| Birmingham Edgbaston | |
| Parliament: | uk |
| Year: | 1885 |
| Type: | Borough |
| Elects Howmany: | One |
| Population: | 96,568 (2011 census)[1] |
| Electorate: | 71,354 (2023)[2] |
| Region: | England |
| Party: | Labour |
Birmingham Edgbaston is a constituency, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2017 by Preet Gill, a Labour Co-op MP.
The most high-profile MP for the constituency was former Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain (1937–1940). Since 1953 it has elected a succession of female MPs.
1885–1918: The Municipal Borough of Birmingham ward of Edgbaston, part of Rotton Park ward, the local government district of Harborne, and part of the local government district of Balsall Heath.
1918–1974: The County Borough of Birmingham wards of Edgbaston, Harborne, and Market Hall.
1974–1983: The County Borough of Birmingham wards of Deritend, Edgbaston, Harborne, and Quinton.
1983–1997: The City of Birmingham wards of Edgbaston, Harborne, and Quinton.
1997–2018: The City of Birmingham wards of Bartley Green, Edgbaston, Harborne, and Quinton.
2018–2024: The City of Birmingham wards of Bartley Green, Edgbaston, Harborne, and Quinton, about half of North Edgbaston and fragments of Weoley & Selly Oak and Balsall Heath West.
Rearranged following a local government boundary review which came into effect in May 2018.[3]
2024–present: The City of Birmingham wards of: Bartley Green; Edgbaston; Harborne; North Edgbaston; Quinton.[4]
The remaining areas of the North Edgbaston ward were transferred from Birmingham Ladywood, bringing the electorate within the permitted range. Other changes to align with new ward boundaries.
South west of Birmingham city centre, this is a house and garden-rich and mostly middle-income constituency with limited social housing, featuring parks, Warwickshire's cricket ground and two grammar schools. It was a safe Conservative seat for decades, emphasised by solid Tory areas like Edgbaston itself and Bartley Green, Labour has held the seat since 1997. It contains the University of Birmingham's main campus, and most of the student halls.
The political division elected Conservative candidates as its MP between a by-election in 1898 and the 1992 general elections inclusive. The election of Gisela Stuart in 1997 produced a 10% majority fractionally exceeded in percentage terms by her re-election in 2001 on a lower turnout, stretching her majority to 12.1%. The 2015 re-election of Stuart gave the seat the thirtieth-smallest majority of Labour's 232 seats by percentage of majority and represented an improvement on 2010.[5]
On election night in May 1997, Birmingham Edgbaston was the ninth constituency to declare its results and the first seat to be gained by the Labour Party from the Conservatives[6] on a 10% swing, after 99 years of Conservative representation; presaging the Labour landslide victory of that election. Labour have held the seat ever since. Birmingham Edgbaston has returned only female MPs since 1953, longer than any other constituency in the UK.[7] The current MP for the constituency is Preet Gill of the Labour Party, who is the first-ever female Sikh MP in the UK. She was first elected at the 2017 general election, after long-serving Labour MP Gisela Stuart stood down. It has been classified as a marginal seat; although in 2017 and 2019, the Labour Party won more than 50% of the vote.[8]
Turnout has ranged from 78.8% in 1950 to 48% in 1918, and was recorded as 61.5% in 2019.
| Election | Member | Party | Notes | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1885 | George Dixon | Liberal | |||
| 1886 | Liberal Unionist | ||||
| 1898 by-election | Francis Lowe | Conservative | |||
| 1929 | Neville Chamberlain | Conservative | Prime Minister 1937–1940; died 1940 | ||
| 1940 by-election | Peter Bennett | Conservative | Resigned 1953 on being raised to the peerage | ||
| 1953 by-election | Edith Pitt | Conservative | Died January 1966; no by-election held due to imminent general election | ||
| 1966 | Jill Knight | Conservative | |||
| 1997 | Gisela Stuart | Labour | |||
| 2017 | Preet Gill | Labour Co-op | |||