MERIDEN (UK PARLIAMENT CONSTITUENCY)

'Meriden' is a county constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.

Contents

Boundaries

History

Members of Parliament

Election results

See also

Boundaries

The constituency is one of two covering the Metropolitan Borough of Solihull. It covers the
rural area, known as the Meriden Gap, between the West Midlands conurbation and Coventry, which contains villages such as Balsall Common, Hampton-in-Arden and Meriden itself. It also covers some urban parts of the borough, particularly Castle Bromwich and Chelmsley Wood (a large area of 1960s council housing on the eastern edge of Birmingham), but also the affluent areas of Dorridge and Knowle.

History

A Meriden constituency was first established in 1955, but that constituency was considerably different from the present one, and included much of the current North Warwickshire constituency. That seat was a Labour/Conservative marginal, covering the coal mining areas of northern Warwickshire and the more affluent area near Solihull. It changed hands between the two parties several times, including in a by-election in 1968, which was won by Keith Speed of the Conservatives.
The constituency took its current boundaries in 1983. Since then it has been a safe Conservative seat. Iain Mills held the seat until he died in office in January 1997,
with the seat remaining vacant until the dissolution of Parliament and no by-election being held.
Caroline Spelman was victorious in the 1997 general election, and has held the seat since then.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1955	Reginald Moss	Labour
	1959	Gordon Matthews	Conservative
	1964	Christopher Rowland	Labour
	1968 by-election	Keith Speed	Conservative
	Feb. 1974	John Tomlinson	Labour
	1979	Iain Mills	Conservative
	1997	Caroline Spelman	Conservative

Election results

See also

★ List of Parliamentary constituencies in West Midlands