Post by Robert Waller on Dec 31, 2023 23:56:07 GMT
This is based on the original profile by The Bishop, with commentary on boundary changes by Pete Whitehead and local election and census updates by me.
Carlisle is Cumbria's only city and its biggest urban centre, and dates back to Roman times and very likely even earlier. Once a heavily fortified garrison just south of the border with Scotland (important military installations have remained nearby into the last few years) it became a merchant centre when the importance of the castle faded, and then a major mill town with the arrival of the railways which turned it into an important transport hub. Until that time settlement had been mostly confined within the old city walls, resulting in some notorious overcrowded slums - and real expansion did not come until the construction of major council estates on the periphery in the first half of the 20th century. In recent years it has become the centre of the University of Cumbria, and has the highest proportion of students in the county. It also has slightly lower than average figures for Cumbria regarding its ethnic homogeneity (under 97% white and 93% "white British") – though still very high compared with most seats much further south.
It has sent an MP to parliament pretty much continuously since medieval times, and following the 1832 Reform Act was Liberal for most of the period subsequently until WW1. As with most other Cumbrian seats Labour only became a force after then, indeed 1918 was the first time a Labour candidate even stood (though the first 1910 GE was notable for one of the final electoral interventions of the once powerful Social Democratic Federation) and whilst a "Coalition" Liberal candidate beat them 2 to 1 on that occasion, Labour broke through to win in 1922 against evenly split Tory and "National Liberal" opposition. Labour lost to the Tories in 1924, won again in 1929 but then lost in the 1931 drubbing, and did not subsequently win Carlisle back until 1945.
Fairly comfortable Labour wins then and in 1950 were ultimately overturned by a 4% Tory swing in 1955 (above average for that election, especially in marginals) which saw the victory of Donald Johnson, a medical doctor and one of the parliamentary "characters" of his day. His outspokenness led to him falling out with much of his local party and he was effectively deselected before the 1964 GE - he stood as an Independent then but only polled a few per cent as the seat returned to the Labour column with Ronald Lewis who was already a near veteran after having fought no fewer than five previous seats unsuccessfully since 1945. Having broken his duck, however, he proceeded to go on a continuous winning run until 1983 - though that last contest (when he was in his 74th year) saw him squeak home by just 71 votes, making Carlisle the most marginal Labour seat in the whole election.
The closeness of that contest may have influenced Labour's selection of very much a local man, Eric Martlew, as their new standard bearer for the 1987 GE. Though the Tory vote increased to over 40%, Labour won by over 900 votes then - and by over 3k in 1992. Their gradual move to security then came under at least theoretical threat, however, as boundary changes finally meant more rural territory to its west being tacked on to the seat. Until then, the constituency had almost invariably been tightly drawn around the city itself - however this had led to it becoming increasingly undersized, and the 1973 local government reforms had meant the new Carlisle district council taking in large swathes of rural territory in all directions - which meant that, unlike the old Westminster seat, Labour have only been able to get control in good years for the party - whilst in the city itself the Tories have generally had only a few bankers, notably Belah and Stanwix wards. Thwarted in this ambition before 1983, the Tories finally got their long standing wish - only for their unpopularity after 1992 to make it all academic anyway. Martlew stormed to a win of 12k votes and 28% come 1997, the new mostly rural additions and all.
