Dudley North (UK Parliament constituency)

Constituency profile

Dudley North is one of four constituencies presently covering the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley, encompassing the northern part of the borough, including the town centre. The constituency voted strongly for Brexit and it is slightly poorer than the UK as a whole.

Boundaries

1997–2010: The Metropolitan Borough of Dudley wards of Castle and Priory, Coseley East, Coseley West, Gornal, St James's, St Thomas's, and Sedgley.

2010–2024: The Metropolitan Borough of Dudley wards of Castle and Priory, Gornal, St James's, St Thomas's, Sedgley, and Upper Gornal and Woodsetton.

History

Before the 1997 election, Dudley was divided into East and West constituencies, rather than the current North and Dudley South. Dudley North covers much of the area previously covered by Dudley East, which included Netherton but excluded the western part of Sedgley, which was part of Dudley West.

The earlier Dudley constituency, consisting of central Dudley, Netherton, and Stourbridge, was more prominent before 1974. Colonel George Wigg (later Lord Wigg), Prime Minister Harold Wilson's adviser on security matters and later a Minister of State, held the seat for many years until elevated to the peerage in 1968. At the Dudley by-election in March of that year, Donald Williams, the Conservative candidate, gained the seat with a swing of 20%. In 1970, however, the seat was regained by Labour with the election of Dr John Gilbert, who subsequently represented Dudley East from February 1974 until its abolition at the 1997 general election. Gilbert served as a Minister of State under both James Callaghan and (as a peer) Tony Blair. Dudley West meanwhile was represented, until his death in 1994, by Conservative MP Dr John Blackburn. At the subsequent Dudley West by election the seat was a Labour gain with Ian Pearson elected. After boundary changes, Pearson became the MP for the newly created Dudley South seat at the 1997 election

Ross Cranston (Labour) was the first MP for the new Dudley North seat after winning it at the 1997 election; he remained the constituencies MP until the 2005 general election, when it was retained by his successor Ian Austin.

In 2010, Austin held onto his seat with 38.7% of the vote, a narrow 1.7% ahead of Conservative candidate Graeme Brown, at the first general election in 36 years which resulted in a hung parliament. Despite increasing his majority to 11% at the 2015 election (4,181 votes), in 2017 – after two recounts – it was reduced to a mere 22 votes, the fourth smallest majority at that election, and was the Labour seat that was closest to being taken by the Conservatives that election. (Walsall North, a closely neighbouring constituency was indeed gained by the Conservatives.) In 2019, the Conservatives gained the seat for the first time, with their candidate Marco Longhi winning a majority of more than 11,000 votes. The Conservative vote share increased by 16.6% in the seat, which was the party's fifth-largest increase at the election.

Members of Parliament

Election results 1997–2024

Elections in the 1990s

Elections in the 2000s

Elections in the 2010s

The original Conservative candidate for the 2015 election Afzal Amin was suspended after allegations he persuaded the English Defence League to announce a march against a mosque in the constituency

|reg. electors = 61,936

Notes

References

References

1. "The 2023 Review of Parliamentary Constituency Boundaries in England – Volume one: Report – West Midlands {{!}} Boundary Commission for England".
2. Electoral Calculus https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/seatdetails.py?seat=Dudley+North
3. Leather, Harry. (9 June 2017). "Dudley General Election results: Ian Austin wins Dudley North by just 22 votes". [[Express & Star]].
4. Dare, Tom. (13 December 2019). "Dudley North goes blue for first time in history in general election 2019". [[Birmingham Mail]].
5. (19 December 2019). "General Election 2019: results and analysis". [[House of Commons Library]].
6. {{Rayment-hc. d. 3. (March 2012)
7. "Election Data 1997". [[Electoral Calculus]].
8. "Election Data 2001". [[Electoral Calculus]].
9. "Election Data 2005". [[Electoral Calculus]].
10. "Election Data 2010". Electoral Calculus.
11. "Election Data 2015". Electoral Calculus.
12. (26 March 2015). "Les Jones confirmed as the new Tory candidate for Dudley North". Dudley News.
13. "General Election". West Midlands Green Party.
14. (4 March 2015). "List of selected candidates". Liberal Democrats.
15. (4 February 2015). "TUSC parliamentary candidates in May 2015".
16. (22 March 2015). "Tory candidate suspended over vote-winning allegations". BBC News.
17. "Dudley North parliamentary constituency - Election 2019 - BBC News".
18. (13 December 2019). "Dudley North parliamentary constituency - Election 2019". BBC News.
19. (29 January 2019). "Commons Briefing Paper 7979. General Election 2017: results and analysis". [[House of Commons Library]].