Post by doktorb🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️ on Jul 20, 2023 15:34:15 GMT
This profile contains some content from Devil Wincarnate in the original thread
Wigan is one of those towns, perhaps more specifically one of those names of towns, where the reputation overshadows the reality. The age of coal and northern soul has long since passed. and in any case, the constituency has always covered far more than its history of manual labour. The town is at the very south of the constituency, which broadly covers the small towns and suburbs running along the A49 in the direction of Lancashire, and the two B-roads heading to either Bolton, or Ormskirk, These northern areas of the Borough have a history of voting Conservative, Standish and Shevington amongst them. The ward of Wigan Central, which takes in both mainline railway stations and the residential area of Swinley, has also voted Conservative in the early-to-mid 2000s. Standish is monolithically white and English born, with 45% in the managerial/professional/director category; Shevington is barely a tenth of a percentage different.
Wigan is one of those towns, perhaps more specifically one of those names of towns, where the reputation overshadows the reality. The age of coal and northern soul has long since passed. and in any case, the constituency has always covered far more than its history of manual labour. The town is at the very south of the constituency, which broadly covers the small towns and suburbs running along the A49 in the direction of Lancashire, and the two B-roads heading to either Bolton, or Ormskirk, These northern areas of the Borough have a history of voting Conservative, Standish and Shevington amongst them. The ward of Wigan Central, which takes in both mainline railway stations and the residential area of Swinley, has also voted Conservative in the early-to-mid 2000s. Standish is monolithically white and English born, with 45% in the managerial/professional/director category; Shevington is barely a tenth of a percentage different.
One characteristic of Wigan politics which seems unique to the area is its myriad residential groups: various shades of independents, community action parties and the like have peppered local election results for years, sometimes gaining seats on the council. These results do not translate to parliamentary elections, however. Wigan has a long tradition of being a Labour town, both because of, and despite, its heritage of working class conservatism. It is barely ethnically mixed at all, as little as 1%, and has a small overall percentage of residents born outside the UK. The constituency is one where mixed employment opportunities have taken over from its more industrial, dirt under the fingernails past: construction, transport and professional/admin score highly, with a still generous manufacturing sector too.
Its close transport links to Manchester come with positive and negative consequences. In the 1990s, Wigan's town centre was transformed by the mammoth "The Galleries" shopping centre, built in full glorious 1990s style, all beige and buff brick with portal windows. The advent of cheaper travel within Greater Manchester tore away all reason for people to shop in Wigan, and it shows. "The Galleries" is a ghost-ship sailing in a town centre patched together with crossed fingers and prayers. Only in the pub trade does Wigan seem confident, with Wigan Central (based in the railway arches underneath the West Coast Mainline) being awarded by CAMRA every year and making it to the CAMRA national pub of the year contest finals. The regular trains to regional and national destinations make the town, and the wider Borough, an affordable outcrop for Manchester based professionals. It may not, long term, be doing much for Wigan's economic certainties. You may be interested in the eccentric tourist attraction of the Pie Eating Championships, held here partly in respect to the moniker given to the town, reportedly by cotton workers looking down at miners.
Wigan was one of the very few boroughs in Lancashire to possess Royal Charters during the Medieval period, and is notable for having returned a Member to the Model Parliament in the 13th century. The 1918 general election returned a Labour MP to Wigan. It has remained red ever since: six of them, four from by-elections, and in Lisa Nandy, the first woman for the town itself following Yvonne Fovargue in Makerfield. Results at parliamentary level have less in common with, say, Manchester or Liverpool in terms of percentage wins for Labour. The Conservatives can take a quarter of the vote here, just over 30% in 2019, and this coupled with larger than most ballot papers, can suppress the Labour vote. The voters here have demonstrated their willingness to protest against perceived Labour complacency: the BNP saved its deposit in 2010, as did UKIP in the 1999 by-election, 2010, and 2015. This is a Leave seat - 64% - and the Brexit Party got 13% here in December 2019. Other parties do make their mark here, but while opposition groups both large and breakaway remain active, Wigan is not quite so typical northern as it may seem. Caution required.
