In the centre of Nantwich, beside the handsome 14th-century church, encircled
by a cluster of Ye Olde Shoppes, there are benches celebrating notable
episodes in the town’s history. One marks a Domesday Book entry (1086),
another a great fire (1583) and another the battle of Nantwich in 1644, in
which the royalist siege of the town was lifted by the “Roundhead” army.
In the Crewe and Nantwich by-election on May 22, the roundheads of Labour may
not be so lucky. The Tories are careful not to be cavalier, but quietly they
are hopeful of victory. If they win, it would prompt a new wave of plotting
against Gordon Brown’s leadership.
On the streets the reasons for Tory optimism are all too clear. “Ten pence
tax, fuel prices, food prices, Gordon Brown’s not strong enough,” said
Margaret, 45, a lifelong Labour voter.
“I’m part-time. I’m a couple of grand worse off a year with the 10p tax thing
and with the cost of living. I will not be voting Labour.”
On paper the constituency looks like a Tory long-shot – the 165th most
winnable seat on its list of targets. Gwyneth Dunwoody, the Labour MP, held
Crewe and Nantwich from its creation as a constituency in 1983 until her
death last month.
Crewe, as opposed to its better off and largely Conservative neighbour
Nantwich, accounts for about half the votes. It is built around the railway.
While there is a tradition of highly skilled workers in engineering
industries, it has long been Labour territory. If the Conservatives can win
here, Brown is in serious trouble.
The Tories are bullish after their landslide victory in the May 1 local
elections and a national poll last week that put Labour on a record low of
23% and the Conservatives on 49%. They consider Dunwoody’s 24-year reign in
the constituency to be, in large measure, a “personal vote”.
Dunwoody championed local causes. She was, said one constituent, “like a dog
with a bone”. The taxi drivers loved her because “it was only a £3 ride from
the station to her office but she always gave a fiver”.
Labour has drafted in Dunwoody’s daughter Tamsin as its candidate in the hope
of drawing on her mother’s popularity. To defeat her the Conservatives
require an 8% swing. It seems well possible.
In the local elections the Tories turned over Labour strongholds in Crewe
itself. Although there have been no specific local polls ahead of the
by-election, one estimate based on national and regional trends predicts a
10% swing to the Tories. If they can storm the Labour citadel again on May
22, it will be a milestone.
The Tories have not captured a by-election seat from Labour for 30 years. The
last time they did so, Margaret Thatcher was the party leader – and the next
year she swept to power, ushering in 18 years of Conservative government.
Could Crewe be another turning point?
Tory fortunes lie, in every sense, with Edward Timpson, a Cheshire barrister
and scion of the multi-millionaire Timpson shoe-mending family, who looks
like a youthful Tom Hanks and just as inoffensive.
Labour has already tried to paint Timpson as a privileged, public-schooled
toff, even sending out two activists in top-hat-and-tails to sabotage a
recent walkabout with David Cameron. Timpson responded by saying that his
rich parents had fostered dozens of disadvantaged children and that his
childhood was spent seeing life from every angle.
On the doorsteps of Nantwich no one cares about Timpson’s schooling
(Uppingham, then Durham University). Indeed, in the Barony Weaver district –
an area largely populated by chatty pensioners – his genteel manner works in
his favour.
“And what are the issues that you care about?” he asked one old dear. “Well,
everything is getting more expensive,” she said. “Mmmm, 10p tax?” he purred,
with a tilt of the head and a scrunch of the nose.
“Well, everything is much more expensive.” She said she would “definitely
think about” voting Conservative. Timpson put a tick in the box.
Keith Wilson, 52, had just come home from work at Bombardier, the rolling
stock company which is a large employer in Crewe. His main concern was that
his gas and electricity bills are going up. Everyone at work is “very
worried”.
“Well, if you want to send a message to Gordon Brown,” said Timpson, “then the
best way to do it is by voting Conservative on May 22.” Another tick went in
the box.
After two hours of canvassing, a picture emerged. People in Nantwich like
Timpson. More importantly, they are worried about higher taxes and the cost
of living. They are also concerned, to a lesser extent, about crime and
antisocial behaviour.
