Leigh

[Deleted]

Faced with Leigh, a constituency with boundaries barely brushed by an administrator's pencil since the 1890s, Internet searches run wild. Before you realise what you've done, there are 50 browser tabs open and your laptop is trying to throw itself out of the window. This is a symptom of wanting to scour websites for every potential paragraph-filling statistic, and of realising that Leigh is not particularly that interesting to write about. 

Maybe this is unfair. Leigh is based where traditional Lancashire meets traditional Cheshire, at a point where both industrial and geological history meet. These are the flat, coal seamed landscapes of the outer reaches of what is now Greater Manchester, where the railway between Manchester and Liverpool made its way through tricky terrain, perhaps amongst the most challenging for Victorian engineers. Numerous halts and stations which once stood here, for passengers and coal-based freight, have long since vanished into history, amongst them Leigh's own station, and others at Lowton, Pennington, Tyldesley, and Astley. Railway engineers, enthusiasts and generally interested types alike will know of Chat Moss, the peat-bog which almost stopped the railways from connecting the original northern powerhouses. The town of Leigh sits approximately 4-5 miles northwest of the Moss, with the engineering marvel of the 'floating' railway running to its south. Satellite images show where Leigh's former railway track bed ran, curving away from the town into Worsley and Salford: it remains one of the largest population centres in the UK with no railway station. 

The scattering of towns in this constituency hark back to a proud, long-lasting Labour voting tradition, but as with the whole of Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council, this Leave-supporting collection of ex-mining and ex-manufacturing communities don't give Labour an easy ride these days. This is an overwhelmingly white, working class seat, barely 4% of the population were born outside the UK, and with fewer managerial employment figures than the regional average, fewer higher level qualifications than neighbouring seats, it is not surprising to see Leigh classified as a constituency of "somewheres", far less likely to have the means or desire to travel for employment far beyond their own immediate surroundings. All three components of Wigan MBC have Conservative voting 'segments' amongst their otherwise monumentally Labour-voting towns: in Leigh, the traditionally blue-leaning areas include Lowton to the south/southwest, and Astley-Mossley Common in the southeast, where the East Lancs Road snakes towards Worsley, Swinton, and ultimately Manchester. 

At Parliamentary level, Leigh has returned Labour MPs from the 1920s until December 2019, when Jo Platt became the sole Wigan MP to fall to Brexit-fuelled Conservative opposition. James Grundy became the first Tory MP for this area in modern parliamentary history, and for that matter, pretty much ancient parliamentary history too: the 1st Viscount Cross and John Ireland Blackburne represented the sprawling South West Lancashire constituency, of which this was a small part, in the 19th century. On somewhat derisory turnouts, current Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham secured two healthy vote shares upto the 2010 general election, at which he dropped 15 percentage points to an array of local independents, a Christian, and the combined forces of (a very rare) BNP candidate and (a very common) UKIP nominee. The rot had set in, for UKIP shot up to 20% in 2015 alongside a moderate Conservative increase, the prelude to the Tories jumping to take the seat in 2019 on a 12% swing. For context, the 2015 local elections to Wigan council saw Labour take each and every ward except two: Lowton East in Leigh being one of these. Lowton stayed blue in 2018 and 2019, the only island of opposition to Labour in the constituency. Perhaps, then, it is unfair to say Leigh is not interesting to write about, because in this loyally Labour voting, all-white, former coal mining industrial slice of southern Lancashire, something stirred amongst the electorate which very few people truly predicted beforehand. There is always something to write about if you dig deep. 

[pragmaticidealist]

Jo Platt was the losing Labour candidate in 2019, not Burnham.

[Deleted]

Apr 28, 2020 19:24:05 GMT pragmaticidealist said:

Jo Platt was the losing Labour candidate in 2019, not Burnham.

Tweaked. Ta.

[pragmaticidealist]

Apr 28, 2020 21:33:04 GMT @barnabymarder said:

The possibility of Labour losing Leigh was discussed in this forum during the election campaign, and dismissed by most (though not by me, as it happens - I had heard it was dicey).

It was also predicted by the YouGov MRP model IIRC.

[Merseymike]

My partner used to work here and it's the sort of place where 'Normal for Leigh' was a frequently heard comment. It's not especially grim but it feels a bit like the land that time forgot, and it's hard to imagine that both Liverpool and Manchester are half an hour away. For a Metropolitan borough it couldn't be less metropolitan

[Deleted]

Apr 28, 2020 22:38:42 GMT Merseymike said:

My partner used to work here and it's the sort of place where 'Normal for Leigh' was a frequently heard comment. It's not especially grim but it feels a bit like the land that time forgot, and it's hard to imagine that both Liverpool and Manchester are half an hour away. For a Metropolitan borough it couldn't be less metropolitan

 A great line which should be added to the profile, whoever writes the finished version! 

