Post by Robert Waller on Nov 17, 2023 14:15:22 GMT
This has a basis in the original profile by warofdreams, who has indicated that he wishes to 'pass' on this 'edition' of the online Almanac, plus the comments on boundary changes by Pete Whitehead
This constituency is currently, up to and including the 2019 general election and the July 2023 byelection, what you get when you draw up boundaries based on the current non-metropolitan counties. It's the southern bit of North Yorkshire, but because the City of York is its own county, it creeps around the west side of that city and flows into the area south of Harrogate. Beyond being in the same county, what unites the seat is that it is essentially rural. Most of it has links to York - the two towns of Selby and Tadcaster do - but the southern end of the seat has better links to Wakefield and Castleford, over in West Yorkshire, while the northern end links to Harrogate, which has its own seat. The Ainsty, meanwhile, is a historic area west of York with no major settlements, and which falls only partly within the seat.
However the Boundary Commission final proposals for this constituency remove the "Ainsty" component in Harrogate district, and also remove the north-western part of Selby district around Tadcaster and Church Fenton. Instead this becomes a cross-county constituency, with the ward of Kippax & Methley from the Leeds City Council area being added from the abolished Elmet & Rothwell constituency. The name returns to being simply "Selby", with no mention of the Leeds component – and unusual example of a shortening in the most recent review, and indeed of a short constituency name.
The 2010 boundary changes were very bad for Labour here. The changes this time reverse this to some extent: the areas lost, especially those in Harrogate district, are some of the most Conservative parts of the current constituency, while Kippax & Methley is probably the least Conservative ward in the existing Elmet & Rothwell and reliably elects Labour councillors to Leeds City Council. However, estimates suggest that the Conservative majority in 2019 was still in five figures, and while it became plausible again that Selby could have a Labour MP, it seemed it would probably only happen if the party is winning nationally reasonably comfortably.
However, in June 2023 the Conservative MP for Selby & Ainsty since 2010, announced his intention to resign his seat at the same time as Boris Johnson and Nadine Dorries, but unlike the last named did depart immediately, allowing a byelection to take place on the same day as that caused in Uxbridge & South Ruislip, the next month (20 July). While the former PM’s seat stayed with the Conservatives, to the surprise of many, Selby and Ainsty actually fell to Labour with a two party swing of 23.7%, the largest between Conservative and Labour since Dudley West in 1994. The 25 year old Keir Mather became the new MP and the ‘Baby of the House of Commons’ (its youngest member), displacing Nadia Whittome of Nottingham East.
That this result owed less to the political circumstances of Selby & Ainsty than to the national party situation was largely confirmed when Labour win two more apparently safe Tory seats in October 2023, Mid Bedfordshire (on Nadine Dorries’s eventual departure) and Tamworth, with similar magnitude of swings. Nevertheless Labour’s enormous opinion poll lead showed longevity and suggested that Mather may be able to extend his parliamentary career in the new Selby division.
A seat focused on Selby has existed since 1885, when Barkston Ash was created - stretching further west than the current seat. This was almost always a Conservative seat, the Liberals managing a win at their peak, in a 1905 by-election. Labour didn't stand until 1923, but came close in 1929 and 1945, when they stood a candidate from the agricultural workers' union. In 1983, the area around Selby and Tadcaster became the Selby constituency, which also took in the southern suburbs of York. This was a bellwether, although the Conservative majorities before 1997 were large, and the Labour ones thereafter were small. Since 2010 we've had a seat without the York suburbs.
At first glance, a Conservative seat in rural North Yorkshire is no surprise, but the area around Selby is marked by closed coal mines, normally a mark of an area with high levels of Labour support. The large Selby Colliery complex closed only in 2004, and Kellingley Colliery was the last in the UK, closing in 2015. But these are atypical, having opened in the 1980s and 1960s respectively. Most miners transferred from other mines, on their way out. Those at the Selby Colliery complex mostly commuted in from West Yorkshire, while Kellingley was right by the county boundary anyway. While there were undoubtedly a few miners living in the seat - Labour were very strong in the villages immediately around Kellingley - this wasn't a mining constituency in the traditional sense.
