Cardiff North has some of the richest wards in Wales, and for generations was true blue territory. One of the suburbs, Whitchurch, even boasts the headquarters of the Conservative Party in Wales. It appeared as though the Conservatives could always count on the voters of Cardiff North to support them. Although the majority over Labour was slender at times, the seat produced two junior ministers at the Welsh Office, Michael Roberts and Gwilym Jones.

In the 1994 council elections, however, the Conservatives lost all of their council seats in Cardiff North. Never before had the Conservatives been so weak in their heartland seat. It was perhaps unsurprising, therefore, that in the general rout of Conservative parliamentary seats in Wales in 1997, Julie Morgan, wife of Rhodri, won the seat with a majority exceeding 8,000.

The Assembly and council elections of 1999 failed to see any significant revival in the Conservatives' fortunes. The majority of council wards remained in Labour hands, Labour won the Assembly seat, and the Conservative vote at 31.4% was even lower than in 1997. It appeared as though the voters of Cardiff North were far happier with the Labour Party than their neighbouring residents in traditional Labour seats. The general election result is likely to depend on whether the 'New' Labour voters of Cardiff North continue to prefer Labour over the Conservatives. The Tory hopefull is Alastair Watson.

Parliamentary Statistics pre-Election 2001

Labour majority 8,126 (16.8%)  Conservative target 137
MP Julie Morgan
1997 (Turnout 79.7%)
Labour	24,460	50.5%
Conservative	16,334	33.7%
Liberal Democrat	5,294	10.9%
Plaid Cymru	1,201	2.5%
Referendum	1,199	2.5%

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For Cardiff North 2001 Election result - click here.