Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough (UK Parliament constituency)

Coordinates: 53°24′40″N 1°27′07″W / 53.411°N 1.452°W

Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough
Borough constituency for the House of Commons
Boundary of Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough in South Yorkshire for the 2010 general election.
Location of South Yorkshire within England.
County	South Yorkshire
Electorate	69,206 (December 2010)
Current constituency
Created	2010
Member of parliament	Gill Furniss[1] (Labour)
Created from	Sheffield Hillsborough, Sheffield Brightside
Overlaps
European Parliament constituency	Yorkshire and the Humber

Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough is a constituency^{[n 1]} represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament by Gill Furniss, a member of the Labour Party.^{[n 2]}

History

Following its review of parliamentary representation in South Yorkshire the Boundary Commission for England recommended substantial changes to the constituency boundaries in Sheffield, to add part of the Sheffield Hillsborough to the whole of the Sheffield Brightside constituency (other than a handful of houses in the corner of Walkley). The rest of the Sheffield Hillsborough constituency formed the southern half of the new Penistone and Stocksbridge seat.

The constituency's representative from 2010 to 2015 was David Blunkett, who also represented the predecessor Sheffield Brightside constituency since 1987. Blunkett was a former frontbench senior minister who was a Secretary of State from 1997 until 2005 in the New Labour Government. He served the first four years of government as the Secretary of State for Education and Employment, three years as the Home Secretary and six months as Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. Blunkett retired from Parliament at the 2015 general election after representing Brightside/Brightside and Hillsborough for 28 years, the longest of any MP for the seat. The constituency representative from 2015 was Harry Harpham until he died on 4 February 2016. He was succeeded by his widow, Gill Furniss, who won a by-election on 5 May.

Boundaries

The City of Sheffield wards of Burngreave, Firth Park, Hillsborough, Shiregreen and Brightside, and Southey.

Constituency profile

The last instance of either of the two predecessor seats being held by an MP from a party other than the Labour Party was the period for both before the 1935 general election. Majorities since World War II have been substantial suggesting a safe seat on historic voting preferences.

In statistics

The constituency consists of Census Output Areas of a local government districts with: a working population whose income is close to and fractionally below the national average and that has higher than average reliance on social housing.^[2] At the end of 2012 the unemployment rate in the constituency was the highest of Sheffield's five constituencies at 7.6% of the population claiming jobseekers allowance, compared to the regional average of 4.7%.^[3] The borough contributing to the bulk of the seat has a reasonably high 33% of its population without a car, has 24.3% of the population without qualifications and 25.7% with level 4 qualifications or above. In terms of tenure a lower than average share, 58.3% of homes, are owned outright or on a mortgage by occupants as at the 2011 census across the district.^[4]

Members of Parliament

Election		Member[5]	Party	Notes
	2010	David Blunkett	Labour	Previously MP for Sheffield Brightside from 1987
	2015	Harry Harpham	Labour	Died in office February 2016
	2016 by-election	Gill Furniss	Labour

Elections

By-election 2016: Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough^[6]

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Labour	Gill Furniss	14,087	62.5	+5.9
	UKIP	Steven Winstone	4,497	20.0	-2.1
	Liberal Democrat	Shaffaq Mohammed	1,385	6.1	+1.6
	Conservative	Spencer Pitfield	1,267	5.6	-5.4
	Green	Christine Gilligan Kubo	938	4.2	-0.1
	Yorkshire First	Stevie Manion	349	1.5	1.5
	Give Me Back Elmo	Bobby Smith	58	0.2	0.2
Majority			9,590	42.5	+8.8
Turnout			22,581	33.2

General Election 2015: Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough^[7][8]

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Labour	Harry Harpham	22,663	56.6	+1.6
	UKIP	John Booker	8,856	22.1	+18.0
	Conservative	Elise Dünweber	4,407	11.0	-0.5
	Liberal Democrat	Jonathan Harston	1,802	4.5	-15.5
	Green	Christine Gilligan Kubo	1,712	4.3	+4.3
	TUSC	Maxine Bowler	442	1.1	-0.6
	English Democrat	Justin Saxton	171	0.4	+0.4
Majority			13,807	34.58	-0.32
Turnout			40,053	54.8	-2.3
	Labour hold		Swing	-8.2

General Election 2010: Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough^[9][10]

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Labour	David Blunkett*	21,400	55.0	-14.6
	Liberal Democrat	Jonathan Harston	7,768	20.0	+6.9
	Conservative	John Sharp	4,468	11.5	+1.7
	BNP	John Sheldon[11]	3,026	7.8	+3.2
	UKIP	Patricia Sullivan	1,596	4.1	+1.1
	TUSC	Maxine Bowler	656	1.7	+1.7
Majority			13,632	35.0
Turnout			38,594	57.1	+7.1

* Served as an MP in the 2005–2010 Parliament

Notes and references

Notes

1. A borough constituency (for the purposes of election expenses and type of returning officer)
2. As with all constituencies, the constituency elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election at least every five years.

References

1. http://www.sheffieldnewsroom.co.uk/result-sheffield-brightside-hillsborough/
2. 2001 Census
3. Unemployment claimants by constituency The Guardian
4. 2011 census interactive maps
5. Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "B" (part 5)
6. "Brightside and Hillsborough by-election result 2016". Sheffield City Council. Retrieved 15 May 2016.
7. "Election Data 2015". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 17 October 2015. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
8. "Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough". BBC News. Retrieved 14 May 2015.
9. "Election Data 2010". Electoral Calculus. Archived from the original on 17 October 2015. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
10. "UK > England> Yorkshire & the Humber > Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough". Election 2010. BBC. 7 May 2010. Retrieved 13 May 2010.
11. New BNP Candidate in Sheffield Calls for War Crimes Trial for David Blunkett