Post by batman on Jul 7, 2023 10:59:50 GMT
edited to take into account the 2024 election result.
HAMMERSMITH AND CHISWICK
This constituency has no real resemblance to any that has existed before, as in addition to most (though not all) of the Hammersmith and Shepherd's bush communities it now takes in the whole of the Chiswick community - or, more accurately, that part of the Chiswick community which can be found within the London Borough of Hounslow. Not in living memory has Hammersmith previously been paired with Chiswick, but this arrangement does perhaps have some logic; Chiswick in some respects has a closer affinity with Hammersmith than it does with Brentford, the neighbouring district with which it has been paired since 1918, and the constituency is now a little less socially polarised than the Hammersmith seat was. Although West Kensington ward has departed from Hammersmith to a redrawn Chelsea and Fulham constituency, most of the West Kensington community north of the A4, which lies in the Avonmore and Addison wards, is also included. This new seat is potentially quite a bit less safe for Labour than Hammersmith latterly became, and is a mixture in which the Conservatives could reasonably aspire to win if circumstances were to become a great deal more propitious for them in London; however, the expectation was very much of a Labour retention in the 2024 general election, and with a slightly increased share of the vote and a positive swing of 6% Labour's Andy Slaughter very easily secured a further term at Westminster.
To take Chiswick first. Chiswick has always tended slightly towards the Conservatives, and much of it is very prosperous indeed, but in its strongest years Labour has generally managed to compete effectively with the Tories there. Something of a dichotomy has started to emerge between its voting habits in local and national elections. In the 2019 general election, Labour (we know this from data supplied by Hounslow Council) was effectively level with the Conservatives in the 3 wards which make up the Chiswick community in the borough, yet in the 2022 local elections, despite a strong nationwide swing from the Tories to Labour, the Tories still managed to win all but one of the seats in these wards. Perhaps rather surprisingly, this was in the most upmarket of all the wards, Chiswick Riverside, which had last elected a Labour councillor 51 years previously although on rather different boundaries. One possible explanation for this is the unpopularity of two transport-related policies, firstly the rather controversial cycle lane which runs along the A315 (King Street, Hammersmith and Chiswick High Road) and secondly the Low Traffic Neighbourhood which makes it impossible for non-permit-holders to drive into parts of the Chiswick Riverside ward directly from the A316 trunk road for most of the day except on Sundays. There are some very attractive houses, both Victorian and interwar, spread throughout Chiswick, and a beautiful villagey area around the riverside close to the long-established (but now Japanese-owned) Fuller's Brewery. Chiswick has its own stately home and grounds, Chiswick House, and has other attractions such as Hogarth's House on the A4 close to what has now become his eponymous roundabout. All Chiswick wards have a council estate element, but in all 3 cases this element is outnumbered by private housing, both houses and flats, with the houses being very expensive indeed and housing some celebrities including Ant and Dec (broadcasting folk are much in evidence in these parts because of the proximity of the BBC, even though its famous TV Centre in White City is now converted into flats). Until the very large swing to Labour which took place in so much of London in 2017, the Tories had a commanding lead over Labour, perhaps not surprisingly considering its social composition, in Chiswick, but Labour now seems to have essentially drawn level, or even in all probability drawn somewhat ahead in the 2024 election bearing in mind the final result. Until the Tories regain the support of many of their traditional well-to-do voters, as in many other London constituencies, they cannot rely on any sort of lead over Labour in Chiswick. Nevertheless, it is the only part of the constituency which has any remaining Conservative councillors.