Most of all, however, they just loathe Brown. As Michael Thorley, a
59-year-old antiques dealer, said: “Big clunking fist? I don’t think so.”
That is Nantwich. Crewe is a different story. Here, not only are there worries
about jobs, there are also plans to move Crewe station to another site out
of town and the city-centre regeneration has stalled. Most tellingly,
however, the pandemic dislike for the prime minister has infected voters
here, too.
“The only thing that doesn’t go up is my pension,” said Esther Grant, 72. “I
blame Mr Brown. I blame the government. I blame the whole bloody lot of
them.”
The Liberal Democrats hope to capitalise on this groundswell of disaffection.
Their candidate is a bottle blonde trade unionist called Elizabeth Shenton
who could never be called a dog with a bone. She is a cat person (although
she had to give up fostering cats “when she hit big-time politics”).
Her enervated style on the doorstep is more Mrs Merton than Mrs Thatcher. Even
when she is worked up about an issue, one has to bend to hear her modulate
from pianissimo to piano.
“I heard David Cameron saying he was going to make this by-election a
referendum on the 10p tax,” she said, gently increasing the volume. “Well
that’s hypocritical. They didn’t oppose it when the idea was first put
forward. Only we opposed it.”
Whether the Lib Dems will pick up disaffected Labour supporters is far from
clear. Jules Hornbrook, who works at the Bentley factory and lives in one of
the many new cul-de-sacs on the northern edge of Crewe, is the town’s only
political blogger. He believes that the Tories have a real chance because so
many natural Labour supporters are going to spoil their ballots rather than
turn Lib Dem.
Some may register their protest by voting for Miss GB – Gemma Garrett, who is
standing on a “Beauties for Britain” platform.
“This by-election is in no way going to be fought on local issues,” said
Hornbrook. “People used to vote for Gwyneth Dunwoody and not necessarily
Labour. With her gone, people feel that this is their chance to say
something to Labour in London.”
At Dunwoody’s funeral in London on Thursday, more than 100 Labour MPs came to
pay their respects. The mourners ranged from Ed Balls, the schools secretary
who has ambitions to succeed Brown as prime minister, to Dennis Skinner, the
left-wing “beast of Bolsover”. The high attendance reflected the feeling
that Dunwoody had stood for a set of simple time-honoured virtues which have
been lost in an age when Labour has been accused of taxing the poor to bribe
the middle classes.
“Gwyneth always stood up for the little person,” said one Labour backbencher.
“The decision to abolish the 10p income tax rate suggested Labour had
forgotten its commitment to help the vulnerable and the needy.”
There was one noticeable absentee. The prime minister was in Belfast meeting
Irish political leaders and had sent Harriet Harman, the party’s deputy
leader, as his representative. His nonattendance was seen by some as yet
another miscalculation. Cameron and Nick Clegg, the Lib Dem leader, both
made appearances.
“Gordon should have been there,” said one mourner, echoing mutterings that are
a measure of continuing discontent in Labour’s ranks, despite the
government’s efforts at appeasement.
On Tuesday Frank Field and Greg Pope, the two former ministers who led the 10p
tax revolt, were invited to the Treasury for tea with Alistair Darling, the
chancellor. Field and Pope emerged reassured that low-paid people who lost
out from the tax change would be compensated. Pope told friends: “I think
Alistair gets it.”
They expected details to emerge at Wednesday’s prime minister’s questions. But
when Clegg raised the issue, Brown stuck to his old script and concluded
with a sour attack on the “Liberal party”, as he always calls the Lib Dems.
Backbench rebels began contemplating the nuclear option: voting against the
entire Finance Bill unless significant concessions are made. If that were to
happen and Brown lost, he would almost certainly have to resign.
Disarray was evident elsewhere, too. Wendy Alexander, leader of the
beleaguered Labour party north of the border, launched a political Exocet by
demanding a referendum on Scottish independence. “Bring it on!” she said in
a television interview.