As elsewhere in Cumbria come 2001, foot and mouth hit Labour and their majority more than halved with a 6% swing to the Tories - who had also swept to an overall majority in the district council in 1999 all-out elections. They were thus optimistic going into 2005, but Martlew held on with almost no adverse swing at all. Labour also recovered in local terms to make the council hung again, but this rosy outlook was disrupted by Martlew's unexpected announcement that he would stand down at the coming GE (he was only 61 when he retired) and a then somewhat acrimonious battle within the local Labour ranks to succeed him. A swing of 6% at the 2010 GE saw a win by 800 votes for John Stephenson, the only Tory gain in Cumbria that year. Labour had high hopes of reversing that in 2015, but a bitterly disappointing result for them saw Stephenson's majority increase to over 2.5k - as in other places the Lib Dem collapse seemed to benefit the Tories more than Labour, whilst the 12% for UKIP seemed to come at least equally from both "main" parties. 2017 saw Labour's share increase by 6% (which would surely have won it for them two years earlier) but the plunge in the previous UKIP vote meant Stephenson's majority was hardly dented. A 60% vote for Brexit in the 2016 referendum mean that any "Brexit election" was only likely to go one way here - and come December 2019 the Tory share leapt to 55% and Stephenson luxuriated in a winning margin of over 8k and 19% of the vote (a minor curiosity, the UKIP share of 2.4% was the highest anywhere in the UK). A harbinger of this might also have been seen in the local council elections earlier that year - an all out contest after boundary changes saw the Tories emerge as the biggest party despite their poor showing nationally, Labour seeing below average votes and turnouts in their traditionally safe estates in the east and south of the city (Independents now dominate Botcherby at local level, whilst Labour dropping a seat to UKIP by a single vote was particularly embarrassing).
In the most recent local elections here, in May 2022 for the new Cumberland unitary authority that came into being in 2023, the Tories won no seats at all within the city of Carlisle; Belah was in effect gained by the Greens, while the Liberal Democrats gained Stanwix Urban. In both cases their predecessors had been solidly Conservative for over 40 years, including during the ‘New Labour’ years. These were also the only victories for those parties in 2022, though the Independents won Botcherby as usual. Labour won all the rest, including the marginals west of the centre Belle Vue (narrowly) and Yewdale (a gain). Harraby South was another narrow hold, as was Morton in south west Carlisle, where there was a large swing to the Tories in 2022. The city centre Castle was a Labour hold (though with only 48%, the opposition being evenly divided between Green and Conservative). The other wards were easy Labour wins by at least two to one: Currock, Harraby North, Upperton, and Denton Holme. Outside the city, but in the constituency, the Tories did hold Wetheral by around two to one over Labour.
Currock and Upperton are part of the peripheral ring of social housing estates on the southern edge of the city (which also includes Botcherby, parts of Harraby, and Morton) that contrast with the 80% owner occupation in Belah, for example. The ‘council estate’ neighbourhoods also have a very high level of employment in working class (routine and semi routine) occupations – over 40% in the 2021 census in the MSOAs covering Botcherby & Harraby, Morton & Raffles and Currock & Upperton – but there are no extensive strongly middle class parts of Carlisle. Indeed, even after the forthcoming boundary changes makes the seat much more rural, the constituency overall is still decidedly more plebeian than the national average.
The boundary review here removed Dalston and Burgh (6,000 voters, and a Liberal Democrat win in May 2022) from the West of the constituency but brought in around 15,000 rural voters on the other side of Carlisle - 'the Border' area from the abolished Penrith & The Border, so that now this seat includes the whole of the former Carlisle district except for the aforementioned Dalston & Burgh ward. The new territory includes small towns like Brampton and Longtown as well as numerous villages, and at Cumberland council level was shared bêtween Conservative and Liberal Democrat victories in May 2022. These boundary changes did boost the notional Conservative majority from 8,319 to around 11,000 - but it remained a seat Labour can (and needed to) win.
That is the sort of margin that is difficult - though far from impossible - to lose in a single election save for a 1997 style anti-government landslide, but still Stephenson could rest on his laurels. This seat contains a large number of traditional "swing" voters who could be won over to a "time for a change appeal" after well over a decade of Tory government, and Brexit being less of a factor helped Labour recover. In July 2024 there was a swing of nearly 17%, and Julie Minns became the first ever female MP in the Carlisle constituency's long history, dating back to 1295. Nevertheless, close contests have been a regular occurrence for this seat in the last century, and could well be so in the future too.
