Created 1997 Member of parliament James Berry | European Parliament constituency London Party Conservative Party | |
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Created from Surbiton and Kingston (part) | ||
Kingston and Surbiton /ˈkɪŋstᵿn ənd ˈsɜːr.bᵻˌtᵿn/ is a constituency created in 1997 represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2015 by James Berry of the Conservatives.
Contents
Boundaries
1997-2010: The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames wards of Berrylands, Burlington, Chessington North, Chessington South, Grove, Hook, Malden Manor, Norbiton Park, Norbiton, St James, St Mark's, Surbiton Hill, Tolworth East, Tolworth South, and Tolworth West.
2010–present: As above less Burlington plus Beverley — and neighbouring Tolworth and Hook wards having been in local government renamed to become Alexandra, Tolworth and Hook Rise, Chessington North and Hook.
The constituency covers most of the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, covering the town of Surbiton, Chessington, New Malden, Tolworth and the south of Kingston itself. The remainder of the borough, a northern part of Kingston, has remained since 1997 in the Richmond Park seat.
2007 boundary review
As part of its Fifth Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, the Boundary Commission made minor changes to re-align the constituency boundaries with the boundaries of the local government divisions (wards); moving the entirety of the Beverley ward into Kingston and Surbiton. It had been partly in Richmond Park until 2002 local elections. The associated public consultation received 11 submissions, of which 10 in support. The revisions came into effect at the 2010 general election.
History
The constituency was created in 1997, when the number of seats covering the boroughs of Kingston upon Thames and Richmond upon Thames was reduced from four to three. It replaced the former Surbiton constituency completely and also covers the south of the former Kingston constituency.
Former Chancellor of the Exchequer Norman Lamont represented Kingston from a by-election in 1972 until the 1997 general election, when he was not selected as the Conservative candidate for either of its replacements. Instead, the incumbent Surbiton MP Richard Tracey was selected, while Lamont unsuccessfully contested Harrogate and Knaresborough in North Yorkshire. In the event, Tracey was defeated by the Liberal Democrat candidate Edward Davey by the very narrow margin of 56 votes.
Davey held on to the seat until the general election of 2015, when he was defeated by the Conservative James Berry. The 2015 result gave the seat the 26th most marginal majority of the Conservative Party's 331 seats by percentage of majority.
Profile
Being majority middle-class suburbia, Kingston and Surbiton were during most of the 20th century strongholds for the Conservatives, with Norbiton being the sole Labour-majority ward. In local government since the seat's creation wards have frequently been won by the Liberal Democrats, whose candidate members have formed majority administrations running the local authority (1994-1998 and 2002-2014). The area has a major long-established large urban kernel in Kingston town centre where waves of public initiatives and spending have overhauled much of the area's cohort of ex-council housing and social housing, which far exceeds that found in the neighbouring borough of Richmond-upon-Thames and is similar to the proportion of such housing stock in the London Boroughs of Merton and Sutton adjoining. The highly commercial town with ancient-founded markets and a public riverside on the River Thames has enjoyed continued economic diversity and prosperity and saw in 2007 a total retail spend of £23.71 billion, placing it 12th among UK towns and cities.