Post by YL on Dec 9, 2023 11:42:08 GMT
This is a new name, but it is essentially the successor to the existing Barnsley Central constituency, and to the Barnsley constituency which existed before 1983. The name change is a fair reflection of the boundary changes, which remove Kingstone ward, south-west of Barnsley town centre, and add a number of communities to the east of the town, including Cudworth and Grimethorpe, which have been in the Barnsley East constituency.
Barnsley is the heartland of the South Yorkshire coalfield. It still hosts the headquarters of the National Union of Mineworkers, and books and films set in the coalfield are often associated with either this constituency or Barnsley South; as mentioned Grimethorpe, the mining village whose brass band inspired Brassed Off, is one of the areas added to the constituency. It is also the constituency which produced Dickie Bird, Darren Gough (who it was supposedly suggested once might stand here as a Conservative candidate) and Michael Parkinson. Unsurprisingly it has a long history of Labour representation, with all areas in the constituency having had Labour MPs continuously since 1935.
It is also a deprived constituency, though not spectacularly so: the old Barnsley Central was the 125th most deprived constituency in the all-UK ranking used in Alasdair Rae's charts, between Belfast East and Plymouth Moor View and slightly less deprived than Birmingham Edgbaston, and as the tour below will show it does contain some better off areas. It does, overall, have a strongly working class demographic profile, with high proportions in routine jobs and in "lower supervisory and technical occupations". Proportions with degrees are low and with no qualifications high, though in both cases Barnsley South is more extreme. Like most coalfield areas, it is not very diverse, being 96.8% white.
The Barnsley urban area includes the core of the town together with a number of adjacent towns, all with strong mining connections, which formed Urban Districts of their own before 1974. This constituency contains most of the core (though not its southern parts, which are unsurprisingly in Barnsley South) as well as the area of Monk Bretton on the other side of the River Dearne (once its own Urban District, though annexed to Barnsley long before 1974). Parts of these areas have very high deprivation, especially around the council estates of New Lodge and Athersley to the north of Monk Bretton and the Lundwood area to the east, and also areas just to the north and south of the town centre. However there are also areas, including other parts of Monk Bretton and the Old Town area north-west of the town centre, which are close to median deprivation.
To the north-west it includes the former Urban District of Darton, which now forms two wards of Barnsley council and as well as the eponymous village includes the areas of Staincross, Mapplewell, Kexborough, Barugh and Barugh Green. The Darton area is better off than most of Barnsley, with much of the area having quite low deprivation, though higher figures are found in Kexborough and part of Staincross. Together with some north-western parts of Barnsley town, it is also the part of the constituency with the highest rate of relatively middle class employment (the "lower managerial, administrative and professional" category) and education levels, though the levels of the latter are still mostly a little below the England and Wales average.
East of Darton is Royston, which was in Wakefield constituency before 1983 and some distinctiveness from Barnsley is shown by linguistic research showing that the Royston accent still features some more Midland-sounding vowels, apparently the legacy of miners moving there from Staffordshire. Further east, and previously in the Barnsley East constituency and before 1983 in Hemsworth, is the town of Cudworth (as with Dodworth on the other side of Barnsley, the W is silent), another mining community, and beyond Cudworth is the North East ward, which includes Grimethorpe. Cudworth and Royston are moderately deprived, as are the parts of North East ward other than Grimethorpe, but Grimethorpe itself, unsurprisingly, is one of the poorest parts of the constituency.
The MP for Barnsley Central, expected to inherit this constituency, is Dan Jarvis, who was first elected in a 2011 by-election caused by his predecessor Eric Illsley being caught up in the expenses scandal (to the extent of being imprisoned after his resignation from the Commons). As with many ex-mining areas there is a history of support for the populist right and for Brexit, and in 2019 Barnsley Central gave the Brexit Party their highest vote share, just over 30%, with Jarvis's majority over them cut to under 4000.
At local level Labour have been a little more secure here than elsewhere in Barnsley borough, though there have been occasional victories for the Barnsley Independent Group and in 2019 the Democrats and Veterans party won Monk Bretton. There is a particular tradition of weighing the Labour vote in St Helens ward, which covers Athersley and New Lodge. There is one exception, though: the Liberal Democrats have developed an effective campaigning machine in Barnsley and tend to win the wards they target. Since 2019 Darton East has been one of these targets, and it now has three Lib Dem councillors, the only non-Labour councillors at present within the boundaries of the new constituency.
