Why Harlow is the sort of seat where Labour is in retreat

In his analysis of where Labour got it so badly wrong in the last election, Liam Byrne has looked at the types of seats where Labour did badly (quite a few of those) and the ones where Labour did well (not so many).

The target seats where Labour failed to make headway and often went backwards, seats like Harlow in Essex, have on average much smaller middle-class populations and bigger blue-collar voting numbers – 13 per cent middle class on average compared with a national average of 23 per cent; 34 per cent blue collar compared with an average of 23 per cent.

The target seats Labour actually won suggest that they usually are significantly above average in one of two mosaic social breakdown groups and have larger numbers of ethnic minorities – or of what Mr Byrne calls Guardian-reading types.

Harlow is where Liam Byrne grew up, and we visited there with him today. He says it’s typical of the type of seat where Labour is in retreat. Younger citizens tend to think the only way to get on is to get out. There is an ageing population which adds to Labour’s difficulties considering how badly Labour is doing with older voters (John Curtice writes about that here).

Follow @garygibbonblog on Twitter