Chiswick was in Middlesex until the formation of the present-day London Boroughs. The rest of the constituency, however, has been officially part of London since the 19th century, and has a much more strongly Labour heritage. Hammersmith's bustling town centre (much visited by music and comedy fans going to gigs at what used to be known as the Hammersmith Odeon, but is currently the Eventim Apollo at the time of writing - it changes often.....) and its northern, western and eastern districts form what can be regarded as the central part of the new seat, but southern Hammersmith, most of which comes under the confusingly named Fulham Reach ward (it can be argued that it's actually in Hammersmith not in Fulham), is now separated from the town centre for parliamentary purposes, as was the case before 1997. Hammersmith itself is probably the most socially polarised part of this new seat. It has some hugely expensive riverside homes, and much other highly desirable, mostly 19th-century, residential properties in other parts, such as Hammersmith Grove (pretty large mansions) and what is these days known as Brackenbury Village (mostly smaller, bijou heavily gentrified cottages), a sub-district which crosses the ward boundaries between Hammersmith Broadway and Ravenscourt Park. The latter park, too, is set in a mostly very well-to-do residential area with more celebrities in residence, and was a comfortably safe Tory ward until Labour gained it for the first time in decades in 2018, a gain which was confirmed in the 2022 elections. But Hammersmith has some pretty grim council estates too, especially on the outskirts of the town centre. This polarisation has been reflected in some local election results in the past, with Hammersmith Broadway ward seeing some very narrow Labour majorities, though much increased in recent years. Hammersmith is more multiethnic than Chiswick, and has long-established Black Caribbean, Irish and (rather more recently) middle Eastern communities amongst others. Some of its wards have voted Labour for years but until recent years have tended to see rather narrow Labour majorities; Ravenscourt Park has been the Tories' best ward in this part of the seat, but to that one could also add the mostly very select Brook Green area north of the town centre, with its mixture of graceful 19th-century homes and modern executive apartments, some of which are the second homes of wealthy foreigners. Brook Green too was a Conservative ward for a long time, either on its own or partnered with Avonmore (West Kensington north of the A4), but along with all of Hammersmith's best-off areas has seen a very large swing to Labour in the last two council elections. Currently, the reconstituted Brook Green ward has what appears to be an absurdly high Labour majority, but even this is dwarfed by the Labour majorities in other parts of Hammersmith. Shepherd's Bush has always had a reputation as a working-class area, again with long-established Black and Irish populations, but it is not quite uniformly so. Its prosperous western edge can be regarded as effectively part of the Hammersmith community despite its W12 postcode and has long been in the Ravenscourt Park ward. The most heavily Labour part of Shepherd's Bush is White City, dominated by a venerable council estate hard by the Queen's Park Rangers football ground (QPR many years ago did play in Queen's Park, hence the name). This is even more multiethnic than the rest of the Bush and is monolithically Labour these days. Not much better for the Tories is Shepherd's Bush Green ward, which as well as the town centre also includes a surprising enclave of Hammersmith and Fulham borough across the relief road which uniquely for the borough carries the W11 postcode, and is very close to Grenfell Tower across the borough boundary. This enclave cannot be reached from the rest of the borough without passing through a small section of the borough of Kensington & Chelsea, and is almost all council flats, many of them high-rise. Here too Labour is far, far ahead. The other Shepherd's Bush wards are more socially mixed; some areas are significantly gentrified, others such as the Askew Road area have been much slower to do so. Gentrification of Shepherd's Bush, although not quite as pronounced as in parts of Hammersmith, should not be underestimated; after all, Absolutely Fabulous features Shepherd's Bush residents who like to pretend that they actually live in Kensington. But taken as a whole, with the W11 enclave, Shepherd's Bush is very heavily Labour, presenting a formidable obstacle to the Tories, and this remains the case even without Wormholt, and College Park and Old Oak wards, which will no longer be linked with the rest of the Bush for parliamentary purposes and are two of the very safest Labour wards in the borough. Another famous sitcom, Steptoe and Son, was also set in Shepherd's Bush and strongly emphasizes its working-class character. That character may have been diluted somewhat, but a Labour stronghold the community remains.
