Participation in Elections by Asians in Bradford (1975)

[Filuwaúrdjan]

This is the first of a load of articles on the politics of race from a sociological yearbook published in 1975 that I'm posting up here.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

4. PARTICIPATION IN ELECTIONS BY ASIANS IN BRADFORD

M.J. Le Lohe

The Asian Electorate, it's Location and Political Significance

1. The Old Boundaries

Fortunately one can usually find copies of electoral registers for previous years and in Bradford these can be used to chart the growth of the Asian electorate. In 1954 only 341 Asian names could be found on the city's electoral register, but by 1959 there were three wards each of which included about that number. Two of these wards, Exchange and Listerhills, thereafter had substantial increases in their Asian electorates and by 1962 both had totals of over a thousand. At the same time the demolition of housing was reducing the total electorate, thus the percentage who were Asian tended to grow more rapidly than their actual numbers. By 1962 Asians formed 25.9% of the electorate in Exchance which was then the smallest ward in the city.
At Listerhills the Asian level was lower at 19.7% but their total of 1604 gave a subjective impression, particulary in certain polling districts, that Asians were in the majority.
By 1967, when ward boundaries were altered, Asians accounted for 28.2% of the electorate in Exchange and 27.5% of that at Listerhills. Two other wards, Manningham and South, had about 10% and a further three, Bolton, Little Horton and North East had figures of over 5%. Before proceeding to consider the importance of these figures it should be noted that the degree of geographical concentration of Asians is is not shown by these figures. In each of these wards certain polling districts which were close to the commercial centre of the city had high proportions of Asians, whereas other, more suburban, polling districts within the same ward had few, if any, Asians. Thus for example in Bolton Ward in 1967 Asians accounted for 5.6% of the electorate, but 84% of these  Asians were in one downtown polling district where they formed 46.4% of the electorate.

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