The New Marginal

By: Faiza Shaheen

In 2010 Iain Duncan Smith won his east London constituency by 13,000 votes — but now it’s trending red.

Iain Duncan Smith was once the leader of the Conservative Party — but his responsibility while Minister for deeply unpopular policies like the Bedroom Tax could see him lose his seat in the next election. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images.)

Small

I was getting the vote out in Enfield on election day in 2017 when a young man told me that he had heard Chingford and Woodford Green (CWG) would be close. I laughed. As someone who grew up in the area it felt like it would always be a Conservative stronghold. But last year Iain Duncan Smith scraped home by just 2,438 votes. It is now entirely possible that the constituency — whose former MPs include Norman Tebbit and Winston Churchill — could go red whenever the next general election comes.

A closer look at the data reveals the dramatic shift. In 2010 Iain Duncan Smith won by 13,000 votes, in 2015 he won by 8,386. In 2017, the margin was even closer. Chingford and Woodford Green saw a massive 7 percent swing from Conservative to Labour — three times the national average. We saw one of the highest increases in the number of Labour voters of any seat in London, a rise of 63.6 percent. What explains the shift — and will Labour soon win the constituency?

Medium

I was getting the vote out in Enfield on election day in 2017 when a young man told me that he had heard Chingford and Woodford Green (CWG) would be close. I laughed. As someone who grew up in the area it felt like it would always be a Conservative stronghold. But last year Iain Duncan Smith scraped home by just 2,438 votes. It is now entirely possible that the constituency — whose former MPs include Norman Tebbit and Winston Churchill — could go red whenever the next general election comes.

A closer look at the data reveals the dramatic shift. In 2010 Iain Duncan Smith won by 13,000 votes, in 2015 he won by 8,386. In 2017, the margin was even closer. Chingford and Woodford Green saw a massive 7 percent swing from Conservative to Labour — three times the national average. We saw one of the highest increases in the number of Labour voters of any seat in London, a rise of 63.6 percent. What explains the shift — and will Labour soon win the constituency?

Large

I was getting the vote out in Enfield on election day in 2017 when a young man told me that he had heard Chingford and Woodford Green (CWG) would be close. I laughed. As someone who grew up in the area it felt like it would always be a Conservative stronghold. But last year Iain Duncan Smith scraped home by just 2,438 votes. It is now entirely possible that the constituency — whose former MPs include Norman Tebbit and Winston Churchill — could go red whenever the next general election comes.

A closer look at the data reveals the dramatic shift. In 2010 Iain Duncan Smith won by 13,000 votes, in 2015 he won by 8,386. In 2017, the margin was even closer. Chingford and Woodford Green saw a massive 7 percent swing from Conservative to Labour — three times the national average. We saw one of the highest increases in the number of Labour voters of any seat in London, a rise of 63.6 percent. What explains the shift — and will Labour soon win the constituency?

I was getting the vote out in Enfield on election day in 2017 when a young man told me that he had heard Chingford and Woodford Green (CWG) would be close. I laughed. As someone who grew up in the area it felt like it would always be a Conservative stronghold. But last year Iain Duncan Smith scraped home by just 2,438 votes. It is now entirely possible that the constituency — whose former MPs include Norman Tebbit and Winston Churchill — could go red whenever the next general election comes.

A closer look at the data reveals the dramatic shift. In 2010 Iain Duncan Smith won by 13,000 votes, in 2015 he won by 8,386. In 2017, the margin was even closer. Chingford and Woodford Green saw a massive 7 percent swing from Conservative to Labour — three times the national average. We saw one of the highest increases in the number of Labour voters of any seat in London, a rise of 63.6 percent. What explains the shift — and will Labour soon win the constituency?

Sorry, but this article is available to subscribers only. Please log in or become a subscriber.