Isle of Wight West

[stb12]

Isle of Wight West

[greenhert]

onthewight.com/isle-of-wight-general-election-2024-sees-12-candidates-vying-for-two-constituencies/

Candidates for Isle of Wight West:

Cameron Palin (Green)
Ian Pickering (Reform UK)
Richard Quigley (Labour)
Bob Seely* (Conservative)
Nick Stuart (Liberal Democrats)
Rachel Thacker (Alliance for Democracy & Freedom)

[nyx]

Been looking at local news on this. I moved away from the island a few years ago but it's good to keep up with stuff.

Local hustings seem to confirm it being a two horse Con vs Lab race with the Labour candidate fairly popular www.islandecho.co.uk/labours-richard-quigley-comes-out-top-in-hustings-exit-poll/

Combine this with the fact the Green focus is heavily on East, though, and the Lib Dems are very quiet in both– and I'm wondering if there might have been a tacit deal between the local Greens and Labour to ease off campaigning in West and East respectively.

[andrewp]

Bob Seely picked the wrong half.

The Conservative share was similar in both halves, but the opposition more split in East.

[Khunanup]

Jul 5, 2024 18:00:24 GMT andrewp said:

Bob Seely picked the wrong half.

The Conservative share was similar in both halves, but the opposition more split in East.

He lives (and was a councillor for that area) there. Don't think there was much picking involved.

[matureleft]

A pretty substantial Labour vote has been well-concealed until fairly recently in parliamentary elections, and remains so in local government contests. Quigley is the only avowedly Labour councillor on the island.

I can recall periods when Labour was squeezed to near oblivion and, if I remember correctly, a time when the party was a Militant outpost. Some serious party work has clearly been under way. I’d assume that will be reflected in council elections in due course though I note this remains a place with plenty of rooted Independents.

[tonyhil]

There will be a significant number of seats that Labour has won this time which have little in the way of a local government base. It's not possible to know what the membership base is - my own constituency is supposed to have nearly as many Labour members as the LibDems but with Labour in third or fourth place in every ward at a local level. Whether having an MP will lead to future local government success remains to be seen: I somehow doubt it in somewhere like the Isle of Wight, and would see this victory for Labour more as an act of desperation by the electorate to show what they thought of the Tories than as an enthusiastic endorsement of an alternative.

[The Bishop]

But as already mentioned, the island has for a while now been demographically improving for Labour - so I maybe wouldn't be quite as dismissive as all that.

[Khunanup]

Jul 8, 2024 19:42:18 GMT The Bishop said:

But as already mentioned, the island has for a while now been demographically improving for Labour - so I maybe wouldn't be quite as dismissive as all that.

By who?

I don't see any evidence that the demographics of the Island have largely changed, and if so certainly not in Labour's favour (it's getting older both as people live longer and younger people leave).

[CatholicLeft]

Jul 8, 2024 20:20:28 GMT Khunanup said:

Jul 8, 2024 19:42:18 GMT The Bishop said:

But as already mentioned, the island has for a while now been demographically improving for Labour - so I maybe wouldn't be quite as dismissive as all that.

By who?

I don't see any evidence that the demographics of the Island have largely changed, and if so certainly not in Labour's favour (it's getting older both as people live longer and younger people leave).

Yet Labour won the seat, which, let's be honest, nobody here would have predicted in a normal election.

[CatholicLeft]

Jul 6, 2024 4:32:28 GMT matureleft said:

A pretty substantial Labour vote has been well-concealed until fairly recently in parliamentary elections, and remains so in local government contests. Quigley is the only avowedly Labour councillor on the island.

I can recall periods when Labour was squeezed to near oblivion and, if I remember correctly, a time when the party was a Militant outpost. Some serious party work has clearly been under way. I’d assume that will be reflected in council elections in due course though I note this remains a place with plenty of rooted Independents.

Back in 1983, it seemed like many of the local Militant candidates had Scouse accents, and I seem to remember that the Labour candidate in IoW, who got hardly any votes, fitted that stereotype. To see Labour do well on the Island, let alone win a parliamentary seat, is remarkable.

[finsobruce]

Jul 14, 2024 23:27:06 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Jul 6, 2024 4:32:28 GMT matureleft said:

A pretty substantial Labour vote has been well-concealed until fairly recently in parliamentary elections, and remains so in local government contests. Quigley is the only avowedly Labour councillor on the island.

I can recall periods when Labour was squeezed to near oblivion and, if I remember correctly, a time when the party was a Militant outpost. Some serious party work has clearly been under way. I’d assume that will be reflected in council elections in due course though I note this remains a place with plenty of rooted Independents.

