Those 103 petition signatory PPCs and where their contituencies are on the LibDem target list
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Petition is here – “target list” is here and is based simply on a ranking of the difference in percentage points between the winner of the seat and the LibDem candidate.
There are six PPCs who signed the petition who are in the “top fifty LibDem target seats”. That’s 12% of the top 50 PPCs. Make of that what you will.
The 103 PPCs represent 17.36% of the 593 seats we don’t hold. So the distribution in the top 50 is just short of a third below that you’d see with an even spread across seats of all winnability degrees.
| Signatory | Target Rank | % points margin from winner |
| Denis Healy (Hull North) | 12 | 1.92 |
| Lucy Care (Derby North) | 20 | 5.01 |
| Andrew Simpson (Northampton North) | 25 | 6.17 |
| Carol Woods (City of Durham) | 28 | 6.63 |
| Jerry Evans (Birmingham Hall Green) | 38 | 8.32 |
| Michael Mullaney (Bosworth) | 42 | 9.27 |
| Wendy Taylor (Newcastle upon Tyne East) | 53 | 11.77 |
| Peter Carroll (Maidstone and the Weald) | 54 | 12.03 |
| Adrian Collet (Aldershot) | 59 | 12.31 |
| Daniel Roper (Broadland) | 73 | 13.84 |
| James Blanchard (Huddersfield) | 76 | 14.07 |
| Paul Elgood (Hove) | 78 | 14.16 |
| Christian Vassie (York Central) | 82 | 14.8 |
| Jill Wareham (Isle of Wight) | 86 | 14.99 |
| Gareth Epps (Reading East) | 87 | 15.21 |
| Philip Eades (Poole) | 91 | 15.9 |
| David Goodall (Southampton Itchen) | 92 | 15.92 |
| Farooq Qureshi (Leyton and Wanstead) | 94 | 15.97 |
| Nigel Bennett (South Suffolk) | 103 | 16.9 |
| Jon Underwood (Tiverton and Honiton) | 105 | 16.97 |
| Bernadette Millam (Brighton Pavilion) | 115 | 17.52 |
| Jamie Matthews (Pudsey) | 117 | 17.62 |
| Graham Oakes (Exeter) | 120 | 17.92 |
| Helen Flynn (Skipton and Ripon) | 123 | 18.18 |
| Nigel Jones (Newcastle under Lyme) | 128 | 18.35 |
| Lynne Beaumont (Folkestone and Hythe) | 137 | 19.17 |
| John Dixon (Cardiff North) | 138 | 19.18 |
| Steve Guy (Wycombe) | 141 | 19.85 |
| Godfrey Newman (Horsham) | 151 | 20.52 |
| James Monaghan (Morley and Outwood) | 155 | 20.83 |
| David Rendel (Newbury) | 157 | 20.9 |
| Sam Boote (Nottingham East) | 159 | 21.05 |
| Trevor Carbin (South West Wiltshire) | 161 | 21.15 |
| Mark Chapman (Spelthorne) | 162 | 21.18 |
| Paul Brighton (Alyn and Deeside) | 165 | 21.28 |
| Elizabeth Jewkes (City of Chester) | 170 | 21.51 |
| David Smith (Wakefield) | 185 | 22.94 |
| Richard Baum (Bury North) | 193 | 23.19 |
| Mike Willis (Loughborough) | 194 | 23.27 |
| Mike Collins (The Cotswolds) | 198 | 23.47 |
| Jane Brophy (Altrincham and Sale West) | 199 | 23.48 |
| Sally FitzHarris (Kingswood) | 201 | 23.57 |
| Steven Lambert (Aylesbury) | 207 | 23.73 |
| Roger Barlow (Macclesfield) | 215 | 23.89 |
| Tom Snowdon (Amber Valley) | 225 | 24.17 |
| Alan Beddow (Warwick and Leamington) | 228 | 24.27 |
| Robin Lawrence (Wolverhampton South West) | 234 | 24.69 |
| Tim McKay (Edinburgh South West) | 238 | 24.81 |
| Nick Perry (Hastings and Rye) | 251 | 25.38 |
| Peter Reisdorf (Wirral West) | 254 | 25.64 |
| Andrew Aalders (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) | 256 | 25.81 |
| Nigel Rock (Kinelworth and Southam) | 261 | 25.92 |
| Chris Foote Wood (Middlesbrough) | 262 | 25.98 |
| Chris Bramall (Stourbridge) | 270 | 26.3 |
| Adam Carew (East Hampshire) | 271 | 26.3 |
