One hundred and ten years of elections in Chorlton

I am looking at the election address of the three Progressive candidates who stood for election here in Chorlton in 1904. 

This was the first local election after we had voted to join the city of Manchester and of the six candidates who put themselves forward, three were Progressives, two Conservatives and one an Independent.

The three Progressive candidates stood on the platform of advancing “good government” which involved “exercising a rigorous protest against extravagance” and “preserving as far as possible the residential character” of Chorlton coupled with the need for “adequate Schools, Libraries, Open Spaces, Public Baths and everything which counts for the better health and morality of the people”

The result was one of those odd outcomes with one Progressive, one Conservative and the Independent being elected.

And during the next two decades elections continued to be dominated by the Conservatives, the Progressives and Independents.

Although that is to simplify the scene, because there was a blurring of what it was to be an Independent and Progressive, so that at least two Progressive candidates slipped between the labels and one even later described himself as a "Ratepayer."

Not until 1922 would there be an election where Liberal faced Conservative and where over the next few years the electoral battle would be so finely drawn that

“Of the eight elections that have been fought in Chorlton since 1920 four have been won by the Conservatives and four by the Liberals.”*

But from 1928 the Liberals were on the defensive increasingly being challenged by the Labour Party.

All of which is a story for another time, but as we have just had an election  I rather think I will close with the result.

Now there will be those who mutter that the outcome here in Chorlton was no surprise but that would be to misread elections.

The year after Labour won its first election victory in 1986 the Conservatives held onto their seat and it would not be until the following year that Labour won again.

And at the start of the new century the Lib Dems seemed to be a serious challenger to the dominant position of the Labour Party here in Chorlton wining two seats.

But in the last few years their share of the vote has fallen back and from a commanding 44% in 2010 has slid ever downwards, so that today they achieved 15%.

There will be plenty I guess with explanations but that also is for another time.

Picture; Progressive Party election material, 1904 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

**The Chorlton By-Election, Manchester Guardian December 18, 1928