2021 Census, new boundaries
Age 65+ 21.3% 192/575
Owner occupied 67.1% 256/575
Private rented 17.9% 300/575
Social rented 14.9% 289/575
White 96.7% 93/575
Black 0.3% 504/575
Asian 1.5% 446/575
Managerial & professional 27.0% 451/575
Routine & Semi-routine 31.4% 56/575
Degree level 27.3% 421/575
No qualifications 20.2% 185/575
Students 5.3% 334/575
General Election 2024: Carlisle
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Labour Julie Minns 18,129 39.4 +4.9
Conservative John Stevenson 12,929 28.1 −28.4
Reform UK Stephen Ward 9,295 20.5 N/A
Liberal Democrats Brian Wernham 2,982 6.5 +1.5
Green Gavin Hawkton 1,922 4.2 +2.6
Independent Sean Reed 303 0.7 N/A
SDP Rachel Hayton 244 0.5 N/A
Independent Thomas Lynestrider 175 0.4 N/A
Lab Majority 5,200 11.3 N/A
2024 electorate 77,863
Turnout 45,979 59.1 −8.4
Labour gain from Conservative
Swing 16.7 C to Lab
General Election 2019: Carlisle
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Conservative John Stevenson 23,659 55.2 +5.3
Labour Ruth Alcroft 15,340 35.8 −8.0
Liberal Democrats Julia Aglionby 2,829 6.6 +3.7
UKIP Fiona Mills 1,045 2.4 −1.0
C Majority 8,319 19.4 +13.3
Turnout 42,873 65.9 −3.2
Conservative hold
Swing 6.7 Lab to C
Boundary Changes
Carlisle consists of
90.6% of Carlisle
26.4% of Penrith & The Border
Map
boundarycommissionforengland.independent.gov.uk/review2023/9bc0b2ea-7915-4997-9d4a-3e313c0ceb51/north-west/North%20West_226_Carlisle_Portrait.pdf
2019 Notional result (Rallings & Thrasher)
Carlisle is Cumbria's only city and its biggest urban centre, and dates back to Roman times and very likely even earlier. Once a heavily fortified garrison just south of the border with Scotland (important military installations have remained nearby into the last few years) it became a merchant centre when the importance of the castle faded, and then a major mill town with the arrival of the railways which turned it into an important transport hub. Until that time settlement had been mostly confined within the old city walls, resulting in some notorious overcrowded slums - and real expansion did not come until the construction of major council estates on the periphery in the first half of the 20th century. In recent years it has become the centre of the University of Cumbria, and has the highest proportion of students in the county. It also has slightly lower than average figures for Cumbria regarding its ethnic homogeneity (under 97% white and 93% "white British") – though still very high compared with most seats much further south.
It has sent an MP to parliament pretty much continuously since medieval times, and following the 1832 Reform Act was Liberal for most of the period subsequently until WW1. As with most other Cumbrian seats Labour only became a force after then, indeed 1918 was the first time a Labour candidate even stood (though the first 1910 GE was notable for one of the final electoral interventions of the once powerful Social Democratic Federation) and whilst a "Coalition" Liberal candidate beat them 2 to 1 on that occasion, Labour broke through to win in 1922 against evenly split Tory and "National Liberal" opposition. Labour lost to the Tories in 1924, won again in 1929 but then lost in the 1931 drubbing, and did not subsequently win Carlisle back until 1945.
Fairly comfortable Labour wins then and in 1950 were ultimately overturned by a 4% Tory swing in 1955 (above average for that election, especially in marginals) which saw the victory of Donald Johnson, a medical doctor and one of the parliamentary "characters" of his day. His outspokenness led to him falling out with much of his local party and he was effectively deselected before the 1964 GE - he stood as an Independent then but only polled a few per cent as the seat returned to the Labour column with Ronald Lewis who was already a near veteran after having fought no fewer than five previous seats unsuccessfully since 1945. Having broken his duck, however, he proceeded to go on a continuous winning run until 1983 - though that last contest (when he was in his 74th year) saw him squeak home by just 71 votes, making Carlisle the most marginal Labour seat in the whole election.
