Post by John Chanin on Apr 13, 2020 10:52:03 GMT
This seat is the heart of the old East End with a long and varied history, as well as an interesting recent political history. It extends from Whitechapel and Spitalfields right on the border with the City of London in the west, through Bethnal Green and Stepney in the middle, to Bow alongside the river Lea in the east. In the north-east corner is one of London’s largest Victorian parks - named appropriately as Victoria Park, and in the north-west it blends imperceptibly into Shoreditch. This area on the edge of the City was famous historically for its poverty and its rookeries. It was also classically an area of immigrants. Spitalfields was the home of Huguenot weavers fleeing religious conflict in the late 1600s, and as the community prospered many fine houses were built. Later there was an influx of Irish, and in the late 1800s it became the home of Jewish immigrants from eastern Europe. This was the location of Jack the Ripper, and life in the old Jewish tenements has been documented by Jerry White in his fine book about Rothschild Buildings in Flower & Dean Street. There is still a larger than usual Jewish population here (although only 1%), but the area is now known as the heart of the Bangladeshi community in Britain, now nearly half the population in Bethnal Green and Stepney, with the ward surrounding the commercial centre of Brick Lane, with its textile shops and restaurants, renamed Spitalfields and Banglatown at the last review (although the Bangladeshi population is actually larger to the east in Stepney). This constituency has the highest Bangladeshi population in the country, with only neighbouring Poplar to the south bearing comparison. This seat has the 5th highest percentage of social rented households in the country, and is famous for the very first council estate, built at Boundary Road (appropriately on the boundary with Shoreditch) at the end of the 1800s on the site of the Old Nichol rookery. It also has the 2nd lowest proportion of owner-occupiers. The figures for occupation are slightly misleading, this being London. There is certainly some expensive modern housing on the edge of the city, but the seat is thoroughly working class, and there are not many managers of Bangladeshi origin working in the City.
Bow on the east of the seat is a little different. It has similarly high levels of council renting, but has a majority of white inhabitants, and only half the proportion of Bangladeshis. Bow proper has a lot of Victorian two storey terraces, with some gentrification,based around the Roman Road street market, interspersed with the council estates, but Old Ford, cut off by the main A12 which leads to the Blackwall Tunnel, is isolated and modern council estate, formerly one of the 1990s Housing Action Trusts, and now run by the enormous Clarion Housing Association.
Politics here in recent years can best be described as chaotic, and this has a lot to do with divisions in the Bangladeshi community, although the ethnic origin statistics given below show there is much more to this constituency than that. Locally the Liberal Democrats were very strong here through the 1990s, particularly in Bow, where, as in neighbouring Hackney they tended to represent the older white population, not always appreciative of the changing demographics. They controlled the council between 1986 and 1994, and continued to poll strongly in Bow up to and including 2002, before the vote faded away in the 2000s. Meanwhile as the Bangladeshi population grew, this became one of the areas that the new Respect Party, founded originally in 2004 as an anti-Iraq war party, but subsequently a curious amalgam of socialist and muslim groups, gained considerable support. Famously this was the seat won by George Galloway at the 2005 General Election, from Labour’s half-black, half-jewish Oona King. In 1997 when she was first elected, this had one of just 2 seats in the country to swing away from Labour, as a result of local ethnic politics. Respect initially was fended off locally by the Labour Party, under the leadership of Lutfur Rahman, councillor for Spitalfields ward, but he broke with the Labour party in 2010, standing for mayor and winning as an independent. Many of the councillors defected to Respect, and then to Rahman’s Tower Hamlets First party. He was re-elected as mayor in 2014, but subsequently disqualified for electoral malpractice, and the mayor, and all the wards in this constituency reverted to Labour. Following the end of his disqualification Rahman has returned, being re-elected mayor in 2022, and his Aspire party fought Labour to a 10-10 dead heat at the accompanying local council elections.
Galloway decided, rather curiously, not to restand here in 2010, but rather in neighbouring Poplar & Limehouse, although the only boundary change was the loss of Wapping. There was undoubtedly local pressure to have a Bangladeshi candidate, and the leader of the Respect group on the council stood, but only finished third behind the resurgent Liberal Democrats. Elected for Labour was Rushanara Ali, the first MP of Bangladeshi descent, and one of the first female muslim MPs. She is still the MP, and was briefly part of the shadow frontbench team under Ed Miliband, but perhaps surprisingly has not been on the front bench since. The seat has now reverted to very safe Labour status, but there may be a new challenge at the next general election.
Like virtually all the east London seats this one is seriously oversized with nearly 90,000 voters. Shadwell ward is to come in from Poplar & Limehouse, and the two Bow wards are being removed to a new Stratford & Bow seat. The seat is accordingly renamed Bethnal Green & Stepney. Shadwell is one of the most Bangladeshi wards in the borough, and Bow on the contrary has the lowest Bangladeshi population by some margin. This will strengthen the Bangladeshi influence here, and may make the revised seat majority Muslim, so the result will depend much more on internal considerations in the Bangladeshi community.
The new seat of Stratford & Bow takes 45,000 voters from the north-west of Newham Borough, including all the new development in the Olympic Park area, and middle-class Forest Gate. Three wards from Tower Hamlets, including Bromley by Bow from the Poplar seat, amounting to 29,000 voters also form part of the new seat. While still very cosmopolitan this seat will not be Bangladeshi dominated in the same way, and will resemble more neighbouring seats like West Ham and East Ham. It will of course be a very safe Labour home for whoever is selected to fight the new seat.