| Philip Latham (Stockton North) | 284 | 26.79 |
| Richard Grayson (Hemel Hempstead) | 286 | 27.1 |
| Jane Kulka (Reigate) | 289 | 27.19 |
| Jane Lock (North Swindon) | 294 | 27.32 |
| Jonathan Bramall (Dudley South) | 295 | 27.41 |
| Linda Jack (Mid Bedfordshire) | 300 | 27.6 |
| Les Jones (Morecambe and Lunesdale) | 301 | 27.66 |
| David Ord (North Tyneside) | 304 | 27.76 |
| Sally McIntosh (Mid Derbyshire) | 306 | 27.81 |
| Simon McDougall (Littlehampton and Bognor) | 308 | 27.88 |
| Colin Ross (Wolverhampton North East) | 311 | 27.91 |
| Nigel Quinton (Hitchin and Harpenden) | 313 | 27.92 |
| Martin Lury (Chichester) | 314 | 27.96 |
| Fiona Hornby (Devizes) | 316 | 28.07 |
| Stephen Martin (North Warwickshire) | 335 | 28.58 |
| Simon Partridge (Great Yarmouth) | 341 | 28.76 |
| Paul Dixon (Sunderland Central) | 349 | 28.98 |
| Howard Keal (Thirsk and Malton) | 360 | 29.6 |
| Joe Naitta (Derbyshire Dales) | 362 | 29.64 |
| Derek Deedman (Arundel and South Downs) | 365 | 29.82 |
| Mark Blackburn (Westminster North) | 371 | 29.96 |
| Paul Smith (Enfield North) | 376 | 30.15 |
| Richard Nixon (Brigg and Goole) | 378 | 30.24 |
| Rob Hylands (Gosport) | 388 | 30.71 |
| Margaret Rowley (Mid-Worcestershire) | 399 | 31.14 |
| Tony Hill (Maidenhead) | 401 | 31.21 |
| Chris Tucker (Slough) | 404 | 31.3 |
| Anna Pascoe (South West Devon) | 421 | 31.83 |
| David Rundle (Banbury) | 428 | 32.4 |
| Margaret Phelps (Witham) | 429 | 32.45 |
| John McClintock (Chatham and Aylesford) | 439 | 32.87 |
| Alex Berhanu (Ilford North) | 445 | 33.05 |
| Chris Nelson (Kettering) | 449 | 33.28 |
| Dave Raval (Hackney South and Shoreditch) | 451 | 33.34 |
| David Harding-Price (Sleaford and North Hykeham) | 453 | 33.43 |
| David Hall Matthews (Bradford West) | 456 | 33.69 |
| Andrew Falconer (Runnymede and Weybridge) | 466 | 34.29 |
| Denise Hawksworth (Bolsover) | 468 | 34.49 |
| Brendan D’Cruz (Castle Point) | 470 | 34.59 |
| Alan Bullion (Sevenoaks) | 480 | 35.44 |
| Stephen Glenn (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) | 497 | 37.01 |
| Paula Keaveney (Garston and Halewood) | 525 | 39.41 |
| John Loughton (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) | 535 | 41.59 |
| Susan Gaszczak (Rayleigh and Wickford) | 541 | 42.68 |
| Iarla Kilbane-Dawe (Edmonton) | 543 | 43.13 |
| Ian Robertson (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) | 558 | 48.8 |
| Martin Pierce (West Ham) | 561 | 51.19 |
| Kevin Ward (Glasgow East) | 569 | 56.52 |
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Related posts:
- That petition in full – 104 LibDem PPCs beg MPs to save the party’s integrity and vote against higher tuition fees
- The new Liberal Democrats’ target seat list
- Talk of LibDem target seats
- Revealed: Tory Central Office "watch-list" of awkward PPCs and associations
- How to deal with the odious “me, me, me” LibDem “I want a peerage” list
12 Responses to “Those 103 petition signatory PPCs and where their contituencies are on the LibDem target list”
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Burbler-in-chief
So there are seven PPCs on this list who are in the “top fifty” and we should “make of that what we will”. That’s rather snide Paul – are we second class citizens of some sort? We’ve all got to start somewhere. And if I ever become as good a candidate as Ed Fordham I’ll be a very proud man.
