Post by batman on Jul 8, 2023 21:57:39 GMT
Edited to take into account the 2024 election result.
KINGSTON AND SURBITON
This constituency was created in 1997 out of all of the previous Surbiton constituency and the majority of the former Kingston-upon-Thames. Both seats (although Surbiton was not created as a constituency until 1955) had been held by the Conservatives since World War II and Kingston-upon-Thames way before that, generally by comfortable if not always overwhelming majorities, but despite putting more of their energies into other nearby seats the Liberal Democrats took advantage of the Tories' terrible electoral situation at that time by winning by a few handfuls of votes. Their youthful winner at that time, Ed Davey, still remains today, and has now acquired both a knighthood and the leadership of his party, although his tenure was briefly interrupted in 2015 when his party went into electoral meltdown following their going into coalition with the Conservatives. He now looks very safe as his majority climbed back into five figures in 2019, with a swing from the Conservatives to him of a similar amount to that seen in neighbouring Richmond Park at that general election, and grew a good deal further in 2024 as the Tory vote collapsed still further. Currently, there are no Conservative councillors in the constituency at all, although the Tories remain either fully or slightly competitive in a number of the wards - but not all, as the Lib Dems have formidable leads in some of them. The only non-Liberal Democrat councillor elected in the constituency in the 2022 elections, instead, was James Giles of the Kingston Independent Residents' Group, who has made long journeys both political and geographic since being the Agent of George Galloway in the 2021 parliamentary by-election in the Yorkshire constituency of Batley and Spen; indeed, these journeys continued thereafter, as he was Galloway's election organiser in the 2024 Rochdale by-election won by Galloway and his Workers' Party, and was a candidate for that party elsewhere in the 2024 general election. Giles however declines to sit as a Workers' Party councillor in New Malden, at least at present. His group has gained the other seat in that ward, Green Lane and St James's (basically, the most prosperous part of the New Malden community), in a subsequent by-election. That ward's predecessor St James's was, along with a number of wards in the constituency, once regarded as a pretty safe Conservative ward, but the Tories now struggle to compete in its successor. Part of this ward has now been transferred to the Wimbledon constituency, as the Boundary Commission used the pre-2022 wards for their proposals.
This is another very strongly pro-Remain constituency, but it does have significant areas which are less uniformly socially upscale and where there are large numbers of White working class and White lower-middle-class voters who backed Leave. Chessington South and Malden Rushett ward, which stretches into at least semi-rural territory and includes the somewhat scruffy detached village of Malden Rushett, has a long-ago Labour heritage and currently still has a coherent Conservative vote, based mostly on pro-Leave voters who are more likely than average to be small traders or craftspeople. The Tories, however, having competed very effectively in Hook & Chessington North ward (its name was the other way round before 2022), fell back quite a long way in the last council elections, and the Lib Dems who used to be very strong there have regained quite a bit of their past strength.
Further in towards Surbiton, which has a bustling town centre with a reasonable array of shops and restaurants although a much more minor shopping centre than Kingston, voters were particularly strongly in favour of Remain. Most of the territory north of the A3 trunk road is comfortably-off rather than superwealthy like Coombe Hill ward, which remains outside this constituency, with perhaps Coombe Vale (which has now joined this constituency from Richmond Park in the boundary changes) being the most prosperous of all, though one could hardly describe Alexandra and Berrylands as gritty working-class areas either. All those 3 wards have a strong Conservative history, but while the Tories remain at least a little competitive in Alexandra and Coombe Vale, they are remarkably weak in Berrylands considering that it was once considered one of the safest Conservative wards in the borough. Coombe Vale ward, as its name implies, includes parts (though not generally the very wealthiest ones - it's very prosperous rather than superwealthy) of the Coombe community, but also a large chunk of New Malden, reaching the fringes of its town centre. Berrylands has its own railway station and is an almost entirely interwar sub-area of Surbiton not that far away from the latter's town centre, and Alexandra is rather similar in character to it, too. Surbiton Hill ward, too, was once a regularly Conservative ward but has long been dominated by the Liberal Democrats, as has New Malden Village, although a by-election in the predecessor Beverley ward, in very unpropitious circumstances for the Lib Dems about which I propose not to go into detail, did see a rare Conservative win and also an unusually high Labour vote for that area. St Marks & Seething Wells ward in Surbiton, closer to the Thames, has a remarkably weak Conservative vote nowadays, and they only just avoided being beaten into fourth place by Labour in the 2022 elections. The Lib Dems are now challenged there, unusually for this borough, by the Greens, but not that closely particularly in parliamentary elections. Davey himself lives in the riverside part of Surbiton.
