Psephology Blog 7- Recent General Elections in Sunderland

This is actually more difficult than you might suppose, because Sunderland has a very complicated history of boundary reorganisation in the recent past. Perhaps that's a good place to start. Here are the Constituencies and their wards.

What a bloody mess of a reorganisation, and it's not over - there may be further boundary changes in future. Sunderland North and South were mixed up a bit, and bits of the Houghton and Washington East constituencies were added in.

The ward population totals were as follows, (the electoral commission's figures):-

·       Washington/Sunderland West - 71,894

·       Houghton/Sunderland South - 72,456

·       Sunderland Central - 79,522

I suppose that's as even a spread of numbers as they could get. I note that in the Electoral Commission document, "Final recommendations on the future electoral arrangements for Sunderland" from October 2003, there are several references to the Sunderland  political parties being consulted. The council's views seemed to have been given the most weight. The cynic in me wonders if the political parties have lists of the electorate by street, with their probable voting intentions, when deliberating such matters.

So let's look at some voting percentages for the area, if I can negotiate my way through the numerical confusion. Figures are as accurate as I can make them in the circumstances.

The problem is, the split up of the constituencies was weird. Take Sunderland North - it lost some wards to all three of the new wards, and gained some from Sunderland South. My diagram perhaps illustrates it best. The original three constituencies are coded red, blue and purple, and it makes it easier to see the mix.

So what did I find out, after all this stress? Pretty much what you'd expect - a general downward trend for Labour after the high of 1997, matching national trends. Two of the three constituencies show a corresponding rise for the Tories, although this isn't reflected in the Sunderland South constituency of Chris Mullin, my own constituency. I would guess that his good reputation would keep the opposition at bay. Fraser Kemp in Washington had the highest percentages in the period. Was the final fall from the heights of Labour in 2010 due to the Gordon Brown effect, the Iraq War, the MPs expenses scandal or all of the above? Oh yes, and the Independents are back - Notably Neil Herron, who stood in 2001 and 2005 in Sunderland North, and carries on the fine Liberal tradition of protesting against injustice, and took a parking ticket appeal right to the High Courts in London
http://neilherron.blogspot.co.uk/2010/05/neil-herron-and-parking-appeals-ltd-v.html

On a more positive note, since he lost, let's look at how many LibDems are in the borough - potential voters, my optimistic self says.

LibDems	Houghton	Washington	S/land Central	totals
1992	5844	7346	5389	18579
1997	4606	3209	3973	11788
2001	3675	4203	3599	11477
2005	4492	6245	4277	15014
2010	5292	6382	7191	18865

I can compare the 2010 figure of 18,865 to the number of LibDems voting in the 2010 local elections, which was 20,247. Interestingly, the number voting yes in the AV Referendum was 21,476 in Sunderland in 2011, so some people are still listening to common sense.

Next time, sources of information collated on the Borough of Sunderland - and yes, that includes shopping data, which Sunderland Council appears to be obsessed with.