Maybe some of those on the list, certainly me (number 311), stood as a favour to the party in a non-winnable seats. I am not sure why that should mean my views are less worthy – I signed the pledge and as a result if elected, however, unlikely would have voted against an increase in tuition fees.
Colin and Mark, I have not written what you suggest, and do not believe it for a second. I have spent thousands of my own personal spare hours working voluntarily for number 157 for many years, and I travelled hundreds of miles to voluntarily work for number 133 in 2009 and 2010. I made what I intended, and carefully worded, as a neutral mathematical observation.
You are putting constructions on my words of your own making, and perhaps you should ask yourselves why that is – not me.
And I have known Ed Fordham and been a political admirer of him since the 1990s (I think he was the agent at 1994 Dudley West by-election wasn’t he?), so, of course, I agree with you Mark.
Unfortunately Ed Fordham has been included on the list of supporters to the petition in error. Please remove him from your interesting analysis.
Many thanks.
Derek
PS Another 15 Parliamentary have, however, indicated their support and a supplementary list will be issued later this week.
Thank you very much Derek. I’ve now modified the list accordingly. I’ll revise the analysis when you issue the expanded list.
Paul, if you did not want to make a point, Why do the maths?
What is your point exactly?
By listing signatories by target list and stating the top 50 target seats have a lower percentage of signatories you are leading your readers to believe the lower down the list the less important the view.
What else can we conclude you are trying to suggest.
Well I apologise if that is the impression. I have spent long hours of my own time working very hard over decades for PPCs lower down the list. I would have to be insane to do this if I thought they were not important.
My point is that all PPCs are important – and you only have to look at Redcar last time to see that – and John Leech before that. However, when I skimmed through the list of petition signatories I noticed that it was missing a lot of the names in our key target seats. So I did a quick Vlookup to my target list, to see if my initial impression was correct. It was – partially.
I intended to present the numbers and let people draw their own conclusions. It really is another step of logic forward to conclude that “PPCs lower down the list are not so important”. I am very depressed that Colin and Mark have assigned this assumption or insinuation to me, because it was not my intention and I was very careful with my wording to make sure I didn’t imply this.
To be frank, if there was a hidden agenda behind this, it was for me to show off how good I am at Vlookups. I did it all in a few seconds! I even did an extraction of the constituencies in brackets on the petition list using the Excel “mid” command. Aren’t I clever?
No.
So yes, I am guilty of pride in my Excel skills. But, to be honest, any LibDem activist (and others) with a knowledge of our key target seats would come to the same conclusion as I did, when looking down the petition signatory list – it is missing lots of the key target seats.
So, I took this a step further and did some work on the seats involved to come up with some data. And then I get accused of being “rather snide” and labelling PPCs lower down the list of being unimportant, despite twenty years of working hard in my spare time to help those in lower down seats.
Such is life.
How rude. Have you actually got the next general election results on you then? If so, you must be very rich. I’m not on the list, but I have a massive amount of respect for our hardworking PPC’s who have a largely thankless task. Some on the list WERE in “winnable” seats, but clearly things this year didn’t go to plan. How nice of you to rub it in! Think before you blog please.
I stand by my posting on this subject. It was right to highlight that there was a paucity of key target seats appearing on the list. Me posting on the subject is called democracy, as is my proven support for PPCs in non-top target seats over twenty years.
I am glad there have been some responses. Whether or not we were in winnable seats or not the point is that the pledge was costed in the manifesto to indicate it was affordable. What has not been proved is that the country was in more of a financial mess than had been thought.