Croydon Central is a place of contrasts. Resting between the Labour and Conservative safe seats of Croydon North and Croydon South, Croydon Central is a critical marginal that has all the hallmarks of a post-industrial English landscape: mock Tudor suburbs and leafy golf clubs are nearby council housing estates and post-war prefabs. The urban wards are demographically diverse, like much of inner city London, but areas such as New Addington and Field Way are home to a large population of white working class Croydoners. The suburban areas, meanwhile, are populated by many affluent commuters, who use the East Croydon train station connecting Greater London’s second most populous town with the rest of the city.The town is currently at the centre of a great demographic surge of expansion. In 1991, the population of Croydon as a whole was just under over 300,000. Today, according to the Office for National Statistics, Croydon’s population is expected to surpass 400,000 by 2021. This dramatic expansion has brought with it its own familiar problems. Infrastructure – ranging from the town’s tram system to its hospitals, schools and social housing – has been put under strain.
Croydon Central is also one of the seats that lies at the heart of the upcoming 2019 election. In 2015, in a closely-fought contest, the Conservative candidate, Gavin Barwell, took the seat by just 145 votes, a mirror of the whisker-thin majority won by David Cameron overall. In 2017, national trends were reflected to the detriment of the Tories. The crushing of the Liberal Democrat vote (just 1.9%, and a lost deposit) coincided with a late Labour surge to give the Labour candidate Sarah Jones a 9% swing, and the seat along with it.
Mario Creatura is the Conservative party candidate hoping to beat the incumbent Labour MP. Mario, whose father was an Italian migrant to the UK, was born in Croydon’s May Day hospital and grew up in Addiscombe.
Creatura campaigned for Remain in 2016, but, as all Tory candidates now do, he backs Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal. The Conservatives’ national message of “Get Brexit Done” ties in well with local concerns, he claims. “We’ve spent three years not focussing on domestic priorities that actually help people’s lives materially,” he said. “Most people just want to get on with the stuff that matters to them”.
The estimates from 2016 suggest Croydon Central voted to Leave the EU by the small majority of 50.31%, a figure just below the national average of 52%.
Creatura is more enthusiastic about the announcement by the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, that there will be ÂŁ12.7 million of investment in an upgrade of the critical care units in Croydon University hospital.
