Indian-origin candidates in UK election: Is it more of the same?
The Conservative Party’s focus to win over Indianorigin voters under David Cameron’s leadership appears set to be diluted as it has not nominated any candidate from the community in its strongholds where sitting MPs are not contesting the June 8 election.
The party has nominated 13 candidates from the community, of whom five are sitting MPs expected to win the election comfortably. The other eight candidates have not been nominated in strongholds or “safe” seats and only two have a chance of a narrow win.
In contrast, the Labour Party has five sitting MPs who are expected to win comfortably and has nominated three Indian-origin candidates in its strongholds. This is likely to raise the number of Labour MPs from the community beyond five for the first time.
There is much disquiet within Conservative ranks that the usual selection process was cut short by Prime Minister Theresa May’s surprise mid-term election announcement, when many shortlists and candidates were imposed by the party’s central office, ignoring local claimants.
Not only has the party selected fewer Indian-origin candidates – 13 instead of 17 in the 2015 election – but there is much ennui that they have been ignored in its safe seats. Most of the candidates (non-sitting MPs) have been nominated in seats where they have no chance of winning.
A senior community leader told HT: “The Conservative Party seems to be taking us for granted, perhaps because many abandoned Labour in recent elections and voted for the party.
The candidate selection process does not match May’s feelgood words about the community.”
Of the eight Conservative candidates (non-sitting MPs), Paul Uppal has the strongest chance of winning in Wolverhampton South West, from where he lost in 2015 by barely 800 votes. In Coventry North West, Resham Kotecha will seek to overcome Labour’s 4,509 winning margin.
Four Labour candidates (nonsitting MPs) with a significant chance of winning in what are called “marginal” seats (with small majorities in the last election) are: Kuldip Sahota in Telford (2015 Conservative win margin 730), Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi in Slough (2015 Labour win margin 7,336), Preet Kaur Gill in Birmingham Edgbaston (2015 Labour win margin 2,706), and Navin Shah in Harrow East (2015 Conservative win margin 4,757).
An interesting election sidelight is the fortunes of two unabashedly pro-India sitting MPs, Bob Blackman (Conservative, Harrow East) and Barry Gardiner (Labour, Brent North). Local leaders despair that both face two strong candidates from the community.
Blackman won in 2015 with a margin of 4,757 in the constituency with a large population of Indian-origin, but now faces Labour’s Navin Shah, the popular member of the London assembly for Harrow and Brent.