| Wentworth and Dearne | |
| Parliament: | uk |
| Map2: | EnglandSouthYorkshire |
| Map Entity: | South Yorkshire |
| Year: | 2010 |
| Abolished: | 2024 |
| Type: | County |
| Elects Howmany: | One |
| Electorate: | 73,863 (December 2019)[1] |
| Region: | England |
Wentworth and Dearne was a constituency in South Yorkshire represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since its 2010 creation by John Healey, a member of the Labour Party who served as Shadow Secretary of State for Defence from 2020.
Further to the completion of the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, the seat was abolished. Subject to boundary changes, which entailed the loss of the two Dearne wards, and offset by the addition of the City of Doncaster wards of Conisbrough, and Edlington and Warmsworth it was reformed as Rawmarsh and Conisbrough, and was first contested at the 2024 general election.[2]
Parliament accepted the Boundary Commission's Fifth Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies recommending the creation of this constituency for the 2010 general election.
In September 2015 he was appointed Shadow Minister for Housing (attending Shadow Cabinet).
The seat comprises satellite settlements to two large Yorkshire towns, separated by green buffers, in a band north of Rotherham and southeast of Barnsley and as such has the electoral wards:
Hoober, Rawmarsh, Silverwood, Swinton, Wath and Wickersley
Dearne North and Dearne South[4]
Most of the constituency succeeded Wentworth, however the large settlement of Dearne was instead the largest in Barnsley East and Mexborough. The name of the seat stems from the village that shares its name with the largest private house in the country and listed gardens in the seat, Wentworth Woodhouse, in a similar manner, with a widened use of an otherwise scarcely populated settlement, as Sefton and Tatton.
The South Yorkshire settlements grew in the seat into primarily large town size developments from the large presence of coal leading to extensive mining in this area, coupled with convenient proximity to Sheffield, the canals and rivers network, as well as to Doncaster, York, Wakefield and Leeds. As the mining industry has suffered a decline and agriculture employs few people, niche manufacturing, general processing (such as of food and raw materials) as well as retail and distribution are critical sectors of the economy to local employment. Workless claimants who were registered jobseekers were in November 2012 higher than the national average of 3.8%, at 5.6% of the population, based on a statistical compilation by The Guardian.[5]
| Election | Member | Party | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | John Healey | Labour | ||
| 2024 | Constituency abolished | |||
* Served as an MP in the 2005–2010 Parliament