Brown seemed either unaware or unwilling to acknowledge Alexander’s
initiative. Asked by Cameron whether he agreed with her plans to call a
referendum, the prime minister weakly responded: “That is not what she has
said.” After much confusion, Alexander appeared to be backtracking yesterday.
But this weekend Stephen Byers, the former transport secretary from the
ultra-Blairite wing of the party, has fired off another volley of barbs,
attacking Brown’s entire taxation policy. Writing in The Sunday Times, Byers
says: “In the last year far too many decisions about tax have been taken in
order to try and secure a tactical advantage.
“This has led to some damaging mistakes being made. What has been lacking is a
strategic and principled view of how we should change our tax regime.”
Other party members also felt moved to speak out with striking vehemence. Jon
Cruddas, who came third in the election for Labour’s deputy leadership last
year, declared: “This government has lost the language of ethical politics:
relationships, values, even social justice. The danger is it hears only the
echo of its own jargon.”
Peter Hyman, former speech writer to Tony Blair, suggested that the time had
come to sack the Brownite Darling as chancellor and replace him with the
Blairite David Miliband.
The May 1 annihilation of Labour in the London and local elections has
effectively put Brown on probation. Nervous MPs registered concern at his
leadership but most thought that any talk of deposing him was premature.
If the party loses Crewe, however, Brown may find himself not on probation but
on death row.
Against this backdrop, what chance for Dunwoody to succeed her mother? A slim,
personable former deputy minister in the Welsh assembly (she lost her seat
last year to a Tory), she is eager to fight the by-election on local issues.
A fourth-generation Dunwoody Labour politician, she shares her mother’s
enthusiasms, if not her pugnacious spirit.
Reaction to her last week was mixed as she canvassed with James Purnell, the
work and pensions secretary.
At a local Tesco in Crewe, the Labour candidate came across Valerie Hutton, a
65-year-old who greeted her with a broad smile. “I thought your mother was
marvellous,” she beamed. The cameras clicked.
As the circus moved away, it turned out that Hutton was “not even Labour”. She
said: “Her mum did an awful lot for round here; but we’d vote Conservative
or even UKIP this time around. We feel strongly about the EU. Why can’t we
have a referendum?”
The measure of Labour’s woes is summed by an extraordinary role reversal for
Brown. He appears on Lib Dem election material like some dreadful warning,
but he is nowhere to be seen on Labour’s flyers.
With his abysmal personal ratings, even Dunwoody is not keen for him to make
an appearance in Crewe. “If Gordon wanted to come and knock on some doors
with me, I’m not saying he shouldn’t come,” she said, without conviction.
“He’s said very clearly he wants to listen to people.”
Will she continue to play the class card against Timpson? “He comes from his
background and if you come into the public forum you take that with you,”
she said. “That is absolutely part of what makes you a candidate or not. And
frankly, if you can’t take the heat get out of the kitchen.”
The Tories reckon it is Labour that will feel the heat. “We’re starting to
make a move into the outer core of Labour support,” said Eric Pickles, the
shadow local government spokesman who has masterminded the Tory campaign.
The battle of Nantwich, some historians argue, was the key to the civil war.
Had the royalists taken the town, they could have marched on to Scotland to
join up with General Montrose and from there they might have beaten
Cromwell’s army.
They did not and they could not. Can the Tories now besieging the town topple
its Labour defenders in 2008?
The foot soldiers of both campaigns suggest they can. Either way, it’s going
to be bloody.
They last won when?
The last time the Tories won a by-election from Labour was in 1978, the
year that:
— Louise Brown, the first ever test-tube baby, was born in Oldham
— The average house price was £13,820
— The video game Space Invaders, above, landed in Britain
— Liverpool FC won the European Cup for the second year in a row, with
Kevin Keegan scoring the winning goal
— The film musical Grease was released in cinemas
— Jeremy Thorpe, the former Liberal leader was committed to face trial
for conspiracy to murder
— The Amoco Cadiz oil tanker foundered off Brittany, spewing its cargo
into the Channel
— Birching was outlawed by the European Court
