 1997 removed most of Banstead, except the wards close to Epsom Downs and added Ashtead from the Mole Valley seat, in 2010 the single councillor Preston ward was removed. This is highly owner-occupied seat ranging from very wealthy areas around the Downs, Ewell East and the large village of Ashtead to more middle of the road suburbia towards the North of the seat. There are a few minor grim patches too in this otherwise wealthy suburban seat, however this is overall a very low area in terms of deprivation (8 of the 11 borough council wards have low deprivation scores in line with the rest of surrey and the outer southwest London boroughs) and higher than UK average house prices like neighbouring Kingston upon Thames. This is one of the most consistently ultra-safe Conservative seats with neither Labour or the Liberal Democrats really mounting a serious challenge here, the last time this area was in a seat with a majority was under 10,000 was in 1945, in the old Epsom seat which at the time had a smaller percentage Conservative majority than Streatham (which was a very different area back then politically to what it is today), the battle tends to be who will finish in second place rather than who wins the seat. The Epsom and Ewell borough itself has perhaps more in common with outer London suburban boroughs such as Sutton, Bromley and Hillingdon rather than Elmbridge or Mole Valley.
I will now describe the seat starting with the areas outside the borough which tend to help with the large conservative majority though on borough boundaries, it would still be a rather safe seat and held in bad Tory years.
Ashtead
This is a large village located just within the M25 although it has a Village feel, it is in some ways more like a small Town. It for a start has a population that would have been large enough to have had it’s own pre-1974 Urban District Council (rather than be part of Leatherhead) and also has it’s own post-town. The residents of this very wealthy attractive commuterbelt area prefer Ashtead to be known as a village. Unlike a village it contains three wards – Common, Village and Park and for local government tend to vote for Independent councillors (which is a big figure of this seat in general), the sitting county councillor is also an independent. It has a relatively busy railway station with frequent trains to London Waterloo and London Victoria, and outwards to Dorking and Guildford.
Nork and Tattenhams
Like Ashtead, these areas elect independents at both district and county council level. Both are generally very affluent wards. They both lie to the east of Epsom Downs, two stations serve this area Epsom Downs (which is very little used) and Tattenham Corner which is the station that is closest to the Epsom racecourse.
Now for the areas within Epsom proper
Woodcote and College
These are two of the most affluent areas of Epsom, College ward has very little deprivation with no significant social housing, it contains large (Muswell Hill/Crouch End) style Victorian terraces towards the town and more detached properties towards the downs, this is the only ward that currently has Lib Dem councillors. Woodcote contains Epsom General Hospital and too contains a lot of large detached and semi-detached houses, North of Epsom General Hospital, there is the Ebbisham Estate which is a small area of London overspill, though most of this I imagine is now owner occupied. This ward also contains the settlement of Langley Vale and of course the Epsom racecourse, special buses run from both Epsom National Rail station (406F) and Morden Underground Station (864) for the famous Derby and Oaks races.
Ewell
A pleasant village centre, which lots of historical old building, it contains the modern Bourne hall museum and library (which has been used to film an episode of The Bill), it has a brilliant exhibition documenting the history of Epsom and Ewell and pays tribute to famous people associated with Epsom including Norman Wisdom and the MP James Chuter Ede who was a Labour councillor in Epsom Urban District council in the 1920s and became MP for Mitcham in 1923, later serving as MP for South Shields. The ward also contains the very affluent stockbroker-belt Ewell Downs area.
Stoneleigh and Nonsuch
Both wards border affluent Cheam and Worcester Park in neighbouring Sutton parts of Nonsuch share the Sutton SM2 postcode. Stoneleigh Broadway is a shopping parade built by the art-deco railway station and has mainly 1930s metroland style suburban semis. Nonsuch ward contains East Ewell station and Nescot College. Both are Residents Association strongholds. Stoneleigh has elected Conservative councillors in previous elections.
