Ilford North is a pretty uniform stretch of suburban London strung out along the A12 and the further reaches of the Central Line. There is one large council-built estate at Hainault but a lot of it has been sold under 'right to buy' and the gap between it and 1930s semi-detached suburbia at Fullwell and Barkingside is not so great. It is an Essex equivalent of the Metroland that sprawled over Middlesex in the 1930s. Its main local peculiarity is the high number of London cabbies who live in the area.

The seat now extends up to Woodford Bridge after the abolition of the Wanstead and Woodford constituency, long famous for sending Churchill to parliament. A previous Ilford North was Labour in 1945 and October 1974, but did not contain the Conservative areas from Woodford which are now included.

Labour's Linda Perham did very well to win a seat that is basically Conservative, and gave the Tories a 3.8% lead in the 1998 borough elections. Their lead stretched to 11.9% in Euro 99 and more in 2000. Conservative Vivian Bendall, the MP from a 1978 by-election until 1997, challenges again.

Parliamentary Statistics pre-Election 2001

Labour majority 3,224 (6.6%)  Conservative target 47
MP Linda Perham
1997 (Turnout 71.6%)
Labour	23,135	47.4%
Conservative	19,911	40.8%
Liberal Democrat	5,049	10.3%
BNP	750	1.5%

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For Ilford North 2001 Election result - click here.