New Malden, which community encompasses about two and two-thirds council wards in terms of this constituency, is perhaps best known for its very large Korean community, mostly completely settled here and much of it with naturalised British nationality, in contrast to Acton's Japanese community not that many miles away. Anecdotally Korean voters are said to be quite loyal to the Liberal Democrats. New Malden's high street and Burlington Road off it are full of Korean restaurants, grocery stores and even travel agents, not to mention a Korean church. Tolworth is another distinct area of the constituency, and now has just one eponymous ward - in the old days there were 3 small wards, 2 of which were fairly regularly won by Labour and the other of which tended to oscillate between the Tories and the Liberals. There is quite a strong council estate presence here, but these voters seem much less receptive to the Conservatives than their counterparts in Chessington further out and the Lib Dems now seem to have collared the former Labour vote and made it look a very safe ward. While several wards have a council estate element, one ward, Norbiton, has a much more working-class character than the rest, and has a very substantial council estate element of varying vintages. It is the only ward where Labour at least a little effectively can compete with the Liberal Democrats, but in both the last two council elections the latter have won handily. Norbiton (which has a KT1 postcode, indicating that it is not very far from central Kingston) is more multiethnic than the Kingston-upon-Thames average, and has not just a working-class permanent population (and also a substantial middle-class minority in some of the rather smarter roads which can be found in the ward) but also a goodly number of Kingston University and other students. Which brings us to Kingston proper. If we class Norbiton as semi-separate as a community from Kingston (which some might find arguable), not all that much of Kingston proper's electorate actually lies within this constituency, residing mostly in Richmond Park over the railway line, but it does include the perpetually busy town centre, which has a large John Lewis department store and many other large and small shops, both chain and independent. This area is part of the new Kingston Town ward. The predecessor Grove ward was not many years ago competitive for the Tories, but they have fallen back a long way now, and actually failed to beat Labour outright for second place at the 2022 elections - it is the only ward in the borough apart from Norbiton where this was the case. The Lib Dems are streets ahead here now as they are in too many of this constituency's wards for the Tories' liking. The student population is very multiethnic and there are purpose-built student flats off campus; the number of Chinese students at Kingston University has certainly grown, and is enough to sustain two Chinese restaurants which have opened in recent years.
Taking most of the constituency as a whole, this territory is not as wealthy as some parts of Richmond Park, but while there are some pockets of deprivation, especially in some of the postwar council estate parts of Norbiton, this is far from being a poor seat. Essentially for the most part it is fairly comfortably off but absolutely not ostentatiously wealthy, not even in the case of those parts of Coombe which will now be included. These middle-class, more-educated-than-average voters were very pro-Remain for the most part and, with Labour having never been a serious contender to win a parliamentary election around here, they have increasingly since the John Major days gravitated towards the Liberal Democrats. Whilst that party continues to struggle to break down the Conservative-Labour near-duopoly in English parliamentary politics, here they are very strong, and the chances of the Conservatives repeating James Berry's victory in the 2015 general election do not look high at all for a long time to come. Sir Ed, still well short of pensionable age, seems to be sitting pretty and once again this is a seat where the Tories seem destined to continue to struggle until they find ways of regaining their appeal to middle-class voters, usually with university degrees, who voted Remain in the 2016 referendum.
