List of target seats in the 2015 United Kingdom general election

Last updated

This article describes the likely or potential target seats at the United Kingdom general election of 2015 that was held on 7 May 2015.

Contents

In January 2013, Labour published its list of 106 target seats for the next election. [1] UKIP's list of 12 target seats was reported in August 2014, [2] and others external to UKIP have highlighted seats where UKIP may be strongest. [3] A list of Conservative non-target seats was deduced in February 2015. [4] The Green Party of England & Wales describe having 12 target constituencies, including their one current seat. [5] [6]

Below are the most marginal seats listed by the party in second for those parties which won seats at the 2005 or 2010 general elections, ranked by the percentage swing required. These may not be the seats where parties choose to target their resources. Opinion polling in individual constituencies is also another indicator for possible target seats.

List by party

Conservative

Conservative target seats [7]
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010 Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 Hampstead and Kilburn Labour 0.04% Labour
2 Bolton West Labour 0.10% Conservative
3 Solihull Liberal Democrats 0.16% Conservative
4 Southampton Itchen Labour 0.22% Conservative
5 Mid Dorset and North Poole Liberal Democrats 0.29% Conservative
6 Wirral South Labour 0.66% Labour
7 Derby North Labour 0.68% Conservative
8 Wells Liberal Democrats 0.72% Conservative
9 Dudley North Labour 0.84% Labour
10 Great Grimsby Labour 1.08% Labour
11 Morley and Outwood Labour 1.13% Conservative
12 Telford Labour 1.19% Conservative
13 Walsall North Labour 1.37% Labour
14 St Austell and Newquay Liberal Democrats 1.39% Conservative
15 Somerton and Frome Liberal Democrats 1.50% Conservative
16 Birmingham Edgbaston Labour 1.54% Labour
17 Sutton and Cheam Liberal Democrats 1.66% Conservative
18 Halifax Labour 1.69% Labour
19 Newcastle-under-Lyme Labour 1.80% Labour
20 Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland Labour 1.82% Labour
21 Wakefield Labour 1.82% Labour
22 St. Ives Liberal Democrats 1.87% Conservative
23 Plymouth Moor View Labour 1.91% Conservative
24 Gedling Labour 1.93% Labour
25 Eltham Labour 1.98% Labour
26 Walsall South Labour 2.15% Labour
27 Nottingham South Labour 2.17% Labour

Labour

Labour target seats [8]
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010 Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 North Warwickshire Conservative 0.05% Conservative
2 Thurrock Conservative 0.10% Conservative
3 Hendon Conservative 0.12% Conservative
4 Cardiff North Conservative 0.20% Conservative
5 Sherwood Conservative 0.22% Conservative
6 Norwich South Liberal Democrats 0.32% Labour
7 Stockton South Conservative 0.33% Conservative
8 Broxtowe Conservative 0.37% Conservative
9 Lancaster and Fleetwood Conservative 0.39% Labour
10 Bradford East Liberal Democrats 0.45% Labour
11 Amber Valley Conservative 0.58% Conservative
12 Waveney Conservative 0.75% Conservative
13 Wolverhampton South West Conservative 0.85% Labour
14 Morecambe and Lunesdale Conservative 1.00% Conservative
15 Carlisle Conservative 1.01% Conservative
16 Stroud Conservative 1.12% Conservative
17 Weaver Vale Conservative 1.13% Conservative
18 Lincoln Conservative 1.16% Conservative
19 Brighton Pavilion Green 1.21% Green
20 Plymouth Sutton and Devonport Conservative 1.31% Conservative
21 Dewsbury Conservative 1.41% Labour
22 Warrington South Conservative 1.42% Conservative
23 Brent Central Liberal Democrats 1.48% Labour
24 Bedford Conservative 1.50% Conservative
25 Brighton Kemptown Conservative 1.56% Conservative
26 Pudsey Conservative 1.69% Conservative
27 Brentford and Isleworth) Conservative 1.82% Labour

