Wantage (UK Parliament constituency)

Wantage
County constituency for the House of Commons
120px Boundary of Wantage in Oxfordshire.
Location of Oxfordshire within England.
County	Oxfordshire
Electorate	79,775 (December 2010)
Major settlements	Wantage, Didcot, Wallingford, Faringdon
Current constituency
Created	1983
Member of parliament	Ed Vaizey (Conservative)
Number of members	One
Created from	Abingdon
Overlaps
European Parliament constituency	South East England

Wantage is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2005 by Ed Vaizey, a Conservative.

In terms of electorate, at the time of the 2010 general election, Wantage was the 46th largest constituency in the United Kingdom and the third largest in Oxfordshire.

Boundaries

1983-2010: The District of Vale of White Horse wards of Appleton, Craven, Drayton, Faringdon and Littleworth, Greendown, Grove, Harwell and Chilton, Hendred, Icknield, Island Villages, Kingston Bagpuize and Southmoor, Longworth, Marcham, Segsbury, Shrivenham, Stanford, Steventon, Sutton Courtenay, The Coxwells, and Upton and Blewbury, and the District of South Oxfordshire wards of Brightwell, Cholsey, Didcot North, Didcot Northbourne, Didcot South, Hagbourne, and Wallingford.

2010-present: The District of Vale of White Horse wards of Blewbury and Upton, Craven, Drayton, Faringdon and The Coxwells, Greendown, Grove, Hanneys, Harwell, Hendreds, Kingston Bagpuize with Southmoor, Longworth, Marcham and Shippon, Shrivenham, Stanford, Sutton Courtenay and Appleford, Wantage Charlton, and Wantage Segsbury, and the District of South Oxfordshire wards of Brightwell, Cholsey and Wallingford South, Didcot All Saints, Didcot Ladygrove, Didcot Northbourne, Didcot Park, Hagbourne, and Wallingford North.

History

The constituency was created in 1983 from parts of the seat of Abingdon. It is a safe seat for the Conservative Party. Its first MP was Robert Jackson, who served as a junior minister under both Margaret Thatcher and John Major.

However, Jackson defected to the Labour Party in 2005, and so Wantage unexpectedly had a Labour MP. Jackson was deemed unlikely to be re-elected in Wantage as a Labour MP, so he did not stand at the 2005 general election. At that election, Ed Vaizey was elected as MP for Wantage and now holds the post of Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries.

Constituency profile

There are three market towns in the constituency: Faringdon, Wallingford and Wantage. Wantage is famous as the birthplace of King Alfred the Great, Wallingford has the ancient enclosure walls of a castle and medieval bridge. Faringdon bears a scar of the English Civil War, when its church lost the top of its steeple. The largest town in the constituency is Didcot, which grew up around the Great Western Railway when I.K. Brunel built a branch line from its main line between London and Bristol to Oxford, siting the junction at the then sparsely populated parish of Didcot.

The constituency is mostly rural in character, with more than 400 farms in operation. Included are the Uffington White Horse and The Ridgeway, a prehistoric road, runs along its southern border. The River Thames runs along the northern and western border. The area is affluent and Conservative in nature containing many commuters with fast transport links to London, with Didcot the only area with a strong Labour vote locally. The seat includes international race horse breeders and trainers with racing stables across a broad area that reaches into the Lambourn Downs, crossing over the border into the Newbury seat.

Workless claimants, registered jobseekers, were in November 2012 significantly lower than the national average of 3.8%, at 1.6% of the population based on a statistical compilation by The Guardian.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1983	Robert Jackson	Conservative
	2005		Labour
	2005	Ed Vaizey	Conservative

Elections

Elections in the 2010s

General Election 2015: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Ed Vaizey	31,092	53.3	+1.3
	Labour	Stephen Webb	9,343	16.0	+2.1
	Liberal Democrat	Alex Meredith	7,611	13.1	-14.9
	UKIP	Lee Upcraft	7,288	12.5	+8.2
	Green	Kate Prendergast	2,986	5.1	+3.3
Majority			21,749	37.3
Turnout			58,320	70.3	+0.3
	Conservative hold		Swing	-0.4

General Election 2010: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Ed Vaizey	29,284	52.0	+8.9
	Liberal Democrat	Alan Armitage	15,737	27.9	+0.3
	Labour	Steven Mitchell	7,855	13.9	-10.0
	UKIP	Jacqueline Jones	2,421	4.3	+2.8
	Green	Adam Twine	1,044	1.9	-0.7
Majority			13,547	24.1
Turnout			56,341	70.0	+1.9
	Conservative hold		Swing	+4.3

Elections in the 2000s

General Election 2005: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Ed Vaizey	22,354	43.0	+3.4
	Liberal Democrat	Andrew Crawford	14,337	27.6	−0.4
	Labour	Mark McDonald	12,464	24.0	−4.2
	Green	Adam Twine	1,332	2.6	+0.4
	UKIP	Nikolai Tolstoy-Miloslavsky	798	1.5	-0.4
	English Democrats	Gerald Lambourne	646	1.2	N/A
Majority			8,017	15.4
Turnout			51,931	68.2	+3.7
	Conservative hold		Swing	+1.9

General Election 2001: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Robert Jackson	19,475	39.6	-0.2
	Labour	Stephen Beer	13,875	28.2	-0.7
	Liberal Democrat	Neil Fawcett	13,776	28.0	+1.5
	Green	David Brooks-Saxl	1,062	2.2	+1.0
	UKIP	Nikolai Tolstoy	941	1.9	+1.1
Majority			5,600	11.4
Turnout			49,129	64.5	-13.6
	Conservative hold		Swing	+0.3

Elections in the 1990s

General Election 1997: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Robert Jackson	22,311	39.81
	Labour	C Wilson	16,222	28.94
	Liberal Democrat	J Riley	14,862	26.52
	Referendum	S Rising	1,549	2.76
	Green	M Kennet	640	1.14
	UKIP	Nikolai Tolstoy	465	0.83
Majority			6,089	10.86
Turnout				78.10
	Conservative hold		Swing

General Election 1992: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Robert Jackson	30,575	54.1	+0.2
	Liberal Democrat	RMC Morgan	14,102	25.0	−5.5
	Labour	VS Woodell	10,955	19.4	+3.8
	Green	RJ Ely	867	1.5	+1.5
Majority			16,473	29.2	+5.7
Turnout			56,499	82.7	+4.8
	Conservative hold		Swing	+2.8

Elections in the 1980s

General Election 1987: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Robert Jackson	27,951	53.96
	Social Democratic	W Tumin	15,795	30.49
	Labour	Stephen Ladyman	8,055	15.55
Majority			12,156	23.47
Turnout				77.90
	Conservative hold		Swing

General Election 1983: Wantage

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Robert Jackson	25,992	52.88
	Social Democratic	W Tumin	15,867	32.28
	Labour	AJD Popper	7,115	14.47
	Wessex Regionalist	AP Barrett Mockler	183	0.37
Majority			10,125	20.60
Turnout				76.87
	Conservative hold		Swing

See also

• List of Parliamentary constituencies in Oxfordshire
• Banbury (UK Parliament constituency)
• Henley (UK Parliament constituency)
• Oxford East (UK Parliament constituency)
• Oxford West and Abingdon (UK Parliament constituency)
• Witney (UK Parliament constituency)