[bjornhattan]

Apr 28, 2020 22:38:42 GMT Merseymike said:

My partner used to work here and it's the sort of place where 'Normal for Leigh' was a frequently heard comment. It's not especially grim but it feels a bit like the land that time forgot, and it's hard to imagine that both Liverpool and Manchester are half an hour away. For a Metropolitan borough it couldn't be less metropolitan

Houghton-le-Spring and Hetton-le-Hole in Sunderland could definitely give it a run for its money - and they're technically parts of a city!

Almost every metropolitan county has a few areas like this though. Parts of Dudley borough such as Gornal, much of Barnsley outside its eponymous town (and a good chunk of that too), and the likes of Knottingley all spring to mind as very different to the big cities often just a few miles down the road. The one county which doesn't seem to have such an area is yours - parts of Merseyside are decayed but they don't feel quite as stuck in the past, and they're definitely liberal in comparison to Leigh!

[Devil Wincarnate]

Apr 28, 2020 21:33:04 GMT @barnabymarder said:

The possibility of Labour losing Leigh was discussed in this forum during the election campaign, and dismissed by most (though not by me, as it happens - I had heard it was dicey).

It was dismissed (including by me) because it seemed so far-fetched and borderline insane. But Jez made it happen.

[Devil Wincarnate]

Apr 28, 2020 22:49:03 GMT bjornhattan said:

Apr 28, 2020 22:38:42 GMT Merseymike said:

My partner used to work here and it's the sort of place where 'Normal for Leigh' was a frequently heard comment. It's not especially grim but it feels a bit like the land that time forgot, and it's hard to imagine that both Liverpool and Manchester are half an hour away. For a Metropolitan borough it couldn't be less metropolitan

Houghton-le-Spring and Hetton-le-Hole in Sunderland could definitely give it a run for its money - and they're technically parts of a city!

Almost every metropolitan county has a few areas like this though. Parts of Dudley borough such as Gornal, much of Barnsley outside its eponymous town (and a good chunk of that too), and the likes of Knottingley all spring to mind as very different to the big cities often just a few miles down the road. The one county which doesn't seem to have such an area is yours - parts of Merseyside are decayed but they don't feel quite as stuck in the past, and they're definitely liberal in comparison to Leigh!

Bits of St Helens are pretty backwards. If you want backwards though, Tyldesley is the winner.

[Merseymike]

Apr 29, 2020 1:37:52 GMT Devil Wincarnate said:

Apr 28, 2020 21:33:04 GMT @barnabymarder said:

The possibility of Labour losing Leigh was discussed in this forum during the election campaign, and dismissed by most (though not by me, as it happens - I had heard it was dicey).

It was dismissed (including by me) because it seemed so far-fetched and borderline insane. But Jez made it happen.

No. Brexit made it happen. Any other Labour leader promising a second referendum would have got the same result.
There was a huge amount of underestimation of how much this one issue would shift votes and it will be interesting to see how easy it will be for Labour to get them back. The partisan dealignment of seats like this is notable, though, in that voters have for a long time not necessarily reflected Labour views but continued to vote for them albeit with declining enthusiasm.

One other point worth mentioning. I gather that there were issues surrounding Wigan Council which is a parochial area like this is viewed as distant (well, it's in Wigan!) And I recall a vox pop where someone was moaning about Labour - the interviewer responded with "but Labour aren't in power" and the response we as "they are round here"

[John Chanin]

Apr 28, 2020 19:21:05 GMT @pr1berske said:

Faced with Leigh, a constituency with boundaries barely brushed by an administrator's pencil since the 1890s, Internet searches run wild. Before you realise what you've done, there are 50 browser tabs open and your laptop is trying to throw itself out of the window. This is a symptom of wanting to scour websites for every potential paragraph-filling statistic, and of realising that Leigh is not particularly that interesting to write about. 

One thing apparent from writing these profiles is that some places are interesting politically while being very dull in other respects (eg Ilford North), and some places are very interesting while being dull politically(eg Ladywood).  Worst are those that are dull in both senses and it is difficult to find much to say (eg Romford).

[The Bishop]

Apr 28, 2020 21:33:04 GMT @barnabymarder said:

The possibility of Labour losing Leigh was discussed in this forum during the election campaign, and dismissed by most (though not by me, as it happens - I had heard it was dicey).

The fact that similar had been predicted (for this seat and several others) in 2017 maybe desensitised some of us to the possibility it might actually happen this time.

(indeed, that's the real moral of the "boy cried wolf" story - eventually the *wolf* did arrive but nobody believed it)

[gwynthegriff]

Apr 29, 2020 1:37:52 GMT Devil Wincarnate said:

Apr 28, 2020 21:33:04 GMT @barnabymarder said:

The possibility of Labour losing Leigh was discussed in this forum during the election campaign, and dismissed by most (though not by me, as it happens - I had heard it was dicey).