Selby itself was an important inland port and centre for shipbuilding, and in local elections, it still favours the Labour Party. Labour can also perform well in some of the villages around Selby - Riccall, Brotherton, and even Sherburn-in-Elmet, but elsewhere, and particularly in the Harrogate part of the seat, the Conservatives are usually dominant. The 2019 local elections saw some real success for the Yorkshire Party, winning four councillors, led by former Conservative Mike Jordan, but they managed only 3.4% in the general election, well behind the Liberal Democrats who are largely invisible in the seat.
When the Boundary Commission specified the details of the new Selby seat, the district council still existed, but 2019 were its faunal local elections as North Yorkshire became a unitary authority in April 2023, and elections took place for it in May 2022 bur not May 2023). The electoral division boundaries have been redrawn for the new authority, but some evidence can be drawn about the internal preferences within Selby. In 2022 the Conservatives won Brayton & Barlow, Camblesforth & Carlton (yes, yet another one!), Cliffe & North Duffield, Thorpe Willoughby & Hambleton, and Monk Fryston & South Milford. On the other hand Labour took Barlby & Riccall, Selby East and both seats in the larger Selby West division, and Sherburn-in-Elmet. Independents were first in Osgoldcross and Cawood & Escrick. Generally, Labour did better in the more urban and ex-industrial parts, the Tories were stronger the more rural the area.
Then we must add the Leeds council ward of Kippax & Mathley, This did have an election in May 2023, and Labour won convincingly with 60.5% of the vote to the Conservatives’ 26.0%. The numerical lead was 2,801, even on a turnout of just 30.1%. This is no aberration, as Labour have won the Kippax based ward every time in the 50 years since 1973 with the sole exception is a lone Tory victory in 1982. On general election turnouts Kippax & Methley will make a sizeable impact in the Selby seat in Labour’s interest.
Compared with Selby & Ainsty, the newly redrawn seat is decidedly more working class. A good indicator of this is that now its ranking among the 575 constituencies in England and Wales is slightly higher for routine and semi-routine workers than for those in professional and managerial occupations – although both are fairly near the middle of the spread – whereas previously it was distinctly the other way round. In terms of residents possessing educational degrees, Selby slips 100 places down the rankings compared with its predecessor. This is because the departing Ainsty area b[near Harrogate is significantly more middle class than Kippax & Methley. For example Kippax West MSOA was over 26% routine/semi-routine in the 2021 census, and Methley nearly 25% - not particularly high for the Selby seat as a whole, but much more so than, say, the MSOA in the Ainsty section between Knaresborough and Wetherby which includes Spofforth and the splendidly named Kirkby Overblow, which has a total of only 11% in these occupational categories. That Spofforth-based unitary electoral division, by the way, voted 54% Conservative, 37% Green and 9% Yorkshire Party in May 202, with no Labour candidate nominated (Spofforth with Lower Wharfedale & Tockwith). Back in the new seat if Selby, the most working class area by far is Selby Town (38% routine and semi-routine). There are no very upmarket areas economically, though Sherburn-in-Elmet has around 40% in the professional and managerial categories.
It is sometimes assumed that after huge midterm byelection swings, the ‘natural’ party will easily regain lost strongholds at the subsequent general election. Well, up to a point. This does happen, though Liberals and Liberal Democrats have been able to hang in for considerable periods to seats originally won in this manner (Berwick on Tweed, Rochdale, Bermondsey, Newbury). Even in the case if Labour and Conservative gains, there is often a smaller swing at the next general contest due to the legacy effect of the election plus some incumbency benefit. In the case of Selby the boundary changes will undoubtedly assist Keir Mather; and if his namesake is indeed swept into 10 Downing Street there will be a large positive national swing in any case. Labour did hold the previous iteration of Selby three times from 1997 to 2010. So it cannot be assumed that the Conservatives will make an immediate regain here in the flat lands in the geographical heart of the broad acres of Yorkshire.
