Post by greenhert on May 5, 2020 14:49:33 GMT
South Dorset was created in 1885; it experienced a major boundary change in 1918 when Dorchester was moved to West Dorset; it gained Swanage that year. It comprises the entirety of the former borough of Weymouth & Portland and also the southern edge of the former district of Purbeck.
Weymouth, the largest town in the constituency, is a seaside and harbour town which once hosted cross-channel ferries to France and a tramway (which is in the process of being completely lifted). and tourism has been its key economic source for decades. Portland Harbour nearby on the Island of Portland was home to a key naval base, HMNB Portland, until that closed in 1995 following defence spending cuts, and being a popular windsurfing location on the south coast is also home to the Weymouth & Portland National Sailing Academy, which hosted the sailing events of the 2012 Olympic Games. Swanage, on the eastern edge of the constituency, is a popular seaside resort and also a key quarrying town in Dorset, with Purbeck stone having been used in the rebuilding of London by Sir Christopher Wren; next to it is the Studland & Godlings on Heath National Nature Reserve. South Dorset is the least-well qualified constituency in Dorset, although this is mainly because of the low qualification levels on the Isle of Portland and around Weymouth itself (there is also a significantly higher proportion of apprentices than average, reflecting the working-class nature of this part of South Dorset) although the northern suburbs on the edge of the former Weymouth & Portland conurbation and around Swanage are considerably better educated. Melcombe Regis has one of the highest proportion of private renters in the South West (and in the country outside a metropolitan area), whereas the Weymouth suburbs of Nottington and Preston have high owner-occupation rates even by Dorset standards (85% and 90% respectively).
South Dorset is the most marginal seat in Dorset overall but leans strongly towards the Conservatives just like the rest of Dorset. One of its predecessor constituencies, Weymouth & Melcombe Regis, had Sir Christopher himself as its MP during the reign of Queen Anne. Most of its Conservative MPs have had aristocratic or political relations somewhere; Robert Gascoyne Cecil, 5th Marquess of Salisbury, was Conservative MP for South Dorset from 1929-41 and his grandson, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, the 7th and current Marquess of Salisbury and also Chancellor of the University of Hertfordshire, was Conservative MP for this seat from 1979-87. Victor Montagu,who disclaimed the title of Earl of Sandwich (his son John is the 11th Earl of Sandwich), was this seat's Conservative MP from 1941-62 until his succession to the aforementioned title; one of his grandsons, Jesse Norman, is a Conservative MP (for Hereford & South Herefordshire). The resulting by-election of 1962 saw Guy Barnett become the first ever Labour MP in Dorset after anti-Common Market Conservative Sir Piers Debenham stood as an Independent, splitting the Conservative vote. By October 1964 Sir Piers had died and no similar anti-Common Market candidate took his place, allowing former Labour MP Evelyn Mansfield King (as a Conservative) to defeat Mr Barnett, who later served as MP for Greenwich. Labour finally recaptured the seat at a general election in 2001 when Jim Knight defeated Ian Bruce by just 153 votes (Mr Bruce held on in 1997 by 77 votes despite a Referendum Party intervention) mainly due to drawing tactical votes from the Liberal Democrats; it marked the only Labour gain from the Conservatives that year. In 2005, the Conservative candidate Ed Matts ran into trouble when he was forced to apologise for manipulating photographs in campaign literature and making a false claim about Mr Knight supporting the closure of a school in the constituency; the resulting negative publicity for the Conservatives helped Mr Knight boost the Labour majority to 1,812. It could not last, though, as the Conservatives' Richard Drax (full name Richard Grosvenor Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax) won the seat in 2010 on a 9.3% swing and it has reverted to being a safe Conservative seat for the time being. Mr Drax has his own considerable Establishment connections: he is descended from the Barons Dunsany (his cousin is the 19th Baron Dunsany), six of his ancestors were MPs in the West of England, many of his ancestors were military officers of high rank, he himself achieved the rank of captain in the British Army before relinquishing his British Army commission, and two of his fomer wives are connected to nobility and royalty in some fashion. At a local level, South Dorset has the only Labour councillors in the whole of the Dorset Council area (one represents Portland, the other the Rodwell & Wyke division of Weymouth), and three of the four Greens on Dorset Council, all of whom represent divisions in the former Weymouth & Portland borough; the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives represent the more affluent suburbs in the north of that ex-borough. The eastern divisions in what was Purbeck are currently all Conservative but not safely so; a strong Independent challenge was made in that area in May 2019.
