This seat had a special place in the 1997 roll of honour for Labour as it was the former stronghold of Margaret Thatcher. It is mostly a product of inter-war growth and depends heavily on the erratic Northern Line of the London underground. East Finchley is an increasingly Indian area, and the seat as a whole is 21.2% non-white, but the most prominent local minority is the Jewish community particularly in the Golders Green area. Many residents commute into central London but there are large local employers, including McDonalds' UK headquarters. Finchley and Golders Green is an affluent area in the top ten seats in the country for professional and non-manual workers, and has some of the intellectual sheen of neighbouring Hampstead and Highgate which has gradually become a safe Labour seat.

Labour MP Rudi Vis was famously unprepared for his surprise victory in 1997; he had to find someone to teach his economics classes at the University of East London at very short notice after winning. The next election is a rematch between Vis and the defeated Tory John Marshall, previously MP for Hendon South 1987-97. Labour's strong performance was repeated in the Barnet borough elections in 1998, when the party was still well ahead (5.3%) and consolidated its advantage in the previously marginal St Paul's and Woodhouse wards. Labour were only one point behind even in Euro 99; voters here scorned the Thatcher legacy with a low (3.1%) UKIP vote. In the 2000 elections for the GLA Labour probably lagged by about 11 points.

The demographic and political shifts in outer London have transformed places like this from safe reservoirs of Tory support to the new front line of the major party battle. In the long term it may even follow other middle London seats like Streatham and Hornsey and become a reliable Labour seat, but for now it is still vulnerable to a national Tory recovery.

Parliamentary Statistics pre-Election 2001

Labour majority 3,189 (6.3%)  Labour marginal 45  Conservative target
MP Rudi Vis
1997 (Turnout 68.2%)
Labour	23,180	46.1%
Conservative	19,991	39.7%
Liberal Democrat	5,670	11.3%
Referendum	684	1.4%
Green	576	1.1%
UK Independence	205	0.4%

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For Finchley & Golders Green 2001 Election result - click here.