2021 Census, new boundaries
Age 65+ 20.1% 243/575
Owner occupied 74.6% 65/575
Private rented 13.0% 533/575
Social rented 12.4% 413/575
White 97.5% 69/575
Black 0.4% 505/575
Asian 0.8% 496/575
Managerial & professional 34.5% 236/573
Routine & Semi-routine 25.2% 230/573
Degree level 30.4% 331/575
No qualifications 16.9% 338/575
Students 4.5% 490/575
General Election 2019: Selby and Ainsty
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Conservative Nigel Adams 33,995 60.3 +1.6
Labour Malik Rofidi 13,858 24.6 -9.5
Liberal Democrats Katharine Macy 4,842 8.6 +4.5
Yorkshire Mike Jordan 1,900 3.4
Green Arnold Warneken 1,823 3.2
C Majority 20,137 35.7 +10.1
Turnout 56,418 71.7 -2.4
Conservative hold
Swing 5.5 Lab to C
By-election 20 July 2023: Selby and Ainsty
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Labour Keir Mather 16,456 46.0 +21.4
Conservative Claire Holmes 12,295 34.3 -26.0
Green Arnold Warneken 1,838 5.1 +1.9 Mike Jordan 1,503 4.2 +0.8
Reform UK Dave Kent 1,332 3.7 New
Liberal Democrats Matt Walker 1,188 3.3 -5.3
Independent Nick Palmer 342 1.0 New
SDP John Waterstone 314 0.9 New
Monster Raving Loony Sir Archibald Stanton 172 0.5 New
Heritage Guy Phoenix 162 0.5 New
Andrew Gray 99 0.3 New
Independent Tyler Wilson-Kerr 67 0.2 New
Climate Luke Wellock 39 0.1 New
Lab Majority 4,161 11.7 N/A
Turnout 35,807 44.8 -26.9
Labour gain from Conservative
Swing 23.7 to Lab
Boundary Changes
Selby consists of
73.4% of Selby & Ainsty
20.9% of Elmet & Rothwell
Map
boundarycommissionforengland.independent.gov.uk/review2023/9bc0b2ea-7915-4997-9d4a-3e313c0ceb51/yorkshire-and-the-humber/Yorkshire%20and%20the%20Humber%20Region_530_Selby_Landscape.pdf
2019 Notional Results on New Boundaries (Rallings and Thrasher)
This constituency is currently, up to and including the 2019 general election and the July 2023 byelection, what you get when you draw up boundaries based on the current non-metropolitan counties. It's the southern bit of North Yorkshire, but because the City of York is its own county, it creeps around the west side of that city and flows into the area south of Harrogate. Beyond being in the same county, what unites the seat is that it is essentially rural. Most of it has links to York - the two towns of Selby and Tadcaster do - but the southern end of the seat has better links to Wakefield and Castleford, over in West Yorkshire, while the northern end links to Harrogate, which has its own seat. The Ainsty, meanwhile, is a historic area west of York with no major settlements, and which falls only partly within the seat.
However the Boundary Commission final proposals for this constituency remove the "Ainsty" component in Harrogate district, and also remove the north-western part of Selby district around Tadcaster and Church Fenton. Instead this becomes a cross-county constituency, with the ward of Kippax & Methley from the Leeds City Council area being added from the abolished Elmet & Rothwell constituency. The name returns to being simply "Selby", with no mention of the Leeds component – and unusual example of a shortening in the most recent review, and indeed of a short constituency name.
The 2010 boundary changes were very bad for Labour here. The changes this time reverse this to some extent: the areas lost, especially those in Harrogate district, are some of the most Conservative parts of the current constituency, while Kippax & Methley is probably the least Conservative ward in the existing Elmet & Rothwell and reliably elects Labour councillors to Leeds City Council. However, estimates suggest that the Conservative majority in 2019 was still in five figures, and while it became plausible again that Selby could have a Labour MP, it seemed it would probably only happen if the party is winning nationally reasonably comfortably.
However, in June 2023 the Conservative MP for Selby & Ainsty since 2010, announced his intention to resign his seat at the same time as Boris Johnson and Nadine Dorries, but unlike the last named did depart immediately, allowing a byelection to take place on the same day as that caused in Uxbridge & South Ruislip, the next month (20 July). While the former PM’s seat stayed with the Conservatives, to the surprise of many, Selby and Ainsty actually fell to Labour with a two party swing of 23.7%, the largest between Conservative and Labour since Dudley West in 1994. The 25 year old Keir Mather became the new MP and the ‘Baby of the House of Commons’ (its youngest member), displacing Nadia Whittome of Nottingham East.