Auriol, Cuddington and Ewell Court
This is middle of the road suburbia and where the Epsom and Ewell Residents association has been the longest in dominance of local politics, a lot of the housing here is of the early 1930s. the new residents of that time created Residents Associations in order to protect local interests, these wards have never voted anything else but or the Residents in local election and unless in an extemely unlikely event this area starts to rapidly go demographically in direction of the likes of Redbridge and Croydon, it can’t see this independent localised politics picture changing the foreseeable future.
West Ewell, Stamford and Town
West Ewell is the less affluent part of Ewell but still a pleasant MOR suburban area overall and has good transport links via the West Ewell station. Stamford is where most of the old LCC asylums where located, these have but shut down and new housing has been built here created a new community which has been happy to lend their local vote to the Residents Association in recent years. Town contains the town centre, which has a shopping mall that opened in 1983 and a large station it also contains the Kiln Lane Industrial area of which the industry is car parts. The area contains one the largest Sainsbury’s stores in county which opened in 1989, both this ward and Stamford contain some small areas of social housing. The Lib Dems used to be strong here in the 1980s through to the 2000s. Before the mid-1970s all these wards where mainly won by the Residents Association and Labour were competitive here too and councillors were elected in these wards in the old thirds elections sporadically (especially in the old six councillor West Ewell ward which contained Ruxley).
Ruxley and Court
We now come to these last two wards, these are least affluent (one of which by a country mile) and yes there are few grim patches within this seat. Ruxley has some very nice areas around Clarendon and Horton Park, the housing in generally nice, however 2/3 of this ward is the Watersedge estate some of which is 1930s terraced housing and some low rise flats, this area has among the most deprived in Surrey, though less so than Court (which I will come to in a bit), you would think this would be natural Labour territory but you will be mistaken, again lost most Epsom and Ewell ward politics is dominated by the Residents Association, with the exception of 2003 Labour has never come close to winning the ward it was created in 1976 from the old West Ewell ward. In fact the main challenge to the Residents Association have been the Conservatives, this is perhaps because it has more of a thatcherite working class/Essex man demographic where Labour perhaps (and in particular the Corbynite wing of the party) don’t go down too well, its also most likely to have had the highest Brexit vote of all wards in the borough and perhaps one of the highest in Surrey. Finally we come to Court which contains the Longmead estate and indeed a Labour stronghold and is very deprived by Surrey standards and even compared with outer south-west London. Hence with the exception of 2007, Labour have always managed to win the ward in the past and often very comfortably even in disaster years like 1983 and 1987. Perhaps this is the south of the river equivalent of the close to London border Hertfordshire wards such as South Oxhey in Three Rivers or Cowley Hill in Hertsmere.
I will now describe the seat starting with the areas outside the borough which tend to help with the large conservative majority though on borough boundaries, it would still be a rather safe seat and held in bad Tory years.
Ashtead
This is a large village located just within the M25 although it has a Village feel, it is in some ways more like a small Town. It for a start has a population that would have been large enough to have had it’s own pre-1974 Urban District Council (rather than be part of Leatherhead) and also has it’s own post-town. The residents of this very wealthy attractive commuterbelt area prefer Ashtead to be known as a village. Unlike a village it contains three wards – Common, Village and Park and for local government tend to vote for Independent councillors (which is a big figure of this seat in general), the sitting county councillor is also an independent. It has a relatively busy railway station with frequent trains to London Waterloo and London Victoria, and outwards to Dorking and Guildford.
Nork and Tattenhams
Like Ashtead, these areas elect independents at both district and county council level. Both are generally very affluent wards. They both lie to the east of Epsom Downs, two stations serve this area Epsom Downs (which is very little used) and Tattenham Corner which is the station that is closest to the Epsom racecourse.
Now for the areas within Epsom proper
Woodcote and College
These are two of the most affluent areas of Epsom, College ward has very little deprivation with no significant social housing, it contains large (Muswell Hill/Crouch End) style Victorian terraces towards the town and more detached properties towards the downs, this is the only ward that currently has Lib Dem councillors. Woodcote contains Epsom General Hospital and too contains a lot of large detached and semi-detached houses, North of Epsom General Hospital, there is the Ebbisham Estate which is a small area of London overspill, though most of this I imagine is now owner occupied. This ward also contains the settlement of Langley Vale and of course the Epsom racecourse, special buses run from both Epsom National Rail station (406F) and Morden Underground Station (864) for the famous Derby and Oaks races.
