Westmorland and Lonsdale (UK Parliament constituency)

Westmorland and Lonsdale
County constituency
for the House of Commons
Boundary of Westmorland and Lonsdale in Cumbria.
Location of Cumbria within England.
County	Cumbria
Electorate	66,609 (December 2010)
Current constituency
Created	1983 (1983)
Member of Parliament	Tim Farron (Liberal Democrat)
Number of members	One
Created from	Morecambe and Lonsdale and Westmorland
Overlaps
European Parliament constituency	North West England

Westmorland and Lonsdale is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.

Boundaries

The constituency is based around the South Lakeland district of Cumbria. Important towns in the constituency include Kendal, Windermere and Kirkby Lonsdale.

It does not include the entire historic county of Westmorland, particularly lacking the county town Appleby-in-Westmorland.

Boundary review

Following their review of parliamentary representation in Cumbria, the Boundary Commission for England created a modified Westmorland and Lonsdale constituency, to deal with population changes.

The electoral wards used to create the modified seat, contested for the first time at the 2010 general election, are entirely within the South Lakeland district.

• Arnside and Beetham, Burneside, Burton and Holme, Cartmel, Coniston, Crooklands, Grange, Hawkshead, Holker, Kendal Castle, Kendal Far Cross, Kendal Fell, Kendal Glebelands, Kendal Heron Hill, Kendal Highgate, Kendal Kirkland, Kendal Mintsfeet, Kendal Nether, Kendal Oxenholme, Kendal Parks, Kendal Stonecross, Kendal Strickland, Kendal Underley, Kirkby Lonsdale, Lakes Ambleside, Lakes Grasmere, Levens, Lyth Valley, Milnthorpe, Natland, Sedbergh, Staveley-in-Cartmel, Staveley-in-Westmorland, Whinfell, Windermere Applethwaite, Windermere Bowness North, Windermere Bowness South and Windermere Town

This removed Broughton-in-Furness from the constituency.

History

Having been a fairly safe Conservative seat since its creation in 1983, the 1997 election saw the Tory majority cut to less than 5,000 votes. This was further reduced at the 2001 election. In 2005, the constituency featured among a list of seats held by high-profile Tories (in this case, the Education spokesperson Tim Collins) targeted by the LibDems in what was often referred to in the media as a "decapitation strategy". In the event, this was the only one of the "decapitation" seats to change hands in 2005, with Tim Farron gaining the seat by a very narrow majority.

In the 2010 general election, this constituency recorded the largest swing from the Conservatives to the Liberal Democrats (11.1%) in a seat where those two parties were in the top two positions. The constituency also produced the lowest share of the vote for Labour (2.2%, one of five lost deposits for Labour in Great Britain). With 96.2% of votes cast for either the Conservative or Liberal Democrat candidates, Westmorland and Lonsdale also had the highest combined share of the vote cast for the Coalition parties.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1983	Michael Jopling	Conservative
	1997	Tim Collins	Conservative
	2005	Tim Farron	Liberal Democrat

Elections

Elections in the 2010s

General Election 2010: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal Democrat	Tim Farron	30,896	60.0	+14.1
	Conservative	Gareth McKeever	18,632	36.2	−8.1
	Labour	Jonathan Todd	1,158	2.2	−5.6
	UKIP	John Mander	801	1.6	+0.2
Majority			12,264	23.8
Turnout			51,487	75.8	+5.1
	Liberal Democrat hold		Swing	+11.1

Elections in the 2000s

General Election 2005: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal Democrat	Tim Farron	22,569	45.5	+5.1
	Conservative	Tim Collins	22,302	44.9	−2.0
	Labour	John Reardon	3,796	7.6	−3.3
	UKIP	Robert Gibson	660	1.3	+0.1
	Independent	Anthony Kemp	309	0.6	N/A
Majority			267	0.5
Turnout			49,636	71.6	+3.8
	Liberal Democrat gain from Conservative		Swing	+3.5

General Election 2001: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Tim Collins	22,486	46.9	+4.7
	Liberal Democrat	Tim Farron	19,339	40.4	+7.0
	Labour	John Bateson	5,234	10.9	−9.7
	UKIP	Robert Gibson	552	1.2	N/A
	Independent	Timothy Bell	292	0.6	N/A
Majority			3,147	6.5
Turnout			47,903	67.8	−6.2
	Conservative hold		Swing	−1.2

Elections in the 1990s

General Election 1997: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Tim Collins	21,463	42.3	−14.6
	Liberal Democrat	Stan Collins	16,493	33.4	+5.9
	Labour	John Harding	10,452	20.6	+5.5
	Referendum Party	M. Smith	1,924	3.8	N/A
Majority			4,521	9.0
	Conservative hold		Swing	−10.3

General Election 1992: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Michael Jopling	31,798	56.9	−0.7
	Liberal Democrat	Stan Collins	15,362	27.5	−1.7
	Labour	Dickon J. Abbott	8,436	15.1	+1.9
	Natural Law	Robert Johnstone	287	0.5	N/A
Majority			16,436	29.4	+1.0
Turnout			55,883	77.8	−3.0
	Conservative hold		Swing	+0.5

Elections in the 1980s

General Election 1987: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Michael Jopling	30,259	57.6	−3.7
	Liberal	Stan Collins	15,339	29.2	+2.1
	Labour	S.P. Halfpenny	6,968	13.2	+3.3
Majority			14,920	28.4
Turnout			52,566	74.8
	Conservative hold		Swing	−2.9

General Election 1983: Westmorland and Lonsdale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Michael Jopling	29,775	61.3
	Liberal	K. Hulls	13,188	27.1
	Labour	Chris Stott	4,798	9.9
	Ecology	R.A. Gibson	805	1.7	+1.7
Majority			16,587	34.2
Turnout			48,566	72.3
	Conservative hold		Swing

See also

• List of Parliamentary constituencies in Cumbria