Census data: owner-occupied 26% (572/573 in England & Wales), private rented 31% (32nd), social rented 43% (5th).
:White 47%, Black 7%, Sth Asian 36%, Mixed 4%, Other 6%
: Managerial & professional 48% (54th), Routine & Semi-routine 23% (462nd)
: Degree 40% (47th), Minimal qualifications 30% (476th)
: Students 14% (36th), Over 65: 7% (571st)
: Muslim 34% (5th)
Bow on the east of the seat is a little different. It has similarly high levels of council renting, but has a majority of white inhabitants, and only half the proportion of Bangladeshis. Bow proper has a lot of Victorian two storey terraces, with some gentrification,based around the Roman Road street market, interspersed with the council estates, but Old Ford, cut off by the main A12 which leads to the Blackwall Tunnel, is isolated and modern council estate, formerly one of the 1990s Housing Action Trusts, and now run by the enormous Clarion Housing Association.
Politics here in recent years can best be described as chaotic, and this has a lot to do with divisions in the Bangladeshi community, although the ethnic origin statistics given below show there is much more to this constituency than that. Locally the Liberal Democrats were very strong here through the 1990s, particularly in Bow, where, as in neighbouring Hackney they tended to represent the older white population, not always appreciative of the changing demographics. They controlled the council between 1986 and 1994, and continued to poll strongly in Bow up to and including 2002, before the vote faded away in the 2000s. Meanwhile as the Bangladeshi population grew, this became one of the areas that the new Respect Party, founded originally in 2004 as an anti-Iraq war party, but subsequently a curious amalgam of socialist and muslim groups, gained considerable support. Famously this was the seat won by George Galloway at the 2005 General Election, from Labour’s half-black, half-jewish Oona King. In 1997 when she was first elected, this had one of just 2 seats in the country to swing away from Labour, as a result of local ethnic politics. Respect initially was fended off locally by the Labour Party, under the leadership of Lutfur Rahman, councillor for Spitalfields ward, but he broke with the Labour party in 2010, standing for mayor and winning as an independent. Many of the councillors defected to Respect, and then to Rahman’s Tower Hamlets First party. He was re-elected as mayor in 2014, but subsequently disqualified for electoral malpractice, and the mayor, and all the wards in this constituency reverted to Labour. Following the end of his disqualification Rahman has returned, being re-elected mayor in 2022, and his Aspire party fought Labour to a 10-10 dead heat at the accompanying local council elections.
Galloway decided, rather curiously, not to restand here in 2010, but rather in neighbouring Poplar & Limehouse, although the only boundary change was the loss of Wapping. There was undoubtedly local pressure to have a Bangladeshi candidate, and the leader of the Respect group on the council stood, but only finished third behind the resurgent Liberal Democrats. Elected for Labour was Rushanara Ali, the first MP of Bangladeshi descent, and one of the first female muslim MPs. She is still the MP, and was briefly part of the shadow frontbench team under Ed Miliband, but perhaps surprisingly has not been on the front bench since. The seat has now reverted to very safe Labour status, but there may be a new challenge at the next general election.
Like virtually all the east London seats this one is seriously oversized with nearly 90,000 voters. Shadwell ward is to come in from Poplar & Limehouse, and the two Bow wards are being removed to a new Stratford & Bow seat. The seat is accordingly renamed Bethnal Green & Stepney. Shadwell is one of the most Bangladeshi wards in the borough, and Bow on the contrary has the lowest Bangladeshi population by some margin. This will strengthen the Bangladeshi influence here, and may make the revised seat majority Muslim, so the result will depend much more on internal considerations in the Bangladeshi community.
The new seat of Stratford & Bow takes 45,000 voters from the north-west of Newham Borough, including all the new development in the Olympic Park area, and middle-class Forest Gate. Three wards from Tower Hamlets, including Bromley by Bow from the Poplar seat, amounting to 29,000 voters also form part of the new seat. While still very cosmopolitan this seat will not be Bangladeshi dominated in the same way, and will resemble more neighbouring seats like West Ham and East Ham. It will of course be a very safe Labour home for whoever is selected to fight the new seat.
Census data: owner-occupied 26% (572/573 in England & Wales), private rented 31% (32nd), social rented 43% (5th).
:White 47%, Black 7%, Sth Asian 36%, Mixed 4%, Other 6%
: Managerial & professional 48% (54th), Routine & Semi-routine 23% (462nd)
: Degree 40% (47th), Minimal qualifications 30% (476th)
: Students 14% (36th), Over 65: 7% (571st)
: Muslim 34% (5th)
2010 | % | 2015 | % | 2017 | % | 2019 | % | |
Labour | 21,784 | 42.9% | 32,387 | 61.2% | 42,969 | 71.8% | 44,052 | 72.7% |
Conservative | 7,071 | 13.9% | 8,070 | 15.2% | 7,576 | 12.7% | 6,528 | 10.8% |
Liberal Democrat | 10,210 | 20.1% | 2,395 | 4.5% | 2,982 | 5.0% | 5,892 | 9.7% |
UKIP/Brexit | 3,219 | 6.1% | 894 | 1.5% | 1,081 | 1.8% | ||
Green | 856 | 1.7% | 4,906 | 9.3% | 1,516 | 2.5% | 2,570 | 4.2% |
| Respect | 8,532 | 16.8% | ||||||
Others | 2,275 | 4.5% | 1,947 | 3.7% | 3,888 | 6.5% | 439 | 0.7% |
Majority | 11,574 | 22.8% | 24,317 | 45.9% | 35,393 | 59.2% | 37,524 | 62.0% |