Ewell
A pleasant village centre, which lots of historical old building, it contains the modern Bourne hall museum and library (which has been used to film an episode of The Bill), it has a brilliant exhibition documenting the history of Epsom and Ewell and pays tribute to famous people associated with Epsom including Norman Wisdom and the MP James Chuter Ede who was a Labour councillor in Epsom Urban District council in the 1920s and became MP for Mitcham in 1923, later serving as MP for South Shields. The ward also contains the very affluent stockbroker-belt Ewell Downs area.
Stoneleigh and Nonsuch
Both wards border affluent Cheam and Worcester Park in neighbouring Sutton parts of Nonsuch share the Sutton SM2 postcode. Stoneleigh Broadway is a shopping parade built by the art-deco railway station and has mainly 1930s metroland style suburban semis. Nonsuch ward contains East Ewell station and Nescot College. Both are Residents Association strongholds. Stoneleigh has elected Conservative councillors in previous elections.
Auriol, Cuddington and Ewell Court
This is middle of the road suburbia and where the Epsom and Ewell Residents association has been the longest in dominance of local politics, a lot of the housing here is of the early 1930s. the new residents of that time created Residents Associations in order to protect local interests, these wards have never voted anything else but or the Residents in local election and unless in an extemely unlikely event this area starts to rapidly go demographically in direction of the likes of Redbridge and Croydon, it can’t see this independent localised politics picture changing the foreseeable future.
West Ewell, Stamford and Town
West Ewell is the less affluent part of Ewell but still a pleasant MOR suburban area overall and has good transport links via the West Ewell station. Stamford is where most of the old LCC asylums where located, these have but shut down and new housing has been built here created a new community which has been happy to lend their local vote to the Residents Association in recent years. Town contains the town centre, which has a shopping mall that opened in 1983 and a large station it also contains the Kiln Lane Industrial area of which the industry is car parts. The area contains one the largest Sainsbury’s stores in county which opened in 1989, both this ward and Stamford contain some small areas of social housing. The Lib Dems used to be strong here in the 1980s through to the 2000s. Before the mid-1970s all these wards where mainly won by the Residents Association and Labour were competitive here too and councillors were elected in these wards in the old thirds elections sporadically (especially in the old six councillor West Ewell ward which contained Ruxley).
Ruxley and Court
We now come to these last two wards, these are least affluent (one of which by a country mile) and yes there are few grim patches within this seat. Ruxley has some very nice areas around Clarendon and Horton Park, the housing in generally nice, however 2/3 of this ward is the Watersedge estate some of which is 1930s terraced housing and some low rise flats, this area has among the most deprived in Surrey, though less so than Court (which I will come to in a bit), you would think this would be natural Labour territory but you will be mistaken, again lost most Epsom and Ewell ward politics is dominated by the Residents Association, with the exception of 2003 Labour has never come close to winning the ward it was created in 1976 from the old West Ewell ward. In fact the main challenge to the Residents Association have been the Conservatives, this is perhaps because it has more of a thatcherite working class/Essex man demographic where Labour perhaps (and in particular the Corbynite wing of the party) don’t go down too well, its also most likely to have had the highest Brexit vote of all wards in the borough and perhaps one of the highest in Surrey. Finally we come to Court which contains the Longmead estate and indeed a Labour stronghold and is very deprived by Surrey standards and even compared with outer south-west London. Hence with the exception of 2007, Labour have always managed to win the ward in the past and often very comfortably even in disaster years like 1983 and 1987. Perhaps this is the south of the river equivalent of the close to London border Hertfordshire wards such as South Oxhey in Three Rivers or Cowley Hill in Hertsmere.