KINGSTON AND SURBITON
This constituency was created in 1997 out of all of the previous Surbiton constituency and the majority of the former Kingston-upon-Thames. Both seats (although Surbiton was not created as a constituency until 1955) had been held by the Conservatives since World War II and Kingston-upon-Thames way before that, generally by comfortable if not always overwhelming majorities, but despite putting more of their energies into other nearby seats the Liberal Democrats took advantage of the Tories' terrible electoral situation at that time by winning by a few handfuls of votes. Their youthful winner at that time, Ed Davey, still remains today, and has now acquired both a knighthood and the leadership of his party, although his tenure was briefly interrupted in 2015 when his party went into electoral meltdown following their going into coalition with the Conservatives. He now looks very safe as his majority climbed back into five figures in 2019, with a swing from the Conservatives to him of a similar amount to that seen in neighbouring Richmond Park at that general election, and grew a good deal further in 2024 as the Tory vote collapsed still further. Currently, there are no Conservative councillors in the constituency at all, although the Tories remain either fully or slightly competitive in a number of the wards - but not all, as the Lib Dems have formidable leads in some of them. The only non-Liberal Democrat councillor elected in the constituency in the 2022 elections, instead, was James Giles of the Kingston Independent Residents' Group, who has made long journeys both political and geographic since being the Agent of George Galloway in the 2021 parliamentary by-election in the Yorkshire constituency of Batley and Spen; indeed, these journeys continued thereafter, as he was Galloway's election organiser in the 2024 Rochdale by-election won by Galloway and his Workers' Party, and was a candidate for that party elsewhere in the 2024 general election. Giles however declines to sit as a Workers' Party councillor in New Malden, at least at present. His group has gained the other seat in that ward, Green Lane and St James's (basically, the most prosperous part of the New Malden community), in a subsequent by-election. That ward's predecessor St James's was, along with a number of wards in the constituency, once regarded as a pretty safe Conservative ward, but the Tories now struggle to compete in its successor. Part of this ward has now been transferred to the Wimbledon constituency, as the Boundary Commission used the pre-2022 wards for their proposals.
This is another very strongly pro-Remain constituency, but it does have significant areas which are less uniformly socially upscale and where there are large numbers of White working class and White lower-middle-class voters who backed Leave. Chessington South and Malden Rushett ward, which stretches into at least semi-rural territory and includes the somewhat scruffy detached village of Malden Rushett, has a long-ago Labour heritage and currently still has a coherent Conservative vote, based mostly on pro-Leave voters who are more likely than average to be small traders or craftspeople. The Tories, however, having competed very effectively in Hook & Chessington North ward (its name was the other way round before 2022), fell back quite a long way in the last council elections, and the Lib Dems who used to be very strong there have regained quite a bit of their past strength.
Further in towards Surbiton, which has a bustling town centre with a reasonable array of shops and restaurants although a much more minor shopping centre than Kingston, voters were particularly strongly in favour of Remain. Most of the territory north of the A3 trunk road is comfortably-off rather than superwealthy like Coombe Hill ward, which remains outside this constituency, with perhaps Coombe Vale (which has now joined this constituency from Richmond Park in the boundary changes) being the most prosperous of all, though one could hardly describe Alexandra and Berrylands as gritty working-class areas either. All those 3 wards have a strong Conservative history, but while the Tories remain at least a little competitive in Alexandra and Coombe Vale, they are remarkably weak in Berrylands considering that it was once considered one of the safest Conservative wards in the borough. Coombe Vale ward, as its name implies, includes parts (though not generally the very wealthiest ones - it's very prosperous rather than superwealthy) of the Coombe community, but also a large chunk of New Malden, reaching the fringes of its town centre. Berrylands has its own railway station and is an almost entirely interwar sub-area of Surbiton not that far away from the latter's town centre, and Alexandra is rather similar in character to it, too. Surbiton Hill ward, too, was once a regularly Conservative ward but has long been dominated by the Liberal Democrats, as has New Malden Village, although a by-election in the predecessor Beverley ward, in very unpropitious circumstances for the Lib Dems about which I propose not to go into detail, did see a rare Conservative win and also an unusually high Labour vote for that area. St Marks & Seething Wells ward in Surbiton, closer to the Thames, has a remarkably weak Conservative vote nowadays, and they only just avoided being beaten into fourth place by Labour in the 2022 elections. The Lib Dems are now challenged there, unusually for this borough, by the Greens, but not that closely particularly in parliamentary elections. Davey himself lives in the riverside part of Surbiton.
