Bromley and Chislehurst (UK Parliament Constituency) - History

History

The Bromley parliamentary constituency was created in 1918 (previously the area had been part of the larger Sevenoaks constituency). In 1974 it became Ravensbourne. In 1997, following the abolition of the old Chislehurst constituency, the seats of Ravensbourne and Chislehurst were joined and thus the new parliamentary constituency of Bromley and Chislehurst emerged. Bromley is known as a safe Conservative area,due to its prosperity but one of its wards Plaistow and Sundridge had a Communist Councillor in the 1940s and the previous Chislehurst seat had a Labour MP in 1966. Harold Macmillan was the MP for Bromley from 1945 until his retirement in 1964, when he was succeeded by John Hunt. Hunt, on the left of the Conservative party, held the seat (renamed Ravensbourne in 1974) until 1997 when Eric Forth took over as Conservative MP for the newly-created Bromley and Chislehurst constituency. In May 2006, just after the Local Elections, Forth was taken ill, complaining of severe stomach pains. He was diagnosed with inoperable cancer and died peacefully a few days later.

A by-election was held on 29 June 2006, which returned London Assembly member Bob Neill as the new Conservative MP with an electoral majority of just over 600 votes - compared to the previous Conservative majority of over 13000 in the 2005 general election, however turnout was down by a significant margin. In 2010 Bob Neill was reelected with a Conservative majority greater than that achieved in 2005