That this result owed less to the political circumstances of Selby & Ainsty than to the national party situation was largely confirmed when Labour win two more apparently safe Tory seats in October 2023, Mid Bedfordshire (on Nadine Dorries’s eventual departure) and Tamworth, with similar magnitude of swings. Nevertheless Labour’s enormous opinion poll lead showed longevity and suggested that Mather may be able to extend his parliamentary career in the new Selby division.
A seat focused on Selby has existed since 1885, when Barkston Ash was created - stretching further west than the current seat. This was almost always a Conservative seat, the Liberals managing a win at their peak, in a 1905 by-election. Labour didn't stand until 1923, but came close in 1929 and 1945, when they stood a candidate from the agricultural workers' union. In 1983, the area around Selby and Tadcaster became the Selby constituency, which also took in the southern suburbs of York. This was a bellwether, although the Conservative majorities before 1997 were large, and the Labour ones thereafter were small. Since 2010 we've had a seat without the York suburbs.
At first glance, a Conservative seat in rural North Yorkshire is no surprise, but the area around Selby is marked by closed coal mines, normally a mark of an area with high levels of Labour support. The large Selby Colliery complex closed only in 2004, and Kellingley Colliery was the last in the UK, closing in 2015. But these are atypical, having opened in the 1980s and 1960s respectively. Most miners transferred from other mines, on their way out. Those at the Selby Colliery complex mostly commuted in from West Yorkshire, while Kellingley was right by the county boundary anyway. While there were undoubtedly a few miners living in the seat - Labour were very strong in the villages immediately around Kellingley - this wasn't a mining constituency in the traditional sense.
Selby itself was an important inland port and centre for shipbuilding, and in local elections, it still favours the Labour Party. Labour can also perform well in some of the villages around Selby - Riccall, Brotherton, and even Sherburn-in-Elmet, but elsewhere, and particularly in the Harrogate part of the seat, the Conservatives are usually dominant. The 2019 local elections saw some real success for the Yorkshire Party, winning four councillors, led by former Conservative Mike Jordan, but they managed only 3.4% in the general election, well behind the Liberal Democrats who are largely invisible in the seat.
When the Boundary Commission specified the details of the new Selby seat, the district council still existed, but 2019 were its faunal local elections as North Yorkshire became a unitary authority in April 2023, and elections took place for it in May 2022 bur not May 2023). The electoral division boundaries have been redrawn for the new authority, but some evidence can be drawn about the internal preferences within Selby. In 2022 the Conservatives won Brayton & Barlow, Camblesforth & Carlton (yes, yet another one!), Cliffe & North Duffield, Thorpe Willoughby & Hambleton, and Monk Fryston & South Milford. On the other hand Labour took Barlby & Riccall, Selby East and both seats in the larger Selby West division, and Sherburn-in-Elmet. Independents were first in Osgoldcross and Cawood & Escrick. Generally, Labour did better in the more urban and ex-industrial parts, the Tories were stronger the more rural the area.
Then we must add the Leeds council ward of Kippax & Mathley, This did have an election in May 2023, and Labour won convincingly with 60.5% of the vote to the Conservatives’ 26.0%. The numerical lead was 2,801, even on a turnout of just 30.1%. This is no aberration, as Labour have won the Kippax based ward every time in the 50 years since 1973 with the sole exception is a lone Tory victory in 1982. On general election turnouts Kippax & Methley will make a sizeable impact in the Selby seat in Labour’s interest.
Compared with Selby & Ainsty, the newly redrawn seat is decidedly more working class. A good indicator of this is that now its ranking among the 575 constituencies in England and Wales is slightly higher for routine and semi-routine workers than for those in professional and managerial occupations – although both are fairly near the middle of the spread – whereas previously it was distinctly the other way round. In terms of residents possessing educational degrees, Selby slips 100 places down the rankings compared with its predecessor. This is because the departing Ainsty area b[near Harrogate is significantly more middle class than Kippax & Methley. For example Kippax West MSOA was over 26% routine/semi-routine in the 2021 census, and Methley nearly 25% - not particularly high for the Selby seat as a whole, but much more so than, say, the MSOA in the Ainsty section between Knaresborough and Wetherby which includes Spofforth and the splendidly named Kirkby Overblow, which has a total of only 11% in these occupational categories. That Spofforth-based unitary electoral division, by the way, voted 54% Conservative, 37% Green and 9% Yorkshire Party in May 202, with no Labour candidate nominated (Spofforth with Lower Wharfedale & Tockwith). Back in the new seat if Selby, the most working class area by far is Selby Town (38% routine and semi-routine). There are no very upmarket areas economically, though Sherburn-in-Elmet has around 40% in the professional and managerial categories.
It is sometimes assumed that after huge midterm byelection swings, the ‘natural’ party will easily regain lost strongholds at the subsequent general election. Well, up to a point. This does happen, though Liberals and Liberal Democrats have been able to hang in for considerable periods to seats originally won in this manner (Berwick on Tweed, Rochdale, Bermondsey, Newbury). Even in the case if Labour and Conservative gains, there is often a smaller swing at the next general contest due to the legacy effect of the election plus some incumbency benefit. In the case of Selby the boundary changes will undoubtedly assist Keir Mather; and if his namesake is indeed swept into 10 Downing Street there will be a large positive national swing in any case. Labour did hold the previous iteration of Selby three times from 1997 to 2010. So it cannot be assumed that the Conservatives will make an immediate regain here in the flat lands in the geographical heart of the broad acres of Yorkshire.
2021 Census, new boundaries
Age 65+ 20.1% 243/575
Owner occupied 74.6% 65/575
Private rented 13.0% 533/575
Social rented 12.4% 413/575
White 97.5% 69/575
Black 0.4% 505/575
Asian 0.8% 496/575
Managerial & professional 34.5% 236/573
Routine & Semi-routine 25.2% 230/573
Degree level 30.4% 331/575
No qualifications 16.9% 338/575
Students 4.5% 490/575
General Election 2019: Selby and Ainsty
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Conservative Nigel Adams 33,995 60.3 +1.6
Labour Malik Rofidi 13,858 24.6 -9.5
Liberal Democrats Katharine Macy 4,842 8.6 +4.5
Yorkshire Mike Jordan 1,900 3.4
Green Arnold Warneken 1,823 3.2
C Majority 20,137 35.7 +10.1
Turnout 56,418 71.7 -2.4
Conservative hold
Swing 5.5 Lab to C
By-election 20 July 2023: Selby and Ainsty
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Labour Keir Mather 16,456 46.0 +21.4
Conservative Claire Holmes 12,295 34.3 -26.0
Green Arnold Warneken 1,838 5.1 +1.9 Mike Jordan 1,503 4.2 +0.8
Reform UK Dave Kent 1,332 3.7 New
Liberal Democrats Matt Walker 1,188 3.3 -5.3
Independent Nick Palmer 342 1.0 New
SDP John Waterstone 314 0.9 New
Monster Raving Loony Sir Archibald Stanton 172 0.5 New
Heritage Guy Phoenix 162 0.5 New
Andrew Gray 99 0.3 New
Independent Tyler Wilson-Kerr 67 0.2 New
Climate Luke Wellock 39 0.1 New
Lab Majority 4,161 11.7 N/A
Turnout 35,807 44.8 -26.9
Labour gain from Conservative
Swing 23.7 to Lab
Boundary Changes
Selby consists of
73.4% of Selby & Ainsty
20.9% of Elmet & Rothwell
Map
boundarycommissionforengland.independent.gov.uk/review2023/9bc0b2ea-7915-4997-9d4a-3e313c0ceb51/yorkshire-and-the-humber/Yorkshire%20and%20the%20Humber%20Region_530_Selby_Landscape.pdf
2019 Notional Results on New Boundaries (Rallings and Thrasher)
| Con | 30575 | 58.0% |
| Lab | 15737 | 29.8% |
| LD | 3165 | 6.0% |
| YP | 1678 | 3.2% |
| Green | 1602 | 3.0% |
| Con Majority | 14838 | 28.1% |