Liberal Democrats

Liberal Democrats target seats [9]
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010 Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 Camborne and Redruth Conservative 0.08% Conservative
2 Oldham East and Saddleworth [note 1] Labour 0.12% Labour
3 Oxford West and Abingdon Conservative 0.16% Conservative
4 Ashfield Labour 0.20% Labour
5 Sheffield Central Labour 0.20% Labour
6 Edinburgh South Labour 0.36% Labour
7 Truro and Falmouth Conservative 0.45% Conservative
8 Newton Abbot Conservative 0.55% Conservative
9 Chesterfield Labour 0.60% Labour
10 Swansea West Labour 0.71% Labour
11 Kingston upon Hull North Labour 0.96% Labour
12 Rochdale Labour 0.97% Labour
13 Harrogate and Knaresborough Conservative 0.98% Conservative
14 Watford Conservative 1.29% Conservative
15 Hampstead and Kilburn Labour 1.51% Labour
16 Montgomeryshire Conservative 1.75% Conservative
17 Edinburgh North and Leith Labour 1.82% SNP
18 St. Albans Conservative 2.19% Conservative
19 Newport East Labour 2.39% Labour
20 Weston-super-Mare Conservative 2.56% Conservative
21 Hereford and Herefordshire South Conservative 2.57% Conservative
22 Torridge and West Devon Conservative 2.68% Conservative
23 Winchester Conservative 2.73% Conservative
24 Northampton North Conservative 3.09% Conservative
25 South East Cornwall Conservative 3.25% Conservative
26 Bristol North West Conservative 3.25% Conservative
27 City of Durham Labour 3.32% Labour

SNP

SNP target seats
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 Ochil and South Perthshire Labour 5.14% SNP

Plaid Cymru

Plaid Cymru target seats
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 Ynys Môn Labour 3.55% Labour Labour Labour

Green Party

Green Party target seats
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 Norwich South Liberal Democrats 7.20% Labour Labour Labour

Respect Party

Respect Party target seats
RankConstituencyWinning party 2010Swing
required
Winning party 2015
1 Birmingham Hall Green Labour 3.9% Labour Labour Labour

Northern Ireland

Sinn Féin targets Swing required SDLP targets Swing required DUP targets Swing required Alliance targets Swing required
1 Belfast North (DUP)3.01% Newry and Armagh (SF)9.3% Belfast East (Alliance)2.22% Belfast South (SDLP)15.00%

Notes

  1. As compared to the 2010 general election result, not the 2011 by-election result.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hartlepool (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom

Hartlepool is a borough constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament by Jill Mortimer of the Conservative Party from 2021. The constituency covers the town of Hartlepool plus nearby settlements.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Norwich South (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1950 onwards

Norwich South is a constituency in Norfolk represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, since 2015 by Clive Lewis, of the Labour Party.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">South West Norfolk (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1885 onwards

South West Norfolk is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by Liz Truss of the Conservative Party, who briefly served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from September to October 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Boston and Skegness (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom

Boston and Skegness is a county constituency, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament. It is located in Lincolnshire, England. Like all British constituencies, Boston and Skegness elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first-past-the-post system of election. The seat has been represented by the Conservative MP Matt Warman since the 2015 general election, and is usually considered a safe seat for the party.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nuneaton (UK Parliament constituency)</span>

Nuneaton is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by Marcus Jones, a Conservative. Since 1997, the seat has been seen as an important national bellwether.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hornsey and Wood Green (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1983 onwards

Hornsey and Wood Green is a constituency in Greater London created in 1983 and represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2015 by Catherine West, of the Labour Party. To date it has drawn together for general elections parts of the London Borough of Haringey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chingford and Woodford Green (UK Parliament constituency)</span> UK Parliament constituency since 1997

Chingford and Woodford Green is a constituency in North East London represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament by Sir Iain Duncan Smith of the Conservative Party since its creation in 1997.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harrow West (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1945 onwards

Harrow West is a constituency in Greater London created in 1945 and represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament. Until 1997, it only returned Conservative MPs; since then, it has elected the Labour Co-operative MP Gareth Thomas on a fluctuating majority. Since 2010, this has been bolstered by the loss of Pinner from the seat and the gain of a favourable ward for Labour from Harrow East.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thurrock (UK Parliament constituency)</span> Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1945 onwards

Thurrock is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by Jackie Doyle-Price, a Conservative.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Scotland (European Parliament constituency)</span> Constituency of the European Parliament

Scotland was a constituency of the European Parliament created in 1999. It elected between eight and six MEPs using the D'Hondt method of party-list proportional representation every five years from 1999 until 2020. The constituency was abolished after the United Kingdom left the European Union on 31 January 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2010 United Kingdom general election</span>

The 2010 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 6 May 2010, with 45,597,461 registered voters entitled to vote to elect members to the House of Commons. The election took place in 650 constituencies across the United Kingdom under the first-past-the-post system.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Plymouth Sutton and Devonport (UK Parliament constituency)</span> UK Parliament constituency

Plymouth Sutton and Devonport is a constituency created in 2010, and represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2017 by Luke Pollard, a Labour Co-operative party candidate.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ealing Central and Acton (UK Parliament constituency)</span> UK Parliament constituency since 2010

