Hartlepool

	07/06/2017	A 70.35.100.50
Given the low Labour vote, high UKIP vote and high Brexit vote share, this is ripe for the Tory picking
	23/05/2017	The Guardian 199.16.153.226
Mandelson legacy looms large as Hartlepool approaches crossroads https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/22/peter-mandelson-legacy-hartlepool-general-election-crossroads ... Labour?s share of the vote at general elections has plummeted ? from 60.7% in 1997 to 35.6% two years ago. Bookmakers have the Tories as odds-on favourites to win Hartlepool for the first time in 53 years. Brexit gave disgruntled voters an opportunity to lash out, Mandelson says. But he insists the town has not always been Eurosceptic. ?In the 90s and 2000s before I left, I remember it being regularly said to me that we get more money and a better deal from Brussels than we do from London,? he says. ?People felt the country was completely unbalanced, it was a London-dominated, southern-slanted economy. There was a real sense of being denied economic justice. The counter to that was when Labour came to office and you had me in the government. Tony Blair in the neighbouring constituency [Sedgefield] and lots of other ministers from the north ? suddenly people felt they were being recognised at last.? Graham Robb, a Conservative candidate in the 1992 election, believes Hartlepool has always been Eurosceptic but that it was willing to give Mandelson the benefit of the doubt because they spotted ?a man of exceptional talent?. More significantly, though, he believes the town?s 69.6% Brexit vote was a sign that the town?s latent social conservatism had come to the fore. And that, he says, is why the Tories have a ?very, very good chance? of winning the seat on 8 June. ?Traditional attitudes towards this country are coming back to the surface,? he says. ?I don?t think it?s sudden, I think it?s more gradual and will be exacerbated by the fact it?s a vacant seat for the first time since 1992.? Robb runs a public relations firm, Recognition PR, and is the north-east chairman of the Institute of Directors. He says it is an ?overstated myth that the Labour vote is tribal in the north-east?. He says ?it?s less a left and right thing, more an attitudinal thing? that will determine how Hartlepudlians vote. ...
	05/05/2017	JC 162.23.111.62
While labour lost the Tees Valley mayoralty race, it was only by fairly small margin (0.5% on first round and 2.3% on second round). This bolds well for them as they work to defend their seats in this area where people voted heavily to Leave.
	26/04/2017	Jack Cox 24.212.227.58
This was a 70% Leave vote in the EU, It was also close last time and UKIP did very well here. I suspect UKIP voters will return to the Tory fold and oust Iain Wright.
	19/04/2017	The Guardian 199.16.153.226
Hartlepool ponders a change after half a century voting Labour https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/19/hartlepool-ponders-a-change-after-half-a-century-voting-labour