Analysis

“I DON’T know who to vote for,” one older female voter told The Yorkshire Post in Wakefield city centre this week. “Everyone I’ve spoken to doesn’t know what to do. Does anyone want the Conservatives or do they just not want Labour?”

This sentiment, one suspects, is held by voters across the city, as well as Yorkshire and the country at large, less than a week from what is described as the most important General Election of a generation.

The polls appear to show Boris Johnson’s Conservatives on course for a small majority, turning a decent handful of ‘Labour leave’ seats blue in the process.

Wakefield, held by Labour since the 1930s, would appear to be among them, with most bookies putting the Tories as firm favourites to oust Mary Creagh. And this week a crew from Newsnight filmed in the city, citing it as an example of one of the bricks in the so-called ‘red wall’ which could be about to crumble across the North.

A senior Labour source in Yorkshire confirmed to me that many in the party believe the 2,000 vote majority of Ms Creagh, a Remainer who refused to back the triggering of Article 50 back in 2017, will be overturned on December 12.

They are also worried about neighbouring seats held by Labour heavyweights Yvette Cooper and Jon Trickett, who have much bigger majorities, being at risk.

But while it appears many previous Labour voters locally are unable to back them this time round – one staunch Labour supporter told me he would never

vote for Jeremy Corbyn – the trend also works in the opposite direction.

There are also undoubtedly previous Tory voters who are wavering, either because of the Brexit saga, their dislike of Boris Johnson or the general tone that politics has been conducted in over the last two or three years.

Despite his many eye-catching promises to northern voters, enthusiasm for Boris Johnson as a person is far from widespread. The picture that came across to me from speaking to Wakefield voters this week is that many are yet to make up their mind and are unimpressed with the choices before them.

Another Labour source told me that, were they a betting person they would be backing Ms Creagh to narrowly hold onto their seat, despite the polling. Combine the value of being an incumbent Labour MP with the low turnout due to the time of year and bad weather, the future of Wakefield and seats like it across Yorkshire becomes a lot more unpredictable.