Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough
Jul 6, 2023 19:17:36 GMT
Pete Whitehead, Robert Waller, and 4 more like this
Post by YL on Jul 6, 2023 19:17:36 GMT
This constituency covers most of north Sheffield. Much of it (large areas of Southey, Firth Park and Shiregreen & Brightside wards, and bits of the other wards as well) consists of inter-war council housing in so-called cottage estates; there is some pioneering housing of this type in the Flower Estate in High Wincobank dating from around 1907. Between the main cottage estate belt and the city centre is an area of older development, covering most of Burngreave ward and parts of Firth Park and Shiregreen & Brightside (including Brightside itself), which is a fairly classic inner city area. Both the cottage estate belt and the Burngreave area have high deprivation levels, and this is the most deprived Sheffield constituency and the one of the twenty or so most deprived in England. The proportion with higher education qualifications is well below average and that with no qualifications well above.
Hillsborough, in the west of the consituency, is more mixed socially and is rather less deprived and more educated, reaching average levels. It has some council estates of a similar design to those further east, but there is also a lot of private housing of various sizes from the late Victorian period and early 20th century, which the convenient tram service has helped to make popular with those working in central Sheffield. It is of course best known for its football stadium, which surprisingly was not in Hillsborough ward until 2004 and as a result has been in the Brightside constituency for longer than most of Hillsborough.
Hillsborough shares with much of the cottage estate belt a largely white population, but the inner city belt is very diverse, with Burngreave ward having the lowest white population in Sheffield, and this diversity has been spreading into parts of the cottage estate belt as well, especially in Firth Park ward. As a result in the constituency as a whole the white population is below average and the black and Asian populations above average, and the constituency was nearly 19% Muslim according to the 2021 census. In addition, parts of the constituency have gained a notably high Roma population. This is most concentrated in the Page Hall area, an area of small Edwardian terraced houses in the north of Burngreave ward, with percentages as high as 35.1% in one output area in the 2021 census. This constituency is now number 1 in England and Wales for percentage with a Roma identity, and the Burngreave & Grimesthorpe MSOA which includes Page Hall also has the highest Roma percentage of any MSOA.
Sheffield Brightside was created in 1885, when the Sheffield parliamentary borough was divided into five. It lasted under that name until 2010, when Hillsborough ward was added when its eponymous constituency was dismembered (the largest part actually going into Penistone & Stocksbridge). In spite of the name change, this is clearly a successor to Brightside, not to Hillsborough. As such it has been Labour since 1935, and except for 1931 since 1922. David Blunkett was MP for many years; when he retired he was succeeded by Harry Harpham, who sadly died less than a year after being elected, with his widow Gill Furniss winning the resulting by-election. Although her share of the vote fell by more than average in 2019 it remained well over 50% and this is still a safe Labour seat. The boundary changes are very minor, adding an area in Hillsborough ward along the floor of the Don valley between Hillsborough and the city centre.
The Labour dominance largely extends to local level as well. Hillsborough (not of course in the constituency until recently) has often been the main exception; until the 1970s it voted Tory more often than not (though the boundaries would be a bit different from today's), during the Lib Dems' two strongest periods in Sheffield (the mid to late 1990s and around 2008) it voted for them, and it has now turned to the Greens, who broke through in 2021 and now have all three seats here. Burngreave was one of those places which somehow voted Tory in 1968, but then the Liberals built up local strength and held the council seats for several years, but in recent years it has been monolithically Labour. For a time UKIP were also doing well in local elections here, and came fairly close in Southey and Shiregreen & Brightside in 2014.
2019 notional result (Rallings & Thrasher):
Lab 22838 (56.6%)
Con 10247 (25.4%)
Brexit Party 3916 (9.7%)
Lib Dem 1570 (3.9%)
Green 1210 (3.0%)
Other 585 (1.4%)
Lab majority 12591 (31.2%)
Hillsborough, in the west of the consituency, is more mixed socially and is rather less deprived and more educated, reaching average levels. It has some council estates of a similar design to those further east, but there is also a lot of private housing of various sizes from the late Victorian period and early 20th century, which the convenient tram service has helped to make popular with those working in central Sheffield. It is of course best known for its football stadium, which surprisingly was not in Hillsborough ward until 2004 and as a result has been in the Brightside constituency for longer than most of Hillsborough.
Hillsborough shares with much of the cottage estate belt a largely white population, but the inner city belt is very diverse, with Burngreave ward having the lowest white population in Sheffield, and this diversity has been spreading into parts of the cottage estate belt as well, especially in Firth Park ward. As a result in the constituency as a whole the white population is below average and the black and Asian populations above average, and the constituency was nearly 19% Muslim according to the 2021 census. In addition, parts of the constituency have gained a notably high Roma population. This is most concentrated in the Page Hall area, an area of small Edwardian terraced houses in the north of Burngreave ward, with percentages as high as 35.1% in one output area in the 2021 census. This constituency is now number 1 in England and Wales for percentage with a Roma identity, and the Burngreave & Grimesthorpe MSOA which includes Page Hall also has the highest Roma percentage of any MSOA.
Sheffield Brightside was created in 1885, when the Sheffield parliamentary borough was divided into five. It lasted under that name until 2010, when Hillsborough ward was added when its eponymous constituency was dismembered (the largest part actually going into Penistone & Stocksbridge). In spite of the name change, this is clearly a successor to Brightside, not to Hillsborough. As such it has been Labour since 1935, and except for 1931 since 1922. David Blunkett was MP for many years; when he retired he was succeeded by Harry Harpham, who sadly died less than a year after being elected, with his widow Gill Furniss winning the resulting by-election. Although her share of the vote fell by more than average in 2019 it remained well over 50% and this is still a safe Labour seat. The boundary changes are very minor, adding an area in Hillsborough ward along the floor of the Don valley between Hillsborough and the city centre.
The Labour dominance largely extends to local level as well. Hillsborough (not of course in the constituency until recently) has often been the main exception; until the 1970s it voted Tory more often than not (though the boundaries would be a bit different from today's), during the Lib Dems' two strongest periods in Sheffield (the mid to late 1990s and around 2008) it voted for them, and it has now turned to the Greens, who broke through in 2021 and now have all three seats here. Burngreave was one of those places which somehow voted Tory in 1968, but then the Liberals built up local strength and held the council seats for several years, but in recent years it has been monolithically Labour. For a time UKIP were also doing well in local elections here, and came fairly close in Southey and Shiregreen & Brightside in 2014.
2019 notional result (Rallings & Thrasher):
Lab 22838 (56.6%)
Con 10247 (25.4%)
Brexit Party 3916 (9.7%)
Lib Dem 1570 (3.9%)
Green 1210 (3.0%)
Other 585 (1.4%)
Lab majority 12591 (31.2%)
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