Thrones of David

GNU BRITAIN

I don't know how many of you are interested in this sort of thing, because it's seriously anoraky*, but I was looking through the election results, trying to work out the number of ultra-marginals (more on this soon), and I kept thinking, "there seem to be an awful lot of Davids in the House".

Well, as a labour of love, and as a service to you, dear reader(s), I sat and counted the most often occurring names of current MPs (South Staffordshire by-election not included, but there aren't that many Patricks anyway). The most common names are:

• David: 41 (plus Wayne David, MP for Caerphilly)


• John: 36 (although I should have included Jack Straw, whose real first name is John, so it's really 37)


• Michael/Mike: 24 (not inluding Alun Michael)


• Andrew/Andy: 21


• James/Jim/Jimmy: 18 (not including Sian James, MP for Swansea East)


• Mark: 16


• Alan/Alun: 13 (which, of course, does include Alun Michael)


• Ian/Iain: 13 (the only 'Iain' is Duncan-Smith)


• Stephen/Steve: 13

The above names account for over 30% of MPs. Which says to me what a boring, conservative bunch they are (or their parents were). I mean, where are the Ebeneezers? Even boring names like Simon and Matthew hardly get a look in (there are two Simons, plus one Matthew; and, guess what, two of them are LibDems).

Little points of interest along the way: both the MPs for Dudley are called Ian, and both the MPs for Warrington are called Helen. The new MP for Monmouth is called David Davies, and he must be feeling tremendously popular at the moment (at least until people realise they've spelt his surname wrong).

There are MPs called Short, Humble, Begg, Burden, Goodman, Law (and Laws), Keen, Hope, Breed, Stoate, Slaughter, Love, Blackman (who is a white woman), Mole, Battle, Leech, Balls, Crabb, Borrow, Kidney, Hogg, Cash and Gray - any of which could be taken as amusing or ironic, if you were in the mood (and didn't have much of a sense of humour). Two of the Norfolk MPs are called Lamb and Bacon.

To my surprise, there are only eight MPs called Smith. Of whom two are called Angela Smith (Basildon, and Sheffield Hillsborough).



* I do own an anorak, but I have never worn it.