The constituency is completed by that part of the West Kensington community which forms, currently, the Addison and Avonmore wards. These two wards were still Conservative in 2010, but have swung a long way to the left since. They are mostly dominated by 19th-century townhouses split up into flats, though some (including the London home of Michael Gove) are not. In Avonmore in particular there is a surprisingly large student population, mostly of Imperial College students. The Tories seem to have suffered somewhat here by the near-completion of the process of splitting the larger houses into flats, in many cases with lower rents than in neighbouring areas. An increasingly strong Labour vote in the converted flats is backed up by a longer-established Labour-voting council estate minority in both wards. There has also been a noticeable increase in the number of residents from BAME, often middle Eastern, backgrounds. Labour's gain of a seat in what was then Avonmore and Brook Green ward in the 2014 elections was seen as a surprise, and required a substantial swing. Less than a decade later, Labour now has commanding majorities in both wards, absurdly high-looking in Addison in particular. The Tories would in the past have aspired to outpoll Labour in this part of the seat, but clearly no longer are able to do so.
When the outgoing Hammersmith seat was formed in the 2010 boundary changes, it was regarded as potentially risky for Labour, and Andy Slaughter's majority of under 4000 was actually higher than some Labour people feared. Since then, the Tories' much-discussed loss of support amongst middle-class, Remain-voting professionals led to his majority soaring into the upper teens in terms of thousands, higher than any majority previously achieved by Labour in the pre-1997 Hammersmith (before that Hammersmith North) seat. Thus in the 2024 boundary changes Labour could afford to lose 4 Labour-held wards, 2 of them very safe indeed, and gain previously Tory-inclined Chiswick, and yet were still expect to win comfortably, as indeed they did. The knock-on effect of this seat's creation appears to be harmful to the Tories in some nearby constituencies, but it is a major boundary revision which was comfortably absorbed by Labour here. As long as he retains his CLP's support, Slaughter, who is now approaching his mid-sixties, can reasonably hope to extend his parliamentary career for as long as he wishes; essentially he now has a similar majority to his already commanding figure from 2019, despite all of the boundary changes detailed above. This seat looks very safe certainly for the time being.
HAMMERSMITH AND CHISWICK
This constituency has no real resemblance to any that has existed before, as in addition to most (though not all) of the Hammersmith and Shepherd's bush communities it now takes in the whole of the Chiswick community - or, more accurately, that part of the Chiswick community which can be found within the London Borough of Hounslow. Not in living memory has Hammersmith previously been paired with Chiswick, but this arrangement does perhaps have some logic; Chiswick in some respects has a closer affinity with Hammersmith than it does with Brentford, the neighbouring district with which it has been paired since 1918, and the constituency is now a little less socially polarised than the Hammersmith seat was. Although West Kensington ward has departed from Hammersmith to a redrawn Chelsea and Fulham constituency, most of the West Kensington community north of the A4, which lies in the Avonmore and Addison wards, is also included. This new seat is potentially quite a bit less safe for Labour than Hammersmith latterly became, and is a mixture in which the Conservatives could reasonably aspire to win if circumstances were to become a great deal more propitious for them in London; however, the expectation was very much of a Labour retention in the 2024 general election, and with a slightly increased share of the vote and a positive swing of 6% Labour's Andy Slaughter very easily secured a further term at Westminster.