Ealing Central and Acton is a constituency created in 2010, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2015 by Rupa Huq, who was elected as a Labour MP, suspended from the party in September 2022 following alleged racist comments, and reinstated in March 2023.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2014 European Parliament election in the United Kingdom</span> Election

The 2014 European Parliament election was the United Kingdom's component of the 2014 European Parliament election, held on Thursday 22 May 2014, coinciding with the 2014 local elections in England and Northern Ireland. In total, 73 Members of the European Parliament were elected from the United Kingdom using proportional representation. England, Scotland and Wales use a closed-list party list system of PR, while Northern Ireland used the single transferable vote (STV).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2015 United Kingdom general election</span>

The 2015 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 7 May 2015 to elect 650 Members of Parliament to the House of Commons. It was the only general election held under the rules of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 and was the last general election to be held before the United Kingdom would vote to end its membership of the European Union (EU). Local elections took place in most areas of England on the same day.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2014 Rochester and Strood by-election</span> Kent By-election

A by-election was held on 20 November 2014 for the UK parliamentary constituency of Rochester and Strood in Kent, England. The sitting Member of Parliament (MP) Mark Reckless called it on joining the UK Independence Party (UKIP), from the Conservatives. He resigned his seat.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2015 United Kingdom general election in Scotland</span> List of election results

A general election was held in the United Kingdom on 7 May 2015 and all 59 seats in Scotland were contested under the first-past-the-post, single-member district electoral system. Unlike the 2010 general election, where no seats changed party, the Scottish National Party (SNP) won all but three seats in Scotland in an unprecedented landslide victory, gaining a total of 56 seats and taking the largest share of the Scottish vote in sixty years, at approximately 50 per cent. The Labour Party suffered its worst ever election defeat in Scotland, losing 40 of the 41 seats it was defending, including the seats of Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy and the then Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander. The Liberal Democrats lost ten of the eleven seats they were defending, with the then Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander and former leader Charles Kennedy losing their seats. The election also saw the worst performance by the Scottish Conservative Party, which received its lowest share of the vote since its creation in 1965, although it retained the one seat that it previously held. In all, 50 of the 59 seats changed party, 49 of them being won by first-time MPs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2017 United Kingdom general election</span> General election held in the United Kingdom

The 2017 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 8 June 2017, two years after the previous general election in 2015; it was the first since 1992 to be held on a day that did not coincide with any local elections. The governing Conservative Party remained the largest single party in the House of Commons but lost its small overall majority, resulting in the formation of a Conservative minority government with a confidence and supply agreement with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) of Northern Ireland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2017 Copeland by-election</span>

There was a by-election in the British parliamentary constituency of Copeland on 23 February 2017, following the resignation of Labour Member of Parliament (MP) Jamie Reed. Conservative candidate Trudy Harrison gained the seat from Labour, the first gain for a governing party in a by-election since 1982.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2019 Newport West by-election</span>

A by-election was held in the UK Parliament constituency of Newport West in south Wales on 4 April 2019, following the death of Labour Party MP Paul Flynn. Labour nominated the trade unionist Ruth Jones, who held the seat for the party with 40% of the vote and a reduced majority. The Conservative candidate Matthew Evans came second with 31% of the vote, followed by Neil Hamilton, the UKIP candidate, on 8%. This was the third parliamentary by-election held during the 57th UK Parliament, which was elected at the 2017 general election.

References

  1. "List of Labour's 106 target seats for 2015". Politicshome.com. Archived from the original on 19 January 2013. Retrieved 3 May 2013.
  2. Holehouse, Matthew (26 August 2014). "Ukip to target Tory ministers' seats". Telegraph.co.uk.
  3. Roberts, Marcus. "REVOLT ON THE LEFT Labour's UKIP problem and how it can be overcome" (PDF). Fabian Society.
  4. "Leaked list shows Tories are not competing in five likely marginals". May2015: 2015 General Election Guide. Retrieved 7 March 2015.
  5. "Will you pledge to vote Green?". Archived from the original on 9 March 2015. Retrieved 7 March 2015.
  6. "The Granola Pact: is there a rift between Natalie Bennett and Caroline Lucas?" . Retrieved 7 March 2015.
  7. "CONSERVATIVE TARGET SEATS". ukpollingreport.co.uk. Retrieved 22 September 2013.
  8. "Labour Targets". ukpollingreport.co.uk.
  9. "LIBERAL DEMOCRAT TARGET SEATS". ukpollingreport.co.uk. Retrieved 22 September 2013.

See also