The closeness of that contest may have influenced Labour's selection of very much a local man, Eric Martlew, as their new standard bearer for the 1987 GE. Though the Tory vote increased to over 40%, Labour won by over 900 votes then - and by over 3k in 1992. Their gradual move to security then came under at least theoretical threat, however, as boundary changes finally meant more rural territory to its west being tacked on to the seat. Until then, the constituency had almost invariably been tightly drawn around the city itself - however this had led to it becoming increasingly undersized, and the 1973 local government reforms had meant the new Carlisle district council taking in large swathes of rural territory in all directions - which meant that, unlike the old Westminster seat, Labour have only been able to get control in good years for the party - whilst in the city itself the Tories have generally had only a few bankers, notably Belah and Stanwix wards. Thwarted in this ambition before 1983, the Tories finally got their long standing wish - only for their unpopularity after 1992 to make it all academic anyway. Martlew stormed to a win of 12k votes and 28% come 1997, the new mostly rural additions and all.
As elsewhere in Cumbria come 2001, foot and mouth hit Labour and their majority more than halved with a 6% swing to the Tories - who had also swept to an overall majority in the district council in 1999 all-out elections. They were thus optimistic going into 2005, but Martlew held on with almost no adverse swing at all. Labour also recovered in local terms to make the council hung again, but this rosy outlook was disrupted by Martlew's unexpected announcement that he would stand down at the coming GE (he was only 61 when he retired) and a then somewhat acrimonious battle within the local Labour ranks to succeed him. A swing of 6% at the 2010 GE saw a win by 800 votes for John Stephenson, the only Tory gain in Cumbria that year. Labour had high hopes of reversing that in 2015, but a bitterly disappointing result for them saw Stephenson's majority increase to over 2.5k - as in other places the Lib Dem collapse seemed to benefit the Tories more than Labour, whilst the 12% for UKIP seemed to come at least equally from both "main" parties. 2017 saw Labour's share increase by 6% (which would surely have won it for them two years earlier) but the plunge in the previous UKIP vote meant Stephenson's majority was hardly dented. A 60% vote for Brexit in the 2016 referendum mean that any "Brexit election" was only likely to go one way here - and come December 2019 the Tory share leapt to 55% and Stephenson luxuriated in a winning margin of over 8k and 19% of the vote (a minor curiosity, the UKIP share of 2.4% was the highest anywhere in the UK). A harbinger of this might also have been seen in the local council elections earlier that year - an all out contest after boundary changes saw the Tories emerge as the biggest party despite their poor showing nationally, Labour seeing below average votes and turnouts in their traditionally safe estates in the east and south of the city (Independents now dominate Botcherby at local level, whilst Labour dropping a seat to UKIP by a single vote was particularly embarrassing).
In the most recent local elections here, in May 2022 for the new Cumberland unitary authority that came into being in 2023, the Tories won no seats at all within the city of Carlisle; Belah was in effect gained by the Greens, while the Liberal Democrats gained Stanwix Urban. In both cases their predecessors had been solidly Conservative for over 40 years, including during the ‘New Labour’ years. These were also the only victories for those parties in 2022, though the Independents won Botcherby as usual. Labour won all the rest, including the marginals west of the centre Belle Vue (narrowly) and Yewdale (a gain). Harraby South was another narrow hold, as was Morton in south west Carlisle, where there was a large swing to the Tories in 2022. The city centre Castle was a Labour hold (though with only 48%, the opposition being evenly divided between Green and Conservative). The other wards were easy Labour wins by at least two to one: Currock, Harraby North, Upperton, and Denton Holme. Outside the city, but in the constituency, the Tories did hold Wetheral by around two to one over Labour.
Currock and Upperton are part of the peripheral ring of social housing estates on the southern edge of the city (which also includes Botcherby, parts of Harraby, and Morton) that contrast with the 80% owner occupation in Belah, for example. The ‘council estate’ neighbourhoods also have a very high level of employment in working class (routine and semi routine) occupations – over 40% in the 2021 census in the MSOAs covering Botcherby & Harraby, Morton & Raffles and Currock & Upperton – but there are no extensive strongly middle class parts of Carlisle. Indeed, even after the forthcoming boundary changes makes the seat much more rural, the constituency overall is still decidedly more plebeian than the national average.
The boundary review here removed Dalston and Burgh (6,000 voters, and a Liberal Democrat win in May 2022) from the West of the constituency but brought in around 15,000 rural voters on the other side of Carlisle - 'the Border' area from the abolished Penrith & The Border, so that now this seat includes the whole of the former Carlisle district except for the aforementioned Dalston & Burgh ward. The new territory includes small towns like Brampton and Longtown as well as numerous villages, and at Cumberland council level was shared bêtween Conservative and Liberal Democrat victories in May 2022. These boundary changes did boost the notional Conservative majority from 8,319 to around 11,000 - but it remained a seat Labour can (and needed to) win.
That is the sort of margin that is difficult - though far from impossible - to lose in a single election save for a 1997 style anti-government landslide, but still Stephenson could rest on his laurels. This seat contains a large number of traditional "swing" voters who could be won over to a "time for a change appeal" after well over a decade of Tory government, and Brexit being less of a factor helped Labour recover. In July 2024 there was a swing of nearly 17%, and Julie Minns became the first ever female MP in the Carlisle constituency's long history, dating back to 1295. Nevertheless, close contests have been a regular occurrence for this seat in the last century, and could well be so in the future too.
2021 Census, new boundaries
Age 65+ 21.3% 192/575
Owner occupied 67.1% 256/575
Private rented 17.9% 300/575
Social rented 14.9% 289/575
White 96.7% 93/575
Black 0.3% 504/575
Asian 1.5% 446/575
Managerial & professional 27.0% 451/575
Routine & Semi-routine 31.4% 56/575
Degree level 27.3% 421/575
No qualifications 20.2% 185/575
Students 5.3% 334/575
General Election 2024: Carlisle
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Labour Julie Minns 18,129 39.4 +4.9
Conservative John Stevenson 12,929 28.1 −28.4
Reform UK Stephen Ward 9,295 20.5 N/A
Liberal Democrats Brian Wernham 2,982 6.5 +1.5
Green Gavin Hawkton 1,922 4.2 +2.6
Independent Sean Reed 303 0.7 N/A
SDP Rachel Hayton 244 0.5 N/A
Independent Thomas Lynestrider 175 0.4 N/A
Lab Majority 5,200 11.3 N/A
2024 electorate 77,863
Turnout 45,979 59.1 −8.4
Labour gain from Conservative
Swing 16.7 C to Lab
General Election 2019: Carlisle
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
Conservative John Stevenson 23,659 55.2 +5.3
Labour Ruth Alcroft 15,340 35.8 −8.0
Liberal Democrats Julia Aglionby 2,829 6.6 +3.7
UKIP Fiona Mills 1,045 2.4 −1.0
C Majority 8,319 19.4 +13.3
Turnout 42,873 65.9 −3.2
Conservative hold
Swing 6.7 Lab to C
Boundary Changes
Carlisle consists of
90.6% of Carlisle
26.4% of Penrith & The Border
Map
boundarycommissionforengland.independent.gov.uk/review2023/9bc0b2ea-7915-4997-9d4a-3e313c0ceb51/north-west/North%20West_226_Carlisle_Portrait.pdf
2019 Notional result (Rallings & Thrasher)
| Con | 28959 | 56.5% |
| Lab | 17669 | 34.5% |
| LD | 2560 | 5.0% |
| UKIP | 947 | 1.9% |
| Grn | 823 | 1.6% |
| Oth | 282 | 0.6% |
| Majority | 11290 | 22.0% |
