British Elections 1918-1945

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  I've often wondered what an election held in the late 30's, but before WW 2 started would have looked like, say some time between the Munich conference and the start of the war.  Based on all the by-elections held, I'd guess a narrower Tory victory with serious losses but comfortable enough margin to retain power.  

I can't link, but in a lecture titled "Britain in the Twentieth Century: The Road to War", Vernon Bogdanor writes:

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In a later lecture, he notes:

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Oh - As for Rothwell, it's the old Normanton constituency from 1885, minus the expanded boroughs of Normanton and Wakefield, with those parts replaced by Ardsley and Hunslet to the north. Ardsley was associated with the Wakefield poor law union. The only alternative constituency for Hunslet was Barkston Ash, given the integrity of the Leeds borough boundary, and Rothwell was much more socially similar. In the modern era, we'd probably have "Rothwell and Wakefield North", and "Emley and Wakefield South", but that's the borough boundary question again!

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It's curious, given modern patterns, that West Derbyshire was Labour while High Peak was Tory.  Both seem to have covered basically similar areas to the modern constituencies (West Derbyshire having been renamed Derbyshire Dales in 2010).

In West Derbyshire's case an Independent Labour candidate, Charles White, had won a 1944 by-election and stood as an official Labour candidate in 1945, when he held on narrowly.

The Conservatives won a bigger percentage vote in Western Derbyshire than High Peak in 1945, as in every election since 1923, I think. However, High Peak had a Liberal who won 16%. As was mentioned by Ippikin earlier, Charles White in Western Derbyshire was the son of a Liberal MP. He faced no Liberal opposition.

Oh - As for Rothwell, it's the old Normanton constituency from 1885, minus the expanded boroughs of Normanton and Wakefield, with those parts replaced by Ardsley and Hunslet to the north. Ardsley was associated with the Wakefield poor law union. The only alternative constituency for Hunslet was Barkston Ash, given the integrity of the Leeds borough boundary, and Rothwell was much more socially similar. In the modern era, we'd probably have "Rothwell and Wakefield North", and "Emley and Wakefield South", but that's the borough boundary question again!

Ah, so more an attempt (a successful one, obviously) to preserve a mining constituency, rather than to create one. Makes sense.

Yes - the bias towards continuity of constituency arrangements, where possible.

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In Carnarvon DoB, Conservatives kept their 1935 support while many Lloyd George voters (as well as new voters, I presume) chose Labour, who stood their first candidate since 1929.

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Gosh - but, then again, this was a parliament that included extra seats for certain university graduates...

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It's not so easy to see the 1935-79 changes because 1935 was a very good election for the Conservatives and allies in the urban constituencies.

The main changes between 1935 and 1979 were in the Scottish Central Belt and south Lancashire. They picked up about 50 seats in those two regions by gaining strength in, or taking over completely, cities like Liverpool, Glasgow and Salford, and the nearby towns. Birmingham, Newcastle, Nottingham and Leicester, outside those two regions, behaved similarly, as did those parts of London outside the inner-city areas that stayed strongly Conservative or Labour.

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So I finally got round to taking Al's map and added in the boundary review for 1945:

That's great.

Comparing them to my own map, the only major difference is that the Evesham/Cirencester boundary mess isn't quite perfect in the amended 1918-35 map, though it's right in the 1945 map.

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Looks right to me. Classic example of a constituency of leftover parts that didn't end up in the parli boroughs to the north. It started out with the three towns named at the bottom, and a couple of detached parts of non-contiguous rural districts.

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Bump

1923 was a Liberal false dawn, with scores of 2- and 3-digit majorities. A year later in this region, they held two seats, gained and lost two against Labour, lost one to the Communists (really unofficial Labour) and lost all the rest to the Conservatives. Mosley would soon join Labour and move seat from Harrow to Birmingham, Ladywood, barely losing to Neville Chamberlain. Labour made progress in east London and the Thames estuary, stronger than their gains in other urban areas in 1923.