New Malden, which community encompasses about two and two-thirds council wards in terms of this constituency, is perhaps best known for its very large Korean community, mostly completely settled here and much of it with naturalised British nationality, in contrast to Acton's Japanese community not that many miles away. Anecdotally Korean voters are said to be quite loyal to the Liberal Democrats. New Malden's high street and Burlington Road off it are full of Korean restaurants, grocery stores and even travel agents, not to mention a Korean church. Tolworth is another distinct area of the constituency, and now has just one eponymous ward - in the old days there were 3 small wards, 2 of which were fairly regularly won by Labour and the other of which tended to oscillate between the Tories and the Liberals. There is quite a strong council estate presence here, but these voters seem much less receptive to the Conservatives than their counterparts in Chessington further out and the Lib Dems now seem to have collared the former Labour vote and made it look a very safe ward. While several wards have a council estate element, one ward, Norbiton, has a much more working-class character than the rest, and has a very substantial council estate element of varying vintages. It is the only ward where Labour at least a little effectively can compete with the Liberal Democrats, but in both the last two council elections the latter have won handily. Norbiton (which has a KT1 postcode, indicating that it is not very far from central Kingston) is more multiethnic than the Kingston-upon-Thames average, and has not just a working-class permanent population (and also a substantial middle-class minority in some of the rather smarter roads which can be found in the ward) but also a goodly number of Kingston University and other students. Which brings us to Kingston proper. If we class Norbiton as semi-separate as a community from Kingston (which some might find arguable), not all that much of Kingston proper's electorate actually lies within this constituency, residing mostly in Richmond Park over the railway line, but it does include the perpetually busy town centre, which has a large John Lewis department store and many other large and small shops, both chain and independent. This area is part of the new Kingston Town ward. The predecessor Grove ward was not many years ago competitive for the Tories, but they have fallen back a long way now, and actually failed to beat Labour outright for second place at the 2022 elections - it is the only ward in the borough apart from Norbiton where this was the case. The Lib Dems are streets ahead here now as they are in too many of this constituency's wards for the Tories' liking. The student population is very multiethnic and there are purpose-built student flats off campus; the number of Chinese students at Kingston University has certainly grown, and is enough to sustain two Chinese restaurants which have opened in recent years.
Taking most of the constituency as a whole, this territory is not as wealthy as some parts of Richmond Park, but while there are some pockets of deprivation, especially in some of the postwar council estate parts of Norbiton, this is far from being a poor seat. Essentially for the most part it is fairly comfortably off but absolutely not ostentatiously wealthy, not even in the case of those parts of Coombe which will now be included. These middle-class, more-educated-than-average voters were very pro-Remain for the most part and, with Labour having never been a serious contender to win a parliamentary election around here, they have increasingly since the John Major days gravitated towards the Liberal Democrats. Whilst that party continues to struggle to break down the Conservative-Labour near-duopoly in English parliamentary politics, here they are very strong, and the chances of the Conservatives repeating James Berry's victory in the 2015 general election do not look high at all for a long time to come. Sir Ed, still well short of pensionable age, seems to be sitting pretty and once again this is a seat where the Tories seem destined to continue to struggle until they find ways of regaining their appeal to middle-class voters, usually with university degrees, who voted Remain in the 2016 referendum.
