South Cambridgeshire

[stb12]

South Cambridgeshire

[cogload]

Pippa Heylings is standing for the LD's here in what could be a fascinating 3 way fight.

2019:
electionresults.parliament.uk/election/2019-12-12/results/Location/Constituency/South%20Cambridgeshire

[iain]

Don't see this being a three way fight. As things stand, should be a comfortable Lib Dem gain - certainly no chance for Labour.

[batman]

yes I agree. This seat isn't a Labour target, even now.

[East Anglian Lefty]

Labour has an interest in the Lib Dems targeting this, because it means they're not focusing on St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire, which is a much more plausible stretch target for us.

[andrewp]

South Cambridgeshire is Lab target 164 on paper so a seat they would be winning if they got a majority of 80 or so on a uniform swing. There are several seats around about there on the Lab target list that they would gain on a national swing but where the Lib Dems start in 1st or 2nd and will be targeting. Hazel Grove, Brecon & Radnor and Edinburgh West are all in that sort of territory on the Lab target list

[YL]

Mar 15, 2024 15:27:25 GMT East Anglian Lefty said:

Labour has an interest in the Lib Dems targeting this, because it means they're not focusing on St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire, which is a much more plausible stretch target for us.

Surely the Lib Dems targeting this is completely inevitable and the only question is what else they are targeting in the area. I would imagine that they will also give Ely & East Cambridgeshire a go with St Neots & Mid Cambridgeshire a little further down the list, partly because it's the most plausible Labour target of the three. And they presumably want to try to remain competitive in Cambridge even though they presumably don't have much hope of actually winning it this time.

[YL]

For what it's worth, the current Election Maps UK Nowcast, which has 111 Conservative seats, has the Lib Dems winning this one by over 11,000. It has them winning Ely & East Cambs too, by just under 2,000, but Labour coming out narrowly on top in a tight three way race in St Neots & Mid Cambs. It also has Labour winning Huntington and both Peterborough seats, but the Tories holding NE Cambs pretty comfortably.

[andrewp]

Mar 15, 2024 18:23:01 GMT YL said:

For what it's worth, the current Election Maps UK Nowcast, which has 111 Conservative seats, has the Lib Dems winning this one by over 11,000. It has them winning Ely & East Cambs too, by just under 2,000, but Labour coming out narrowly on top in a tight three way race in St Neots & Mid Cambs. It also has Labour winning Huntington and both Peterborough seats, but the Tories holding NE Cambs pretty comfortably.

I would have thought South Cambridgeshire is a contender for the most likely LD gain in the country- if they don’t gain it, they won’t be doing very well. I wonder if the experience of 2019 will limit their ambitions and mean they focus more on S Cambs rather than assume it’s in the bag ( which it probably is) and move on to Ely & E or somewhere else.

[graham]

If the 2019 result is looked at in isolation , the seat seems a clear LD target.However, Labour was a clear second place here in 2017 - having managed that much more narrowly in 2015. The Labour vote fell sharply in 2019 to less than 12% having been more than 27% in 2017. On the basis of current national polling a vote share of circa 30% should be possible - before taking account of boundary changes.

[Pete Whitehead]

The boundary changes are theoretically helpful to Labour, given they bring in Cherry Hinton as well as areas like Fulbourn and Teversham where they have had historical strength, whereas the areas removed are mostly those where are they chronically weak (although there are more Labour voters in Cambourne and Cottenham than Balsham or Linton). I don't agree with you though. There may be a little tactical unwind, as there was in seats with a similar dynamic in 1997, but most anti-Tory voters will know which way they need to vote to get them out (albeit in Cherry Hinton it might be harder to attract tactival Labour votes when those voters have been accustomed to voting against the Lib Dems). I dount Labour will surpass 20% here.

[graham]

Why would Labour poll less well than in 2017? LD national poll ratings are not significantly higher than that year - and factors which are likely to have depressed Labour's vote in 2019 - Brexit salience and Corbyn - will no longer apply.

[Pete Whitehead]

Mar 15, 2024 19:42:27 GMT graham said:

Why would Labour poll less well than in 2017? LD national poll ratings are not significantly higher than that year - and factors which are likely to have depressed Labour's vote in 2019 - Brexit salience and Corbyn - will no longer apply.

Why did Labour get a lower share of the vote in Sutton, Carshalton in 1997 than they did in 1979?

[graham]

Mar 15, 2024 19:46:44 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Mar 15, 2024 19:42:27 GMT graham said:

Why would Labour poll less well than in 2017? LD national poll ratings are not significantly higher than that year - and factors which are likely to have depressed Labour's vote in 2019 - Brexit salience and Corbyn - will no longer apply.

Why did Labour get a lower share of the vote in Sutton, Carshalton in 1997 than they did in 1979?

Slight boundary changes in 1983 and the Alliance gained second place in 1983 and retained it in later elections. It was also a much longer time period. In South Cambridgeshire Labour was a clear second as recently as 2017 - plus , as you point out, favourable boundary changes.

Labour was a poor third at Portsmouth South in 2010 - yet won from third place in 2017.

[batman]

Was there a boundary change in 1983 at all? If so it would have been very minor. At the time I was under the impression that it was a name change without a boundary change, but perhaps there was a very minor one.

Pete is quite simply completely right on this one. Labour's vote will be squeezed quite significantly in this constituency and there will be almost no Labour Party workers out there trying to counteract that. They'll all be out in other constituencies, including Cambridge which isn't a complete certainty after the boundary change (though highly unlikely to be a serious problem). Constituencies change. Some don't of course, but many do. Sometimes they defy logic & historical precedent, by which you consistently tend to set too much store.

