| North West Leicestershire | |
| Parliament: | uk |
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North West Leicestershire is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2024 by Amanda Hack of the Labour Party. It had previously been held by Andrew Bridgen since 2010, as a Conservative from 2010 until 2023, a Reclaim Party member between May and December 2023 and as an Independent for the remainder of his term.
The constituency was contested for the first time in 1983, and Conservative candidate David Ashby became its first MP that year. He stood down in 1997 and Labour's David Taylor won the seat, holding it until he died of a heart attack in December 2009. Taylor had already announced that he would stand down at the 2010 general election. With the next election being due on 6 May 2010, it was considered uneconomic and (based on precedent) unnecessary to arrange a by-election. In the 2010 election, Andrew Bridgen took the seat for the Conservatives, with a swing of 12% from Labour to the Conservatives and with a smaller Labour–Liberal Democrats swing. Bridgen's majority was 7,511 or 14.5% of the total votes cast.
North West Leicestershire's main settlements are the small towns of Coalville and Ashby-de-la-Zouch. The population is divided between Labour-inclined former mining areas with high rates of employment[1] and low social housing dependency,[2] and Conservative-inclined rural villages, with most people focused close to the two towns named.[3] The seat has been a bellwether since 1983, as the winning party has formed the government.
In 2011 Coalfield Resources plc were given permission to develop an opencast coal mining pit on the site of the former Minorca colliery on the outskirts of Measham, in the seat, which will be 1miles across and extract 1,250,000 tonnes (1,230,000 tons) of coal over five years, and 250,000 tonnes (about 245,000 tons) of clay. This will be one of three large mines all operated by the main UK coal-extracting company.[4]
North West Leicestershire constituency was created in 1983 from parts of the seats of Bosworth to the south and Loughborough to the east.
1983–1997: The District of North West Leicestershire, and the Borough of Charnwood wards of Shepshed East and Shepshed West.
1997–2024: The District of North West Leicestershire.
Following the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, which came into effect for the 2024 general election, the size of the constituency was reduced to bring the electorate within the permitted range by transferring the two small wards of Appleby, and Oakthorpe and Donisthorpe to the newly named constituency of Hinckley and Bosworth.[5]
Bosworth and Loughborough prior to 1983
| Election | Member | Party | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1983 | David Ashby | Conservative | ||
| 1997 | David Taylor | Labour | ||
| 2010 | Andrew Bridgen | Conservative | ||
| Apr 2023 | Independent | |||
| May 2023 | Reclaim | |||
| Dec 2023 | Independent | |||
| 2024 | Amanda Hack | Labour | ||