From Mondeo Man to Whitby Woman
A short, sharp history of British general election target voters
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Every general election in the UK brings with it a new imagined target voter the main parties needs to win over to guarantee a majority – a swing stereotype, usually not too interested in politics from day to day, and definitely not part of either party’s base.
These would-be bellwethers are varied, but they always have a few things in common. They might not always vote. They never live in London, nor in the proper rural countryside; instead, they tend to hail from that silent, liminal Britain of dormitory towns, dead high streets and mock Tudors. They often have a strong sense of right and wrong that doesn’t align with party politics.1 Anointed by pollsters and then sought out by intrepid urban media types who want to glean the earthy, authentic wisdom of the British public, our target voters often respond with a “I don’t really think about politics that much, really”, much to the bafflement of the too-online chattering classes.
Whoever they are, meeting these stereotypes is now as treasured an election tradition as the BBC rolling out John Curtice to suggest the Lib Dems might overperform (or indeed as the Lib Dems subsequently underperforming). And with the recent declaration that it’s “Whitby Woman” who will decide our fates on 4 July, The Chimera took a look back at the rogues’ gallery that is British target voters, past and present, then asked: just how accurate was each label? And just how patronising?
Mondeo Man, 1992
Everyone knows that in 1990, history ended for 18 years, and wouldn’t start up again until the global economy hit black ice and thudded heavily into the central reservation on the motorway of human progress. It’s appropriate, then, that as the first of his kind, Mondeo Man was not named after his town or his political heritage, but a car brand. The age of class-based politics was over, and from now on, people (and their voting intentions) would be defined by their brand allegiances.
Mondeo Man was, really, a rebrand of Essex Man, who was used to explain the success of Margaret Thatcher throughout the 1980s – the post-working-class voter who swung from Labout to the Tories. He’s still the most popular of the archetypes, and in fact we all instinctively still know exactly who he is: the barrow boy come good, living in a right-to-buy house in a southern new town. He’s white collar and believes in the death penalty. (These days, he probably hates Gareth Southgate.) He was only given his name after Thatcher had been dethroned, though, at the 1992 election that saw a surprise win for John Major. And in fact, Mondeo Man has recently been eclipsed by his more prosperous cousin, Deano.
How accurate is the name? Astoundingly, a cursory Wikipedia tells me that the Ford Mondeo actually only first went on sale in 1993, meaning Mondeo owners not only never voted for Thatcher, but didn’t even get a chance to help Major hit the afterburners in 1992. Who knew?
How patronising is the name? A bit patronising, but at the same time, the whole point of Mondeo man is that he’s doing well enough in life that he switched from Labour to the Tories. In a way, it’s a compliment. And anyway, you could get away with anything in the 90s, like Soccer AM and Jonathan Ross.
Worcester Woman – every election since 1997
I know a guy who grew up on Guernsey in the 1970s. When asked what it was like, his go-to response is that it was much like growing up in Guildford in the 1970s – except you couldn’t leave this “Guildford”. In a way, I think that he could as well easily have used Worcester as his comparison, as a place that’s perfectly pleasant and liveable, until the hypothetical moment you’re threatened with getting stuck there, at which point your pulse probably begins to race and your palms get sweaty.2
Worcester has been used as a bellwether since New Labour’s (first) landslide, and thirtysomething mother-of-two Worcester Woman has likewise been the ne plus ultra among general election target voters since. Unlike Mondeo Man, she swung the other way in the 90s – from the Tories, to Labour – as she perceived that the likelihood of her quality of life improving was just as good, or better, under Blair. Over the last 25 years she has become a byword for those voters who don’t think about politics much, but do care enough to actually go out and vote on election day. She is, to a tee, England’s soccer mom.
How accurate is the name? Bear in mind that by this point, Worcester Woman doesn’t actually have to come from Worcester itself – like other target voter profiles, she describes a demographic and a mindset, rather than a place. That said, the constituency of Worcester has voted as the country did in every election since 1979.3 So it’s probably a good profile for party strategists to try to win over, yeah.
How patronising is the name? It’s pretty bland. The fact that it’s such an accurate mirror of the country, and doesn’t come with any explicit class baggage, means it’s quite hard to object to.
