This is according to a piece in this morning's Times about how the parties are assessing which voters in which seats to target:
Conservative headquarters monitors candidate performance by using polls to measure name recognition. The candidate in Harlow, Essex, Robert Halfon, is the most recognised in the country with 48 per cent of those polled in Harlow knowing his name. Successful candidates measure at about 30 per cent. Newly selected candidates can poll at about 5 per cent.
Robert's visibility in the seat is to be applauded and can be put down to over ten years' very hard work. He was first selected to contest the seat in November 1999 and is now standing there for the third successive election, now requiring a swing of just 0.3% to oust Labour's Bill Rammell.
He is one of nine candidates fighting their seat (or a very similar one after boundary changes) for the third election in a row. The others are: Ken Andrew (Carshalton and Walllington), Neil Carmichael (Stroud), Oliver Colvile (Plymouth Sutton and Devenport), Nick de Bois (Enfield North), Karen Lumley (Redditch), Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood), Henry Smith (Crawley) and Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South).
More than thirty candidates are fighting their seat for the second time in a row.
Jonathan Isaby
