Greens: Potential Upsets?

[Peter]

I live in one of the seats in which we could see something of a Green insurgency: Oxford West and Abingdon. There are a number of other seats around the country as well. Question is can they break the three party mould and save a good number of deposits, and maybe even break into the top three anywhere?

[NB A candidate needs 5% of p.v. to save deposit]

Here, the Greens got 2.8% in 01, and they did very well in the Council elections last June. Given the way the Labour vote (17.7% in 01) has been squeezed here in recent years, and is probably on the verge of collapse in an area such as this, there is a chance that not only do they save a deposit, they actually break into third.

In my mind, many of the Lib Dem voters are actually Green voters who have previously realised the Greens didn't have a chance under FPTP. In the seats where the Greens become competitive, the Lib Dems could haemorrage a lot of the support they have been "baby sitting".

One such seat is certainly Brighton Pavilion:
In 2001, joint party leader, Keith Taylor, got 9.3%, nearly quadrupling the share of the vote on the 97 result. With the Lib Dem share presently on a meager 13.3%, I expect something of a collapse benefitting the Greens. Then consider that Labour will be losing votes as a result of the national swing and this is no longer natural Tory territory. Very quickly it easy to see the Greens once again making big strides in this constituency.

2001:
Labour - 48.7%
Conservative - 25.1%
Lib Dem - 13.3%
Green - 9.3%
Assuming a halving of the Lib Dem vote in total deference to the Greens, a slightly higher than average drop in support of Labour, say about 8%, splitting 3/4 Green, 1/4 Tory. Gives a result something like this:
Labour ~40%
Conservative ~27%
Green ~22%
Lib Dem ~ 6%
A seat such as this has added extra volatility from the student vote - it is probably easier for the Greens than anybody else to mobilise this particular group - they speak to very much the same issues, and still have a "hippie" appeal.

Other seats to watch: Leeds West (8% in 01); Hornsey & Wood Green (5.1%); Lewisham Deptford (6.5%); Hackney North ... (7.4%).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Oxwab: could come third. If I lived there I'd vote for them as Labour don't have a prayer there and I can't stand Evan Harris.

Brighton Pavilion: all sorts of weird stuff could happen. Greenies might let the Tories back in via the backdoor (unlikely) and should get third at the very least. If the Greens do ever win a seat it'll be this one (interestingly they almost certainly topped the poll in Pavilion in the Euro elections).

Leeds West: They hold an inner-city ward in the constituency (which is safely Labour, but went Liberal (Meadowcroft, the leader of the rump Liberals nowadays) in a freak upset in '83. Normal service hath resumed) and could do pretty well... third is possible.

Hornsey & Wood Green: I'm suprised they didn't do better in the Muesli Belt (mostly contained in this seat) than they did in 2001. This seat has turned really nasty (Roche v local LibDem leader Featherbrain Featherstone) and the Greenies could do well if the campaign gets much more negative.

Deptford: Greenies might even come second here (Deptford is such a rock solid Labour seat that there's no point voting for the other parties...)

Hackney North & Stoke Newington: IIRC they used to have a counciller here. Can't remember where. Interesting seat anyways (especially the strange voting patterns of the Ultra-Orthodox Jews in Stamford Hill: solidly Tory locally, solidly Labour nationally).

They could do well in Huddersfield as well (don't laugh; they do well in the ward around the Uni. One of there best in the whole country. They get nuked pretty much everywhere else though...) and maybe one of the Islington seats.
Hampstead as well, maybe?

[Peter]

Oxwab: could come third. If I lived there I'd vote for them as Labour don't have a prayer there and I can't stand Evan Harris.

Very much seconded. I do live here, and probably will vote for them, if for no other reason than I want to see them retake some of their rightful voters from the Lib Dems.