Surrey Heath is a county constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom

Parliament of the United Kingdom

The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...

. It elects one Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

 (MP) by the first past the post system of election. Since the 2005 general election

United Kingdom general election, 2005

The United Kingdom general election of 2005 was held on Thursday, 5 May 2005 to elect 646 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party under Tony Blair won its third consecutive victory, but with a majority of 66, reduced from 160....

 the MP has been Michael Gove

Michael Gove

Michael Andrew Gove, MP is a British politician, who currently serves as the Secretary of State for Education and as the Conservative Party Member of Parliament for the Surrey Heath constituency. He is also a published author and former journalist.Born in Edinburgh, Gove was raised in Aberdeen...

, a senior figure in the Conservative Party

Conservative Party (UK)

The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...

. The constituency is one of the party's safest seats.

Boundaries

Surrey Heath is located in the north-west of the county of Surrey

Surrey

Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...

. It contains the entirety of the Surrey Heath

Surrey Heath

Surrey Heath is a local government district with Borough status in Surrey, England. Its Council is based in Camberley. Much of the area is within the Metropolitan Green Belt....

 district as well as the village of Ash

Ash, Surrey

Ash is a village and civil parish in the borough of Guildford, Surrey, with a population of 17,549 according to the 2001 census. It is at the far west of the Guildford borough, and the urban development in the parish runs directly into Aldershot, which is on the western side of the River...

 in the Guildford

Guildford (borough)

Guildford is a local government district with borough status in Surrey, England. It is named after Guildford where its council is based....

 borough. The largest town in the area is Camberley

Camberley

Camberley is a town in Surrey, England, situated 31 miles  southwest of central London, in the corridor between the M3 and M4 motorways. The town lies close to the borders of both Hampshire and Berkshire; the boundaries intersect on the western edge of the town where all three counties...

. The Boundary Commission made no boundary changes for Surrey Heath in the review before the 2010 general election.

History

The constituency was created in 1997 from parts of the seats of Woking

Woking (UK Parliament constituency)

Woking is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election...

, North West Surrey & Guildford

Guildford (UK Parliament constituency)

Guildford is a county constituency in Surrey which returns one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, elected by the first-past-the-post voting system....

.

On the seat's creation, Nick Hawkins was elected to Parliament following the retirement of Surrey North West MP Michael Grylls

Michael Grylls

Sir William Michael John Grylls, known as Michael Grylls, was a British Conservative politician. He was implicated in the cash-for-questions affair, a poitical scandal of the 1990s...

 who in 1992 achieved a majority of 28,392. One of Hawkins' opponents for selection was future Speaker

Speaker of the British House of Commons

The Speaker of the House of Commons is the presiding officer of the House of Commons, the United Kingdom's lower chamber of Parliament. The current Speaker is John Bercow, who was elected on 22 June 2009, following the resignation of Michael Martin...

, John Bercow

John Bercow

John Simon Bercow is a British politician who has been the Speaker of the House of Commons in the United Kingdom since June 2009. Prior to his election to Speaker he was a member of the Conservative party....

. Bercow was selected as the Conservative candidate for the Buckingham

Buckingham (UK Parliament constituency)

Buckingham is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election.-Boundaries:...

 constituency on the same day.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1997 United Kingdom general election, 1997 The United Kingdom general election, 1997 was held on 1 May 1997, more than five years after the previous election on 9 April 1992, to elect 659 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party ended its 18 years in opposition under the leadership of Tony Blair, and won the general...	Nick Hawkins Nick Hawkins Nicholas John "Nick" Hawkins is a lawyer and politician from the United Kingdom. He was a Conservative Party Member of Parliament from 1992-2005....	Conservative Conservative Party (UK) The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
	2005 United Kingdom general election, 2005 The United Kingdom general election of 2005 was held on Thursday, 5 May 2005 to elect 646 members to the British House of Commons. The Labour Party under Tony Blair won its third consecutive victory, but with a majority of 66, reduced from 160....	Michael Gove Michael Gove Michael Andrew Gove, MP is a British politician, who currently serves as the Secretary of State for Education and as the Conservative Party Member of Parliament for the Surrey Heath constituency. He is also a published author and former journalist.Born in Edinburgh, Gove was raised in Aberdeen...	Conservative Conservative Party (UK) The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...

Elections in the 2010s

Elections in the 2000s

Elections in the 1990s

Sources

• Election result, 2010 (BBC)
• Election result, 2005 (BBC)
• Election results, 1997 - 2001 (BBC)
• Election results, 1997 - 2001 (Election Demon)
• Election results, 1997 - 2010 (Guardian)