[Davıd Boothroyd]

Mar 15, 2024 23:29:58 GMT batman said:

Was there a boundary change in 1983 at all? If so it would have been very minor. At the time I was under the impression that it was a name change without a boundary change, but perhaps there was a very minor one.

The post-1983 Carshalton and Wallington had a minor boundary change involving no voters, but was otherwise identical to the 1974-83 Carshalton.

[graham]

Mar 15, 2024 23:29:58 GMT batman said:

Was there a boundary change in 1983 at all? If so it would have been very minor. At the time I was under the impression that it was a name change without a boundary change, but perhaps there was a very minor one.

Pete is quite simply completely right on this one. Labour's vote will be squeezed quite significantly in this constituency and there will be almost no Labour Party workers out there trying to counteract that. They'll all be out in other constituencies, including Cambridge which isn't a complete certainty after the boundary change (though highly unlikely to be a serious problem). Constituencies change. Some don't of course, but many do. Sometimes they defy logic & historical precedent, by which you consistently tend to set too much store.

My main point is that Labour polled  over 27% here as recently as 2017. Under the new boundaries Labour's vote share that year would likely have been close to 30%. Why should the 2019 result - rather than the outcomes in both 2017 and 2015 - be seen as being more indicative of underlying Labour support in the seat?

[Khunanup]

Mar 16, 2024 1:00:36 GMT graham said:

Mar 15, 2024 23:29:58 GMT batman said:

Was there a boundary change in 1983 at all? If so it would have been very minor. At the time I was under the impression that it was a name change without a boundary change, but perhaps there was a very minor one.

Pete is quite simply completely right on this one. Labour's vote will be squeezed quite significantly in this constituency and there will be almost no Labour Party workers out there trying to counteract that. They'll all be out in other constituencies, including Cambridge which isn't a complete certainty after the boundary change (though highly unlikely to be a serious problem). Constituencies change. Some don't of course, but many do. Sometimes they defy logic & historical precedent, by which you consistently tend to set too much store.

My main point is that Labour polled  over 27% here as recently as 2017. Under the new boundaries Labour's vote share that year would likely have been close to 30%. Why should the 2019 result - rather than the outcomes in both 2017 and 2015 - be seen as being more indicative of underlying Labour support in the seat?

Because the local political environment has utterly changed since 2017. It's not even hard to be identify that with even a modicum of psephelogical understanding.

And stop using Portsmouth South as some kind of proof of concept, it was a very simple case of the natural anti-Conservative majority in the constituency realigning enough behind a different party to beat said party (which had fallen apart in 2015, thus the Conservative win). If you want to use it as an example in this seat then the opposite to what you think the outcome should be is what will happen.

[matureleft]

Mar 15, 2024 23:29:58 GMT batman said:

Was there a boundary change in 1983 at all? If so it would have been very minor. At the time I was under the impression that it was a name change without a boundary change, but perhaps there was a very minor one.

Pete is quite simply completely right on this one. Labour's vote will be squeezed quite significantly in this constituency and there will be almost no Labour Party workers out there trying to counteract that. They'll all be out in other constituencies, including Cambridge which isn't a complete certainty after the boundary change (though highly unlikely to be a serious problem). Constituencies change. Some don't of course, but many do. Sometimes they defy logic & historical precedent, by which you consistently tend to set too much store.

Yes. Barring one or two pockets that come and go on the personal endeavour of individuals South Cambridgeshire Labour has been pretty minimally organised for a long time. The Lib Dems will struggle with a thorough squeeze in Cherry Hinton where the city contests between Labour and themselves would take some papering over but much of the area is the kind of place where tactical voting will rapidly be understood and shared. Careful candidate choice helps and their choice doesn’t seem to carry too much baggage that would discourage Labour sympathies. 

[graham]

Mar 16, 2024 2:41:25 GMT Khunanup said:

Mar 16, 2024 1:00:36 GMT graham said:

My main point is that Labour polled  over 27% here as recently as 2017. Under the new boundaries Labour's vote share that year would likely have been close to 30%. Why should the 2019 result - rather than the outcomes in both 2017 and 2015 - be seen as being more indicative of underlying Labour support in the seat?

Because the local political environment has utterly changed since 2017. It's not even hard to be identify that with even a modicum of psephelogical understanding.

And stop using Portsmouth South as some kind of proof of concept, it was a very simple case of the natural anti-Conservative majority in the constituency realigning enough behind a different party to beat said party (which had fallen apart in 2015, thus the Conservative win). If you want to use it as an example in this seat then the opposite to what you think the outcome should be is what will happen.

There has only been one GE since 2017, and whilst it is perfectly understandable that LDs would wish to focus on the 2019 result very little insight is required to see that as a far from typical election given the factors prevalent at the time. It is entirely reasonable to focus on the pattern of results there over a longer time period. The LDs have achieved significant success at local elections  - despite losing a by election to the Tories in Autumn 2022 - in an area which had been dominated by an Independent group until the early to mid-1990s. It is not clear,however, that such support translates into Parliamentary elections in that Labour's second place in both 2015 and 2017 had not been reflected in local election results. Turnout is much higher and people vote on a very different basis.

The Portsmouth South result does not stand alone. On the basis of the 1992 results , seats such as Conway and Falmouth & Camborne should have been taken by the LDs in 1997  - yet both were won by Labour.