Back in 1983, it seemed like many of the local Militant candidates had Scouse accents, and I seem to remember that the Labour candidate in IoW, who got hardly any votes, fitted that stereotype. To see Labour do well on the Island, let alone win a parliamentary seat, is remarkable.

Cathy Wilson. The Militant newspaper recorded that she was actually given an award for recruiting members after that magnificent 2.4% in the 1983 election.

[john07]

Jul 14, 2024 23:27:06 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Jul 6, 2024 4:32:28 GMT matureleft said:

A pretty substantial Labour vote has been well-concealed until fairly recently in parliamentary elections, and remains so in local government contests. Quigley is the only avowedly Labour councillor on the island.

I can recall periods when Labour was squeezed to near oblivion and, if I remember correctly, a time when the party was a Militant outpost. Some serious party work has clearly been under way. I’d assume that will be reflected in council elections in due course though I note this remains a place with plenty of rooted Independents.

Back in 1983, it seemed like many of the local Militant candidates had Scouse accents, and I seem to remember that the Labour candidate in IoW, who got hardly any votes, fitted that stereotype. To see Labour do well on the Island, let alone win a parliamentary seat, is remarkable.

Virtually every Militant candidate, back then, had a scouse accent apart from Tommy Sheridan and Dave Nellist!

[CatholicLeft]

Jul 14, 2024 23:59:59 GMT finsobruce said:

Jul 14, 2024 23:27:06 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Back in 1983, it seemed like many of the local Militant candidates had Scouse accents, and I seem to remember that the Labour candidate in IoW, who got hardly any votes, fitted that stereotype. To see Labour do well on the Island, let alone win a parliamentary seat, is remarkable.

Cathy Wilson. The Militant newspaper recorded that she was actually given an award for recruiting members after that magnificent 2.4% in the 1983 election.

3 true believers as good as 3,000 votes.

[carlton43]

Jul 14, 2024 23:19:23 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Jul 8, 2024 20:20:28 GMT Khunanup said:

By who?

I don't see any evidence that the demographics of the Island have largely changed, and if so certainly not in Labour's favour (it's getting older both as people live longer and younger people leave).

Yet Labour won the seat, which, let's be honest, nobody here would have predicted in a normal election.

But it was rather a good year for you!  Many seats with no demographic move to Labour have 'gone Labour' probably as a 'one off' in a special readjustment 'punishment year' for the Conservatives.  It was a counter to the Boris axe of 2019 but deservedly more excessive as it was less direct elements of brexit reluctance punished and Corbyn effect punished, as nine years of dither and incompetence, sleaze and dissoluteness, and just the shocking inertia and squandering of money and time to be put to bed.  This constituency will slide back to the right as soon as the right deserves to be supported again.

[Khunanup]

Jul 14, 2024 23:19:23 GMT CatholicLeft said:

Jul 8, 2024 20:20:28 GMT Khunanup said:

By who?

I don't see any evidence that the demographics of the Island have largely changed, and if so certainly not in Labour's favour (it's getting older both as people live longer and younger people leave).

Yet Labour won the seat, which, let's be honest, nobody here would have predicted in a normal election.

As I mentioned on the East thread, this seat, compared to East has more areas of ingrained poverty. It's also more spread out in terms of population therefore alienation and isolation is more prevalent, and in an election like we've just had where people were (among other things) reacting about being ignored.

One of the advantages of having previously been involved in processing benefits for The Island is you get to understand where poverty sits, and the nature of it. Whereas in the east of the Isle of Wight, poverty is almost exclusively in certain, reasonably concentrated parts of what is mostly a seat where people live in the urban coastal strip (specifically neighbourhoods of Ryde and Lake/Sandown), in the central and western parts (in West constituency) is not only in Newport (most notably the large Pan estate) and Cowes, but also serious economic deprivation in Yarmouth, Totland and Freshwater alongside in some of the isolated inland villages in the south of the island.

[batman]

this is exactly what my sister (who lives in Southampton & visits the island very frequently) has told me. The most deprived parts are mostly in West, and she mentioned the Pan estate as particularly deprived, as well as parts of Cowes both sides of the Medina.

[andrewp]

Total votes on the Isle of Wight

Con 20490
Lab. 19504
RefUK 12938
Green. 8623
LD 6276
Oth. 537

I wonder if Labour might just have been able to win the previous whole Island seat, if both seats were subject to the same campaign. It Would probably have been very close.