It was dismissed (including by me) because it seemed so far-fetched and borderline insane. But Jez made it happen.

[gwynthegriff]

Apr 29, 2020 1:37:52 GMT Devil Wincarnate said:

Apr 28, 2020 21:33:04 GMT @barnabymarder said:

The possibility of Labour losing Leigh was discussed in this forum during the election campaign, and dismissed by most (though not by me, as it happens - I had heard it was dicey).

It was dismissed (including by me) because it seemed so far-fetched and borderline insane. But Jez made it happen.

I believe it's called "winning the argument".

[Deleted]

Apr 29, 2020 9:08:27 GMT John Chanin said:

Apr 28, 2020 19:21:05 GMT @pr1berske said:

Faced with Leigh, a constituency with boundaries barely brushed by an administrator's pencil since the 1890s, Internet searches run wild. Before you realise what you've done, there are 50 browser tabs open and your laptop is trying to throw itself out of the window. This is a symptom of wanting to scour websites for every potential paragraph-filling statistic, and of realising that Leigh is not particularly that interesting to write about. 

One thing apparent from writing these profiles is that some places are interesting politically while being very dull in other respects (eg Ilford North), and some places are very interesting while being dull politically(eg Ladywood).  Worst are those that are dull in both senses and it is difficult to find much to say (eg Romford).

Oh I think Romford is interesting politically because it’s so very different compared to much of Greater London, and the MP is interesting in his own way.

[owainsutton]

May 1, 2020 13:49:51 GMT @johnyorks said:

Apr 29, 2020 9:08:27 GMT John Chanin said:

One thing apparent from writing these profiles is that some places are interesting politically while being very dull in other respects (eg Ilford North), and some places are very interesting while being dull politically(eg Ladywood).  Worst are those that are dull in both senses and it is difficult to find much to say (eg Romford).

Oh I think Romford is interesting politically because it’s so very different compared to much of Greater London, and the MP is interesting in his own way.

There's some parallels between Havering and Wigan boroughs, too.

- Included in Greater London & Greater Manchester respectively because they had to be put somewhere rather than because it was an immensely logical option.
- Strong track record for independents/RAs/local parties
- Never were fertile territory for BNP or UKIP, perhaps related to the above

[Pete Whitehead]

May 3, 2020 10:37:21 GMT owainsutton said:

May 1, 2020 13:49:51 GMT @johnyorks said:

Oh I think Romford is interesting politically because it’s so very different compared to much of Greater London, and the MP is interesting in his own way.

There's some parallels between Havering and Wigan boroughs, too.

- Included in Greater London & Greater Manchester respectively because they had to be put somewhere rather than because it was an immensely logical option.
- Strong track record for independents/RAs/local parties
- Never were fertile territory for BNP or UKIP, perhaps related to the above

If Havering wasn't fertile territory for UKIP I don't know where was..

[greenhert]

Havering was in fact UKIP's strongest borough in London and in 2014 the London Borough to elect the most UKIP councillors in Greater London-7.

[bsjmcr]

Apr 28, 2020 22:38:42 GMT Merseymike said:

My partner used to work here and it's the sort of place where 'Normal for Leigh' was a frequently heard comment. It's not especially grim but it feels a bit like the land that time forgot, and it's hard to imagine that both Liverpool and Manchester are half an hour away. For a Metropolitan borough it couldn't be less metropolitan

Makes sense, couldn't agree more. I have family here and it probably is quite high in skilled workers, proudly working class with average incomes but a bit socially conservative, heading nuclear families in redbrick semis and some detached houses. People seem to be more religious here too, I noticed there are a lot more churches still standing here than in other parts of GM. It does get semi-rural in parts, as you go towards Warrington and when I was visiting Lowton, the conservative area here, there was a distinct 'farm' smell in the air. Lowton is also home to Pennington Flash, 200 hectares of nature reserve and a lake that filled what was a mining pit, now very well-kept by Wigan Council and popular with birdwatchers. 

I think the 'not especially grim' factor (so less to lose with Conservative policies as fewer here would have been extremely deprived) combined with disconnection and disaffection from Wigan itself and the two cities led probably to last year's election result. Andy Burnham still lives here, as you can see when he appears on the news and some outlets do indeed put LIVE:Leigh (It winds me up when many, including the London-centric BBC just put 'Live: (Greater) Manchester' or worse, 'Live: Northern England' yet when someone is speaking from London they have to put every silly compass point on - Live: South East West Central Inner London when we up north couldn't care less). Anyway, the point is, Mr Burnham is now represented in parliament by a Tory! 

[owainsutton]

OK, fertile-for-London, in that respect the parallel doesn't make as much sense (UKIP having had better results in other GM boroughs).