Worcester Woman is unimpressed and may not be voting at all

The Tories invented her, then wooed her. But she seems likely to rebuff them again on Thursday Charlie Courtauld

It was some bright spark at Tory Central Office who came up with the idea, in 1997. Around the time that they invented that Demon Eyes campaign. But Worcester Woman has outlived most other Central Office wheezes. It was Worcester Woman, they theorised, who would decide that election's outcome. Sadly for the Tories, the eponymous Midlands lady – and many voters across the Middle England constituencies – withheld support for John Major in 1997, and for William Hague in 2001.

Next week Iain Duncan Smith will try his hand at wooing Worcester. There are local elections on Thursday, and Duncan Smith needs to do well here if the party is to stand any chance at the next general election. Its first target is to consolidate control of the council. It is Tory-held – but only thanks to one Labour councillor withdrawing, and even then only with the Mayor's casting vote. But Thursday is the party's opportunity.

A Labour-held seat in the St Clement ward is up for grabs. And you couldn't get more Tory-looking than St Clement: leafy, new cars in the driveways, just across the river Severn from the racecourse ... if the Conservatives can't win here, they're stuffed. But their progress in the ward is unspectacular: last year they snaffled a seat by a mere five votes – out of an electorate numbering more than 6,000.

This year, they're hoping for better. Tony Blair has just taken us into an unpopular war. Council tax shot up last month by 13 per cent. There's even a disastrous PFI-financed hospital in the town: the plans apparently didn't include decent parking, there is no rooms for hospital files and no doctors' rest room – not even a mortuary.

So you'd think that the Tories would be excited about Thursday. The fact that they aren't so confident suggests that Worcester Woman may yet be withholding her vote.

Of course, they're talking down their prospects, but there's obviously still some work to do before Worcester comes back to the Tories. And so it seems to be.

Take Hazel Blizard – traditional Tory voter, St Clement resident, mother and estate agent. Prime Worcester Woman territory for the Conservatives. Along with so many others, she turned away from the Tories a couple of elections ago. But alarmingly for the party, she isn't ready – yet – to return to the fold: "When elections come round, I now put them to the back of my mind. And I can't see that changing on Thursday. I doubt I'll vote at all."

Duncan Smith's unqualified support for Blair over the war has only served to reinforce Hazel's view that there isn't much to choose between the two parties: "They both make promises. They both break them. I can't see much of a difference. Duncan Smith hasn't done anything to make himself stand out."

Not that Hazel in enamoured of New Labour either. "I was expecting much more, on the NHS for example. But Blair's failed miserably. On education too, he's made so many promises, and delivered nothing. The Government has decided that Worcester doesn't qualify as 'deprived' – and so the town gets significantly less funding than other areas in the country. How did they work that one out?"

But Hazel's disquiet over Labour's non-delivery hasn't pushed her back to the Tories. In her mind, all politicians are equally blameworthy. Not even the council tax rises are much of an issue.

With a Tory-Labour coalition on the county council, blame for the hefty bills is shared, and voters are more confused than convinced by the issue. So it doesn't look as if Worcester has reached the point – as it did in the early 1990s – which would cause a rebellion against the Government. Even in housing, that long-anticipated crash has not come: "They've just stabled off. Yes, some agents are offering overvalued prices – and then having to drop them after a couple of weeks, but people are far more cautious than they were in the early Nineties. We aren't going to see a negative equity crisis here again."

Hazel has one crumb of comfort for IDS. The easiest solution for the men in suits – replacing the figure at the head – is unlikely to win her round either: "Duncan Smith isn't the problem," she says. "He seems to be doing his best. I don't look either to Ken Clarke or Michael Portillo to transform the party's fortunes. Neither of them is good-looking enough, for a start!"

Seats being contested

England

Seats on 232 of 238 district councils

Seats on 40 unitary authorities

One-third of seats on 36 metropolitan districts

Scotland

32 councils and 129 seats for the Scottish Parliament

Wales

60 seats in the Welsh Assembly

The state of the parties after the 2002 elections: