Great Grimsby
Labour hold

Grimsby has remained very loyal to Labour and to its veteran MP Austin Mitchell, since he was first elected in a by-election caused by the sudden death of Labour Foreign Secretary Anthony Crosland in 1976. The closest shave was in 1983, but even in that darkest of years for Labour, Mitchell held off the Conservatives by 731 votes. Yet this should not be hopeless ground for the Tories. There is a large middle class bloc of solid housing in the south east of the town around the People's Park. This town has a civic tradition of independence and pride. Although its status as a fishing port has declined with North Sea stocks, it has the largest accommodation capacity for frozen food in Europe, and many Grimsby residents work in the petrochemical complexes on the Humber bank. New housing estates are still being built on the edge of this large town. Yet in 1997 the Conservative candidate, Daily Telegraph leader writer Dean Godson, slipped back despite an energetic campaign backed by a disparate galaxy of talent as guest speakers, and was nearly caught for second place by a popular local politician, the Liberal Democrat Andrew de Freitas. Austin Mitchell won by 16,000: easily his largest margin in more than 20 years here.

Austin Mitchell, an academic-turned-broadcaster with a large self-amused laugh, is a burly tousle-haired lone operator, so fascinated by photography that he photographed the applause he got visiting the Oxford Union. A maverick, off-message MP who dubbed Labour's 1980s leftwing activists "lunatics" and yet was ranked the 25th most rebellious Labour MP in the 1992-97 parliament, he also saw Margaret Thatcher as a destroyer of "the flabby orthodoxies that had held sway for too long, including Labour's". He compared Tony Blair's policy-making style with Kim Il Sung's and yet, though joining the Campaign Group, a collection of hard men who staff all the back bench rebellions, has barely whimpered against the Blair government, other than voting to block the Prime Minister's power to appoint life peers. Born 1934, he attended Bingley Grammar School, Manchester University and Nuffield College, Oxford, where he obtained a doctorate he decently avoids touting.

Area Percent GB Percent Index GB=100   Thriving Wealthy Achievers, Suburban Areas 4.37% 14.99% 29.13 Affluent Greys, Rural Communities 0.00% 2.13% 0.00 Prosperous Pensioners, Retirement Areas 1.61% 2.49% 64.90 Expanding Affluent Executives, Family Areas 2.77% 4.43% 62.70 Well-Off Workers, Family Areas 7.79% 7.27% 107.14 Rising Affluent Urbanites, Town & City Areas 1.27% 2.56% 49.60 Prosperous Professionals, Metropolitan Areas 0.00% 2.04% 0.00 Better-Off Executives, Inner City Areas 1.43% 3.94% 36.32 Settling Comfortable Middle Agers, Mature Home Owning Areas 9.83% 13.04% 75.37 Skilled Workers, Home Owning Areas 35.50% 12.70% 279.47 Aspiring New Home Owners, Mature Communities 5.40% 8.14% 66.29 White Collar Workers, Better-Off Multi Ethnic Areas 3.25% 4.02% 80.74 Striving Older People, Less Prosperous Areas 1.61% 3.19% 50.40 Council Estate Residents, Better-Off Homes 14.89% 11.31% 131.62 Council Estate Residents, High Unemployment 4.16% 3.06% 135.92 Council Estate Residents, Greatest Hardship 6.12% 2.52% 242.99 People in Multi-Ethnic, Low-Income Areas 0.00% 2.10% 0.00 Unclassified Unclassified 0.00% 0.06% 0.00

Area Percent GB Percent Index GB=100   £0-5K 14.92% 9.41% 158.53 £5-10K 23.15% 16.63% 139.16 £10-15K 19.49% 16.58% 117.55 £15-20K 13.58% 13.58% 100.00 £20-25K 9.01% 10.39% 86.67 £25-30K 5.95% 7.77% 76.56 £30-35K 3.98% 5.79% 68.79 £35-40K 2.72% 4.33% 62.66 £40-45K 1.89% 3.27% 57.74 £45-50K 1.33% 2.48% 53.68 £50-55K 0.96% 1.90% 50.28 £55-60K 0.70% 1.47% 47.38 £60-65K 0.52% 1.15% 44.87 £65-70K 0.39% 0.91% 42.66 £70-75K 0.29% 0.72% 40.71 £75-80K 0.22% 0.57% 38.96 £80-85K 0.17% 0.46% 37.38 £85-90K 0.13% 0.37% 35.94 £90-95K 0.11% 0.31% 34.62 £95-100K 0.08% 0.25% 33.41 £100K + 0.37% 1.34% 27.52