Putney is a

constituency An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger State (polity), state (a country, administrative region, ...

created in 1918. It is currently represented in the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

of the

UK Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative supremac ...

since

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

Fleur Anderson Kathleen Fleur Anderson (born 6 February 1971) the Member of Parliament (MP) for Putney, elected in 2019. A member of the Labour Party, she has been Shadow Paymaster General since 2021 and was a member of Wandsworth London Borough Council fro ...

of the Labour Party. Putney was the only seat that Labour flipped during the 2019 general election.

Boundaries

1918–1950: The Metropolitan Borough of Wandsworth wards of Putney and Southfields. 1950–1974: As above plus Fairfield ward. 1983–2010: The London Borough of Wandsworth wards of East Putney, Parkside, Roehampton, Southfields, Thamesfield, West Hill, and West Putney. 2010–present: As above less Parkside ward.

History

When created in 1918 the constituency was carved out of the west of the abolished seat

Wandsworth Wandsworth Town () is a district of south London, within the London Borough of Wandsworth southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan The London Plan is the statutory spatial development strategy for the Gre ...

. The rest of the latter formed Wandsworth Central, Balham and Tooting and

Streatham Streatham ( ) is a district in south London, England. Centred south of Charing Cross, it lies mostly within the London Borough of Lambeth, with some parts extending into the neighbouring London Borough of Wandsworth. Streatham was in Surrey ...

. Putney formed one of the divisions of the Parliamentary Borough of Wandsworth. ;Political history The seat was Conservative from 1918 until 1964, in a national context of Labour marginal wins in the 1920s, the landslide Labour victory in 1945 and the narrower Labour win in 1950. After the Labour win of 1964, the fairly narrow

Heath ministry Edward Heath of the Conservative Party formed the Heath ministry and was appointed Prime Minister of the United Kingdom by Queen Elizabeth II on 19 June 1970, following the 18 June general election. Heath's ministry ended after the February 19 ...

win of 1970 failed to tip the seat back to the

Conservative Party The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right. Political parties called The Conservative P ...

, and the seat was held by Labour for 15 years with Hugh Jenkins as MP. Putney was next held by Conservative

Secretary of State for National Heritage The secretary of state for digital, culture, media and sport, also referred to as the culture secretary, is a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, with overall responsibility for strategy and policy across the Department f ...

David Mellor David John Mellor (born 12 March 1949) is a British broadcaster, barrister, and former politician. As a member of the Conservative Party, he served in the Cabinet of Prime Minister John Major as Chief Secretary to the Treasury (1990–92) and ...

from

1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the ''International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the ''Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the song ...

until

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 ...

during the party's successive national governments; the 1997 Labour landslide saw Putney gained by Tony Colman (Lab) and a signal early-declared result as the landslide unfolded. Putney was the first Conservative gain on election night in

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discovered in ...

, when Justine Greening took back the seat from Labour on a two-party swing (Lab-Con) of 6.5%. The 2015 result gave the seat the 148th most marginal majority of the Conservative Party's 331 seats by percentage of majority, similar to the 2010 result. The 2017 election saw Greening re-elected, but with a 10% swing to Labour; this heavy swing against the Conservatives has been attributed to the fact that the Borough of Wandsworth (of which Putney is part) voted 75% in favour of remaining in the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

in the previous year's referendum. In

, it was the only seat in the country gained by Labour. Results for Putney since 1983

Constituency profile

Putney has long had many desirable properties of South-West London with Southfields to the south and the

River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, se ...

to the north with

Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandsworth ...

lying across the river. The majority of the area as in the 19th century is covered by mid-to-high income neighbourhoods whereas the eastern boundary of the seat eating into Wandsworth town centre is more mixed, and Roehampton which has its university (

University of Roehampton The University of Roehampton, London, formerly Roehampton Institute of Higher Education, is a public university in the United Kingdom, situated on three major sites in Roehampton, in the London Borough of Wandsworth. Roehampton was formerly an e ...

and part of the

Kingston University , mottoeng = "Through Learning We Progress" , established = – gained University Status – Kingston Technical Institute , type = Public , endowment = £2.3 m (2015) , ...

campus) consists of, in terms of housing, by a small majority, a diverse council stock that owing to its cost has only fractionally been acquired under the

Right to Buy The Right to Buy scheme is a policy in the United Kingdom, with the exception of Scotland since 1 August 2016 and Wales from 26 January 2019, which gives secure tenants of councils and some housing associations the legal right to buy, at a large ...

— much of this ward remains in one form or another reliant on

social housing Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, def ...

. The local council is not a

bellwether A bellwether is a leader or an indicator of trends.bellwether
" ''Cambridge Dictionary''. Ret ...

of who will win the Putney seat, and for a considerable time has imposed the lowest

council tax Council Tax is a local taxation system used in England, Scotland and Wales. It is a tax on domestic property, which was introduced in 1993 by the Local Government Finance Act 1992, replacing the short-lived Community Charge The Community C ...

in the country. Between 1997 and 2005 Putney had a unique attribute of being the only seat in the country where every single component ward elected a full slate of Conservative councillors, yet the constituency had a Labour MP, Tony Colman. In the 2016 EU Referendum, Putney voted 72.24% to Remain.

Members of Parliament

Elections

Elections in the 2010s

Elections in the 2000s

Elections in the 1990s

Elections in the 1980s

Elections in the 1970s

Elections in the 1960s

Elections in the 1950s

Elections in the 1940s

Elections in the 1930s

Elections in the 1920s

Elections in the 1910s

Notes

References

External links

Politics Resources
(Election results from 1922 onwards)

(Election results from 1955 onwards) {{DEFAULTSORT:Putney (Uk Parliament Constituency) Parliamentary constituencies in London Politics of the London Borough of Wandsworth Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom established in 1918 Putney