Top five Green wards in Southend-on-Sea over the years

Probably the most underused item in local politics is a Green candidate’s winner’s speech. The Green’s have rarely come anywhere near close, acting as a spoiler vote in many instances.

The following table shows the top five wards for the Green Party in the Borough of Southend-on-Sea, ordered by actual number of votes. The Greens have rarely fielded a full slate, and often less than five candidates which explains the gaps.

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th
2001	St Luke’s	Prittlewell
2002	Victoria	Westborough
2003	Leigh	Prittlewell	Milton	West Leigh	St Luke’s
2004	St Luke’s	Prittlewell	Southchurch	West Leigh	Kursaal
2006	West Leigh	Leigh	Milton	St Luke’s	Southchurch
2007	West Leigh	Chalkwell	St Luke’s	St Laurence	Southchurch
2008	Victoria	St Luke’s
2010	Victoria	West Leigh	Chalkwell	Prittlewell	Westborough
2011	Westborough	Victoria	Southchurch	St Laurence	Shoeburyness
2012	Blenheim Park	Westborough	Southchurch	Kursaal	Victoria
2014	Blenheim Park	Victoria	Kursaal
2015	Leigh	Westborough	Milton	Prittlewell	Eastwood Park
2016	Leigh	Milton	Kursaal	Westborough	Chalkwell

Here are the top five across all years :-

602 Leigh 2015

506 Westborough 2015

498 St Luke’s 2001

476 Milton 2015

441 Prittlewell 2015

There is little to suggest there is a strategy designed to actually win any ward. Their highest vote still resulted in only a fourth-placed finish. Will they field a full slate this year? Whatever, one thing seems a near certainty – the Green Party will not win or even come close in any of the seventeen wards. I guess they will be concentrating on improving on their 4.4% showing in 2016 (which was down on the 7% achieved in 2015)

Tories down, Labour up - a look at recent results in Southend-on-Sea

Here is how Labour's vote share (percentage) has changed in recent years across a number of wards in Southend-on-Sea. I have ignored General Election years as these skew the data.

ward	2008	2011	2012	2014	2016	nett change
Westborough	9.4	26.5	31.0	33.2	33.9	24.5
Milton	25.8	32.5	35.8	36.4	45.3	19.5
Prittlewell	7.9	16.1	17.1	14.5	27..0	19.1
Victoria	37.7	48.7	50.4	39.5	54.7	17.0
Blenheim Park	9.1	18.6	16.5	14.3	24.6	15.5
Kursaal	38.0	44.5	38.8	31.5	42.2	4.2
St Luke's	19.4	21.3	25.8	26.5	20.9	1.5

By comparison, here are how the Conservative vote has changed over the same period.

ward	2008	2011	2012	2014	2016	nett change
Southchurch	37.0	38.0	35.8	38.8	35.1	-1.9
St Laurence	42.5	35.3	35.9	28.2	38.2	-4.3
Belfairs	43.9	51.7	29.6	44.7	39.2	-4.7
West Leigh	58.0	50.0	49.7	40.6	44.6	-13.4
Eastwood Park	57.2	52.3	50.9	41.8	42.6	-14.6
Chalkwell	56.6	47.3	41.7	37.3	38.5	-18.1
West Shoebury	56.3	51.7	39.1	34.8	36.0	-20.3

I have selected the best seven wards for both parties. Every Labour ward has seen improvement, significant in five of the seven. In contrast the Conservatives are down in all wards, significantly in four of them.

Whilst I cannot prove any correlation, the slump in Tory voter numbers matches the rise in UKIP support. The imminent pact may have consequences beyond handing power to an increasingly unpopular Conservative Party.

The slump in Liberal Democrat fortunes does not appear to have transferred voters in any significant numbers to Labour (or so it appears to me).  In 2010 there was certainly some transfer from yellow to red, but in recent years this has levelled out, and I would guess that it is the Greens who are benefiting from disaffected Liberal supporters. The caveat here, though, is that where Labour can seriously challenge the Tories then former Lib Dems votes are going red. The challenge for the Greens (and UKIP) is proving to voters that they can win wards - otherwise voters will peel off towards parties that do stand a realistic chance of seeing their candidates elected.