To take Chiswick first. Chiswick has always tended slightly towards the Conservatives, and much of it is very prosperous indeed, but in its strongest years Labour has generally managed to compete effectively with the Tories there. Something of a dichotomy has started to emerge between its voting habits in local and national elections. In the 2019 general election, Labour (we know this from data supplied by Hounslow Council) was effectively level with the Conservatives in the 3 wards which make up the Chiswick community in the borough, yet in the 2022 local elections, despite a strong nationwide swing from the Tories to Labour, the Tories still managed to win all but one of the seats in these wards. Perhaps rather surprisingly, this was in the most upmarket of all the wards, Chiswick Riverside, which had last elected a Labour councillor 51 years previously although on rather different boundaries. One possible explanation for this is the unpopularity of two transport-related policies, firstly the rather controversial cycle lane which runs along the A315 (King Street, Hammersmith and Chiswick High Road) and secondly the Low Traffic Neighbourhood which makes it impossible for non-permit-holders to drive into parts of the Chiswick Riverside ward directly from the A316 trunk road for most of the day except on Sundays. There are some very attractive houses, both Victorian and interwar, spread throughout Chiswick, and a beautiful villagey area around the riverside close to the long-established (but now Japanese-owned) Fuller's Brewery. Chiswick has its own stately home and grounds, Chiswick House, and has other attractions such as Hogarth's House on the A4 close to what has now become his eponymous roundabout. All Chiswick wards have a council estate element, but in all 3 cases this element is outnumbered by private housing, both houses and flats, with the houses being very expensive indeed and housing some celebrities including Ant and Dec (broadcasting folk are much in evidence in these parts because of the proximity of the BBC, even though its famous TV Centre in White City is now converted into flats). Until the very large swing to Labour which took place in so much of London in 2017, the Tories had a commanding lead over Labour, perhaps not surprisingly considering its social composition, in Chiswick, but Labour now seems to have essentially drawn level, or even in all probability drawn somewhat ahead in the 2024 election bearing in mind the final result. Until the Tories regain the support of many of their traditional well-to-do voters, as in many other London constituencies, they cannot rely on any sort of lead over Labour in Chiswick. Nevertheless, it is the only part of the constituency which has any remaining Conservative councillors.
Chiswick was in Middlesex until the formation of the present-day London Boroughs. The rest of the constituency, however, has been officially part of London since the 19th century, and has a much more strongly Labour heritage. Hammersmith's bustling town centre (much visited by music and comedy fans going to gigs at what used to be known as the Hammersmith Odeon, but is currently the Eventim Apollo at the time of writing - it changes often.....) and its northern, western and eastern districts form what can be regarded as the central part of the new seat, but southern Hammersmith, most of which comes under the confusingly named Fulham Reach ward (it can be argued that it's actually in Hammersmith not in Fulham), is now separated from the town centre for parliamentary purposes, as was the case before 1997. Hammersmith itself is probably the most socially polarised part of this new seat. It has some hugely expensive riverside homes, and much other highly desirable, mostly 19th-century, residential properties in other parts, such as Hammersmith Grove (pretty large mansions) and what is these days known as Brackenbury Village (mostly smaller, bijou heavily gentrified cottages), a sub-district which crosses the ward boundaries between Hammersmith Broadway and Ravenscourt Park. The latter park, too, is set in a mostly very well-to-do residential area with more celebrities in residence, and was a comfortably safe Tory ward until Labour gained it for the first time in decades in 2018, a gain which was confirmed in the 2022 elections. But Hammersmith has some pretty grim council estates too, especially on the outskirts of the town centre. This polarisation has been reflected in some local election results in the past, with Hammersmith Broadway ward seeing some very narrow Labour majorities, though much increased in recent years. Hammersmith is more multiethnic than Chiswick, and has long-established Black Caribbean, Irish and (rather more recently) middle Eastern communities amongst others. Some of its wards have voted Labour for years but until recent years have tended to see rather narrow Labour majorities; Ravenscourt Park has been the Tories' best ward in this part of the seat, but to that one could also add the mostly very select Brook Green area north of the town centre, with its mixture of graceful 19th-century homes and modern executive apartments, some of which are the second homes of wealthy foreigners. Brook Green