I've never lived in an interesting constituency before. Hertfordshire South West was dull as ditchwater, Bedford was fairly bland and Suffolk South was a safe seat of the most tedious kind. But BethnalGreenandBow is shaping up to be something quite different - the scene of what promises to be one of the bitterest and most hard-fought constituency battles during the forthcoming election.
I only just live in Bethnal Green and Bow - right at the eastern tip of this compact urban constituency. It's a very mixed seat, stretching from the Tower of London to Victoria Park and from Brick Lane to Cable Street, covering most of the traditional East End. But, apart from the poverty, there's not a lot of the traditional East End left. Crumbling council estates outnumber gentrified yuppie enclaves. A very high proportion of residents are under 30, but life expectancy is amongst the very lowest in the country. And nearly half of the electorate are Muslim, with Bangladeshis by far the most significant minority. It's the sort of neighbourhood that Middle-Englanders with an engendered fear of immigration might cite as an example of how they don't want their backyard to end up. As you'll have gathered, I rather like the place.
There have only ever been two black female MPs in Britain, and one of them is my MP (at least until Monday). She's OonaKing, and she was elected for Labour round here back in 1997 at the tender age of 29 (she's still younger than me, mumble, grumble...). Oona's an articulate and witty campaigner, so her supporters would say, although others would more readily call her a toadying Blairite. Whenever there's a big vote in the Commons, she always backs the Government. Foundation hospitals? Yes please. Top-up fees? Most certainly. Hunting ban? Quite definitely. And War on Iraq? Ooh yes Tony. And, with such a high proportion of Muslim voters amongst her electorate, it's the war on Iraq that's made Oona's ten thousand majority look suddenly rather vulnerable.
Enter George Galloway, the Scottish firebrand campaigner whose Glasgow constituency has vanished overnight in the latest Boundary Commission reforms. Never one to miss an opportunity, 'Gorgeous' George has parachuted into Bethnal Green and Bow to liberate the indigenous population from the dictatorial rule of their tyrannical MP. He's standing for the new(ish) Respect coalition, born from the socialist heart of the anti-war movement, and he reckons he has a very good chance of picking up tankloads of local votes from disillusioned voters. He's certainly been breast-beating loudly to get his message across, but our George is a litigious bloke so I'll stop short of calling him a self-obsessed hot-headed rabble-rouser. What is true is that George has one of the worst voting records in the current House of Commons, having spoken in no debates whatsoever during the last year and attending a mere 3% of the votes during the last Parliament. Which means I'm in danger of ending up with a political representative who doesn't actually represent anyone (but only if Oona's vote crumbles dis-Respect-fully). The media will be keeping a careful watch on Bethnal Green and Bow over the next few weeks and so will I, just in case any of my local candidates ever decide to take any interest in me and my X.
Bethnal Green and Bow(2001 result)
Oona King (Labour) 19,380 [50.4%]
Shahagir Faruk (Conservative) 9,323 [24.2%]
Janet Ludlow (Liberal Democrat) 5,946 [15.5%]
Anna Bragga (Green) 1,666 [4.3%]
Michael Davidson (British National Party) 1,267 [3.3%]
Dennis Delderfield (New Britain Party) 888 [2.3%] Labour majority: 10,057 Turnout: 48.6%
Vote050505: Bethnal Green and Bow
I only just live in Bethnal Green and Bow - right at the eastern tip of this compact urban constituency. It's a very mixed seat, stretching from the Tower of London to Victoria Park and from Brick Lane to Cable Street, covering most of the traditional East End. But, apart from the poverty, there's not a lot of the traditional East End left. Crumbling council estates outnumber gentrified yuppie enclaves. A very high proportion of residents are under 30, but life expectancy is amongst the very lowest in the country. And nearly half of the electorate are Muslim, with Bangladeshis by far the most significant minority. It's the sort of neighbourhood that Middle-Englanders with an engendered fear of immigration might cite as an example of how they don't want their backyard to end up. As you'll have gathered, I rather like the place.