Weymouth, the largest town in the constituency, is a seaside and harbour town which once hosted cross-channel ferries to France and a tramway (which is in the process of being completely lifted). and tourism has been its key economic source for decades. Portland Harbour nearby on the Island of Portland was home to a key naval base, HMNB Portland, until that closed in 1995 following defence spending cuts, and being a popular windsurfing location on the south coast is also home to the Weymouth & Portland National Sailing Academy, which hosted the sailing events of the 2012 Olympic Games. Swanage, on the eastern edge of the constituency, is a popular seaside resort and also a key quarrying town in Dorset, with Purbeck stone having been used in the rebuilding of London by Sir Christopher Wren; next to it is the Studland & Godlings on Heath National Nature Reserve. South Dorset is the least-well qualified constituency in Dorset, although this is mainly because of the low qualification levels on the Isle of Portland and around Weymouth itself (there is also a significantly higher proportion of apprentices than average, reflecting the working-class nature of this part of South Dorset) although the northern suburbs on the edge of the former Weymouth & Portland conurbation and around Swanage are considerably better educated. Melcombe Regis has one of the highest proportion of private renters in the South West (and in the country outside a metropolitan area), whereas the Weymouth suburbs of Nottington and Preston have high owner-occupation rates even by Dorset standards (85% and 90% respectively).
South Dorset is the most marginal seat in Dorset overall but leans strongly towards the Conservatives just like the rest of Dorset. One of its predecessor constituencies, Weymouth & Melcombe Regis, had Sir Christopher himself as its MP during the reign of Queen Anne. Most of its Conservative MPs have had aristocratic or political relations somewhere; Robert Gascoyne Cecil, 5th Marquess of Salisbury, was Conservative MP for South Dorset from 1929-41 and his grandson, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, the 7th and current Marquess of Salisbury and also Chancellor of the University of Hertfordshire, was Conservative MP for this seat from 1979-87. Victor Montagu,who disclaimed the title of Earl of Sandwich (his son John is the 11th Earl of Sandwich), was this seat's Conservative MP from 1941-62 until his succession to the aforementioned title; one of his grandsons, Jesse Norman, is a Conservative MP (for Hereford & South Herefordshire). The resulting by-election of 1962 saw Guy Barnett become the first ever Labour MP in Dorset after anti-Common Market Conservative Sir Piers Debenham stood as an Independent, splitting the Conservative vote. By October 1964 Sir Piers had died and no similar anti-Common Market candidate took his place, allowing former Labour MP Evelyn Mansfield King (as a Conservative) to defeat Mr Barnett, who later served as MP for Greenwich. Labour finally recaptured the seat at a general election in 2001 when Jim Knight defeated Ian Bruce by just 153 votes (Mr Bruce held on in 1997 by 77 votes despite a Referendum Party intervention) mainly due to drawing tactical votes from the Liberal Democrats; it marked the only Labour gain from the Conservatives that year. In 2005, the Conservative candidate Ed Matts ran into trouble when he was forced to apologise for manipulating photographs in campaign literature and making a false claim about Mr Knight supporting the closure of a school in the constituency; the resulting negative publicity for the Conservatives helped Mr Knight boost the Labour majority to 1,812. It could not last, though, as the Conservatives' Richard Drax (full name Richard Grosvenor Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax) won the seat in 2010 on a 9.3% swing and it has reverted to being a safe Conservative seat for the time being. Mr Drax has his own considerable Establishment connections: he is descended from the Barons Dunsany (his cousin is the 19th Baron Dunsany), six of his ancestors were MPs in the West of England, many of his ancestors were military officers of high rank, he himself achieved the rank of captain in the British Army before relinquishing his British Army commission, and two of his fomer wives are connected to nobility and royalty in some fashion. At a local level, South Dorset has the only Labour councillors in the whole of the Dorset Council area (one represents Portland, the other the Rodwell & Wyke division of Weymouth), and three of the four Greens on Dorset Council, all of whom represent divisions in the former Weymouth & Portland borough; the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives represent the more affluent suburbs in the north of that ex-borough. The eastern divisions in what was Purbeck are currently all Conservative but not safely so; a strong Independent challenge was made in that area in May 2019.
