Julie Hilling, friend or foe?
Monday, April 27, 2015 at 14:00 Between now and the General Election on May 7 I'm highlighting a series of 'target seats', those where the candidate standing for re-election has supported anti-tobacco policies, and those where a leading candidate is an opponent of excessive lifestyle regulations and policies that infantilise us all. With a few exceptions I'm focussing on marginal or semi-marginal seats.
#22 - Bolton West
Julie Hilling is one of many incumbent candidates I've never heard of. She only came to my attention when I checked (a) the list of MPs who voted for plain packaging, and (b) the more marginal seats. Well, Hilling not only voted in favour of plain packaging, she's defending one of the most marginal seats in the country. Since 2012 she's been an Opposition Whip and, if I remember correctly, Labour MPs were whipped to vote for plain packs. It could be argued she was merely obeying orders and, as a Whip, had zero choice in the matter. That's undeniably true but if I was a constituent in Bolton West I'd be giving serious thought to my choice of candidate and plain packaging would be high on my list of considerations because of what it represents.
2010 majority: 92 (0.2%)
Estimated number of smokers in Bolton West: 14,244*
Principal opponent: Conservative
Friend or foe: Foe
Target rating: Extremely high
*Based on 20% of the registered electorate in 2010
Note: marginal seats have been defined as those with majorities of 10% or less that require a swing of 5% for the incumbent party to lose.
Reader Comments (1)
Definitely a foe. She also voted for the vehicle ban, too, and conveniently absented herself from the vote in 2010 on relaxing the ban a bit.
Just out of interest, I've been wondering how it can be that MPs can be absent and/or abstain from a vote. Surely, if they're supposed to be representing their constituents then they should be there, casting their votes on their behalf on all Bills? Is it something to do with the "pairing" arrangement which MPs have, whereby they are allocated to an MP on the opposing side and, if they are intending to vote in directly opposing ways to each other, neither turns up, because their votes would simply cancel each other out? Thought you might know, Simon, expert as you are in all matters political!