2019 notional result (Rallings & Thrasher):
Lab 17141 (38.5%)
Brexit Party 13139 (29.5%)
Con 10663 (24.0%)
Lib Dem 1588 (3.6%)
Green 1051 (2.4%)
Other 898 (2.0%)
Lab majority 4002 (9.0%)
Barnsley is the heartland of the South Yorkshire coalfield. It still hosts the headquarters of the National Union of Mineworkers, and books and films set in the coalfield are often associated with either this constituency or Barnsley South; as mentioned Grimethorpe, the mining village whose brass band inspired Brassed Off, is one of the areas added to the constituency. It is also the constituency which produced Dickie Bird, Darren Gough (who it was supposedly suggested once might stand here as a Conservative candidate) and Michael Parkinson. Unsurprisingly it has a long history of Labour representation, with all areas in the constituency having had Labour MPs continuously since 1935.
It is also a deprived constituency, though not spectacularly so: the old Barnsley Central was the 125th most deprived constituency in the all-UK ranking used in Alasdair Rae's charts, between Belfast East and Plymouth Moor View and slightly less deprived than Birmingham Edgbaston, and as the tour below will show it does contain some better off areas. It does, overall, have a strongly working class demographic profile, with high proportions in routine jobs and in "lower supervisory and technical occupations". Proportions with degrees are low and with no qualifications high, though in both cases Barnsley South is more extreme. Like most coalfield areas, it is not very diverse, being 96.8% white.
The Barnsley urban area includes the core of the town together with a number of adjacent towns, all with strong mining connections, which formed Urban Districts of their own before 1974. This constituency contains most of the core (though not its southern parts, which are unsurprisingly in Barnsley South) as well as the area of Monk Bretton on the other side of the River Dearne (once its own Urban District, though annexed to Barnsley long before 1974). Parts of these areas have very high deprivation, especially around the council estates of New Lodge and Athersley to the north of Monk Bretton and the Lundwood area to the east, and also areas just to the north and south of the town centre. However there are also areas, including other parts of Monk Bretton and the Old Town area north-west of the town centre, which are close to median deprivation.
To the north-west it includes the former Urban District of Darton, which now forms two wards of Barnsley council and as well as the eponymous village includes the areas of Staincross, Mapplewell, Kexborough, Barugh and Barugh Green. The Darton area is better off than most of Barnsley, with much of the area having quite low deprivation, though higher figures are found in Kexborough and part of Staincross. Together with some north-western parts of Barnsley town, it is also the part of the constituency with the highest rate of relatively middle class employment (the "lower managerial, administrative and professional" category) and education levels, though the levels of the latter are still mostly a little below the England and Wales average.
East of Darton is Royston, which was in Wakefield constituency before 1983 and some distinctiveness from Barnsley is shown by linguistic research showing that the Royston accent still features some more Midland-sounding vowels, apparently the legacy of miners moving there from Staffordshire. Further east, and previously in the Barnsley East constituency and before 1983 in Hemsworth, is the town of Cudworth (as with Dodworth on the other side of Barnsley, the W is silent), another mining community, and beyond Cudworth is the North East ward, which includes Grimethorpe. Cudworth and Royston are moderately deprived, as are the parts of North East ward other than Grimethorpe, but Grimethorpe itself, unsurprisingly, is one of the poorest parts of the constituency.
The MP for Barnsley Central, expected to inherit this constituency, is Dan Jarvis, who was first elected in a 2011 by-election caused by his predecessor Eric Illsley being caught up in the expenses scandal (to the extent of being imprisoned after his resignation from the Commons). As with many ex-mining areas there is a history of support for the populist right and for Brexit, and in 2019 Barnsley Central gave the Brexit Party their highest vote share, just over 30%, with Jarvis's majority over them cut to under 4000.
At local level Labour have been a little more secure here than elsewhere in Barnsley borough, though there have been occasional victories for the Barnsley Independent Group and in 2019 the Democrats and Veterans party won Monk Bretton. There is a particular tradition of weighing the Labour vote in St Helens ward, which covers Athersley and New Lodge. There is one exception, though: the Liberal Democrats have developed an effective campaigning machine in Barnsley and tend to win the wards they target. Since 2019 Darton East has been one of these targets, and it now has three Lib Dem councillors, the only non-Labour councillors at present within the boundaries of the new constituency.
2019 notional result (Rallings & Thrasher):
Lab 17141 (38.5%)
Brexit Party 13139 (29.5%)
Con 10663 (24.0%)
Lib Dem 1588 (3.6%)
Green 1051 (2.4%)
Other 898 (2.0%)
Lab majority 4002 (9.0%)