Holby City Woman – 2010
Holby City Woman is only target voter to be named after a TV show, which, cmon, you just know whichever Oxbridge Tory spad came up with in 2010 had never, ever seen an episode of the hospital drama itself. Supposedly, HCW was in her 30s or 40s, and cared about the NHS but – as the more likely manager of household finances than her husband or boyfriend – was ready for the cuts to public spending that Cameron’s supposedly de-toxified party was now advocating to “balance the books” and bring down the budget deficit. In the end, of course, HCW wasn’t wooed enough by Cameron: he failed to get a majority over the line and was forced into an uneasy coalition with the Liberal Democrats.
How accurate is the name? HCW was actually based not on the hypothetical voter who watched Holby City, but on a character within the series called Faye Morton, played by Patsy Kensit.4 So the name’s confusing, as it seems a bit odd to base your target voter profile on a fictional person. Then again, if Cameron came out and said “We need to win Faye Morton’s vote to get into Downing Street”, the soap-watching public would have thought he needed to be, well… hospitalised.
How patronising is the name? If you’re going to assume someone’s taste in TV, then saying “I think these voters will relate to Holby City” is probably not intended as a compliment.
Motorway Man – 2010
What the hell do I write about “Motorway Man”? The weirdest and most forgettable of the British target voter profiles of the last quarter-century, Motorway Man lived – you guessed it – in a housing estate near a motorway, probably in a new build. He was materially ambitious and said to be a sort of more evolved version of Mondeo Man (if he ever existed). Perhaps he was married to Holby City Woman.
How accurate is the name? Motorways, at least to me, don’t really signify much. In the 1960s, they might have been seen as cutting-edge symbols of the white heat of technology, but nowadays it’s more “getting a Big Mac and Coke in your trackies as the blood runs back into your feet after five yours stuck in traffic on the M6 in your friend’s Fiat Panda”. Pretty bleh, Pretty nothing-y. I think this label was a miss, personally. But then it was coined by the FT, and who am I to question them?
How patronising is the name? Too baffling to be patronising.
Workington Man – 2019
Red-blooded Workington man was (supposedly) furious with the state of the country. He (supposedly) lived in post-industrial Cumbria, voted for Brexit and by 2019 he had (supposedly) spent three years getting progressively angrier at the likes of Gina Miller and kimono-clad fox killer Jolyon Maugham QC as they foiled the will of the people in the courts, again and again.
He was, of course, the perfect encapsulation of a very real phenomenon, as the Tory strategy for the 2019 general election worked wonders and dislodged the Red Wall of traditional Labour voters across the North and Midlands, that exhortation to “Get Brexit Done” persuading many in traditionally red seats to vote Conservative for the first time.5 We all know the script.
How accurate was the name? Workington, the constituency, did vote for Brexit, 61% to 39%. And it does look like it’s about to swing back to Labour, along with dozens of other Red Wall seats. Workington Man definitely had a hand in delivering Boris Johnson his landslide, in other words.
How patronising was the name? I can’t read the phrase “Workington Man” without the grinning face of Dominic Cummings floating in my swimming vision (thanks, Dom) – does that imply that it’s patronising? Am I, as part of the London-dwelling Oxbridge-educated liberal elite, triggered by Mr Workington? Possibly. But it’s still a very patronising label. Believing in the easy caricature of Workington Man is only one degree more sanitised than calling people “gammon”. And anyway – statistically and historically, he’s a left-wing voter.
Whitby Woman, Stevenage Woman and Nuneaton Woman – 2024
This being the age of peak content, we have not only one, but three different names for our target voters in 2024. All are women, interestingly, though it is Whitby Woman who is probably the best known. Invented by the wonks at More In Common, WW is one of the 70 per cent of undecided voters who are female (as of 1 June, anyway), and who will supposedly decide whether we get our first Arsenal fan PM, or if it’s going to be another five years of Sunak. She’s older, owns her own home, didn’t go to university, and lives on the east coast of England, if not in Whitby itself. She’s around 61, and has voted Tory historically, but has been alienated by the Tories’ poor handling of the economy and immigration.6
How accurate and patronising is/are the name(s)? We’ll have to wait and see.
Something like Partygate or perceived macho culture often carries a lot more weight with these voters than specific policy positions.
Not in a sexy way, though.
Or at least, as England did.
Fine – perhaps the aforementioned spad did actually watch Holby City.
A short-term strategy that definitely hasn’t come back to bite them with the rise of Reform in 2024.
Incidentally, Stevenage woman is younger – she’s in her 40s – and she cares more about the NHS and the cost of living. Labour want to win her over, rather than Whitby Woman, who is more likely to harm the Conservatives by not voting than by actively voting for a different party.