Eight wards were selected as 'key wards' – in public it was claimed that these wards were subject to particular 'stress factors' leading to a decline in the population of Westminster. In reality, secret documents showed that the wards most subject to these stress factors were rather different, and that the eight wards chosen had been the most marginal in the City Council elections of 1986. Three – Bayswater, Maida Vale and Millbank, had been narrowly won by Labour, a further three, St James's, Victoria and Cavendish had been narrowly lost by them, in West End ward an Independent had split the two seats with the Conservatives, while in Hamilton Terrace the Conservatives were threatened by the Social Democratic Party.