Thanks to Mike Smithson at PoliticialBetting.com for pointing out that Diane Abbott is a vote winner – and that’s fact not opinion. Comparing the last two elections on a like–for-like basis (i.e. adjusting for boundary changes), Diane’s vote went up by 6% or well over 10,000 votes. All other candidates saw a reduction in their share by between 3.8% (Ed Miliband) and 8.8% (his brother Dave).
|
Candidate |
Seat |
Labour 2005 |
Labour 2010 |
| Diane Abbott | Hackney North & Stoke Newington |
49.0% |
55.0% |
| Ed Miliband | Doncaster North |
51.1% |
47.3% |
| Andy Burnham | Leigh |
57.8% |
51.3% |
| Ed Balls | Morley and Outwood |
46.0% |
37.6% |
| David Miliband | South Shields |
60.8% |
52.0% |
I for one am glad that Hackney North & Stoke Newington is such a composite of the modern UK electorate and as such Abbott will undoubtedly result in a thumping Labour majority.
I think that Dan with his not so subtle sarcasm is the point Dan. There are plenty of comments out there that Diane would be an electoral liability. However, none of these comments are backed up by any evidence, neither from election results or from opinion polling. What little opinion polling that has been done has actually indicated that Diane is popular and this post redresses the balance a bit in drawing attention to actual results.