too was a Conservative ward for a long time, either on its own or partnered with Avonmore (West Kensington north of the A4), but along with all of Hammersmith's best-off areas has seen a very large swing to Labour in the last two council elections. Currently, the reconstituted Brook Green ward has what appears to be an absurdly high Labour majority, but even this is dwarfed by the Labour majorities in other parts of Hammersmith. Shepherd's Bush has always had a reputation as a working-class area, again with long-established Black and Irish populations, but it is not quite uniformly so. Its prosperous western edge can be regarded as effectively part of the Hammersmith community despite its W12 postcode and has long been in the Ravenscourt Park ward. The most heavily Labour part of Shepherd's Bush is White City, dominated by a venerable council estate hard by the Queen's Park Rangers football ground (QPR many years ago did play in Queen's Park, hence the name). This is even more multiethnic than the rest of the Bush and is monolithically Labour these days. Not much better for the Tories is Shepherd's Bush Green ward, which as well as the town centre also includes a surprising enclave of Hammersmith and Fulham borough across the relief road which uniquely for the borough carries the W11 postcode, and is very close to Grenfell Tower across the borough boundary. This enclave cannot be reached from the rest of the borough without passing through a small section of the borough of Kensington & Chelsea, and is almost all council flats, many of them high-rise. Here too Labour is far, far ahead. The other Shepherd's Bush wards are more socially mixed; some areas are significantly gentrified, others such as the Askew Road area have been much slower to do so. Gentrification of Shepherd's Bush, although not quite as pronounced as in parts of Hammersmith, should not be underestimated; after all, Absolutely Fabulous features Shepherd's Bush residents who like to pretend that they actually live in Kensington. But taken as a whole, with the W11 enclave, Shepherd's Bush is very heavily Labour, presenting a formidable obstacle to the Tories, and this remains the case even without Wormholt, and College Park and Old Oak wards, which will no longer be linked with the rest of the Bush for parliamentary purposes and are two of the very safest Labour wards in the borough. Another famous sitcom, Steptoe and Son, was also set in Shepherd's Bush and strongly emphasizes its working-class character. That character may have been diluted somewhat, but a Labour stronghold the community remains.
The constituency is completed by that part of the West Kensington community which forms, currently, the Addison and Avonmore wards. These two wards were still Conservative in 2010, but have swung a long way to the left since. They are mostly dominated by 19th-century townhouses split up into flats, though some (including the London home of Michael Gove) are not. In Avonmore in particular there is a surprisingly large student population, mostly of Imperial College students. The Tories seem to have suffered somewhat here by the near-completion of the process of splitting the larger houses into flats, in many cases with lower rents than in neighbouring areas. An increasingly strong Labour vote in the converted flats is backed up by a longer-established Labour-voting council estate minority in both wards. There has also been a noticeable increase in the number of residents from BAME, often middle Eastern, backgrounds. Labour's gain of a seat in what was then Avonmore and Brook Green ward in the 2014 elections was seen as a surprise, and required a substantial swing. Less than a decade later, Labour now has commanding majorities in both wards, absurdly high-looking in Addison in particular. The Tories would in the past have aspired to outpoll Labour in this part of the seat, but clearly no longer are able to do so.
When the outgoing Hammersmith seat was formed in the 2010 boundary changes, it was regarded as potentially risky for Labour, and Andy Slaughter's majority of under 4000 was actually higher than some Labour people feared. Since then, the Tories' much-discussed loss of support amongst middle-class, Remain-voting professionals led to his majority soaring into the upper teens in terms of thousands, higher than any majority previously achieved by Labour in the pre-1997 Hammersmith (before that Hammersmith North) seat. Thus in the 2024 boundary changes Labour could afford to lose 4 Labour-held wards, 2 of them very safe indeed, and gain previously Tory-inclined Chiswick, and yet were still expect to win comfortably, as indeed they did. The knock-on effect of this seat's creation appears to be harmful to the Tories in some nearby constituencies, but it is a major boundary revision which was comfortably absorbed by Labour here. As long as he retains his CLP's support, Slaughter, who is now approaching his mid-sixties, can reasonably hope to extend his parliamentary career for as long as he wishes; essentially he now has a similar majority to his already commanding figure from 2019, despite all of the boundary changes detailed above. This seat looks very safe certainly for the time being.
