The Portsmouth South by-election was held on 14 June 1984, following the death of Bonner Pink, the

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...

MP for

Portsmouth South Portsmouth South is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2017 by Stephen Morgan of the Labour Party. Morgan is the first Labour MP to represent the seat. Boundaries 1918–1950: The County Borough of ...

. Portsmouth South was considered a

safe seat A safe seat is an electoral district (constituency) in a legislative body (e.g. Congress, Parliament, City Council) which is regarded as fully secure, for either a certain political party, or the incumbent representative personally or a combinat ...

for the Conservatives. Pink had held the constituency since the 1966 general election, while the party had held the seat since its creation in

1918 This year is noted for the end of the First World War, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, as well as for the Spanish flu pandemic that killed 50–100 million people worldwide. Events Below, the events ...

. At the 1983 general election, Pink had taken just over half the votes cast.UK General Election results: June 1983
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Candidates

The Conservatives stood Patrick Rock.Portsmouth South 1984
, British Parliamentary ByElections The

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...

(SDP) had narrowly taken second place in the constituency in 1983, with just over one quarter of the vote. They stood Mike Hancock, an engineer and member of

Hampshire County Council Hampshire County Council (HCC) is an English council that governs eleven of the thirteen districts geographically located within the ceremonial county of Hampshire. As one of twenty-four county councils in England, it acts as the upper tier of ...

, who had been their unsuccessful candidate in 1983. The Labour Party had been pushed into third place in 1983, taking 22% of the vote. They also re-stood their candidate from the previous year, Sally Thomas, a supporter of unilateral

nuclear disarmament Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the Atomic nucleus, nucleus of the atom: *Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics *Nuclear ...

. As Portsmouth South was the headquarters of the

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, this was a significant issue in the campaign. Three other candidates had stood in the general election, and two of these stood in the by-election: Gordon Knight of the

far right Far-right politics, also referred to as the extreme right or right-wing extremism, are political beliefs and actions further to the right of the left–right political spectrum than the standard political right, particularly in terms of being ...

National Front, and Alan Evens who stood as "Liberal for Unilateral Nuclear Disarmament", while four new candidate completed the field. Terry Mitchell stood for the

Ecology Party The Green Party, also known as the Green Party UK, was a Green political party in the United Kingdom. Prior to 1985 it was called the Ecology Party, and before that PEOPLE. In 1990, it separated into three political parties: * the Green Part ...

, Thomas Layton stood as "Spare the Earth - Ecology", Anthony Andrews stood as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

with the slogan "Vote Education: Save Schools & Colleges", and Pete Smith stood for the New National Party.

Result

The SDP unexpectedly gained the seat. The Conservative vote fell sharply, while Labour saw only a small increase. None of the other candidates were able to take 1% of the votes cast. Hancock lost the seat at the 1987 general election, but was able to retake it in

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of t ...

References

{{By-elections to the 49th UK Parliament Portsmouth South by-election Portsmouth South by-election By-elections to the Parliament of the United Kingdom in Hampshire constituencies Elections in Portsmouth Portsmouth South by-election 1980s in Hampshire