expeditions were conducted for scientific research, and would sometimes take 18 months. In 1896, Major Powell-Cotton founded the Powell-Cotton Museum at Quex Park to display his collection of mammals and artefacts acquired on his expeditions to Africa and Asia. The animals were mounted by the noted taxidermist Rowland Ward. During World War I, Quex House became an Auxiliary Military Hospital run by the Birchington Voluntary Aid Detachment. In 1923, the Memorial Ground was donated to the village by Mr H. A. Erlebach for sport and recreational use. Mr Erlebach owned the village's now defunct Woodfood House School and purchased land from the Quex House estate for the school. He gave the southern part of the land to the people of Birchington and dedicated it in memory of his three sons who had been killed in World War I. The land is now owned by Thanet District Council. Politics Since 1983, the Member of Parliament for North Thanet, covering northern Thanet and Herne Bay, has been the Conservative Roger Gale. At the 2015 general election, in North Thanet the Conservatives won a majority of 10,948 and 49.0% of the vote. The UK Independence Party won 25.7% of the vote, Labour 17.9%, the Green Party 3.7%, the Liberal Democrats 3.5% and the Party for a United Thanet 0.3%. Birchington-on-Sea is in the Thanet local government district. The village's electoral wards of Birchington North and Birchington South have five of the fifty six seats on the Thanet District Council. At the 2007 local elections, all five of those seats were held by the Conservative Party. The village has its own civil parish, the lowest unit of local government. Birchington Parish Council has ten members and deals with issues specifically affecting Birchington. Education Birchington-on-Sea's secondary school is the secondary modern King Ethelbert School. In 2006, it had around 750 pupils and was seeking government support to become a specialist visual arts school. In 2005, 15 percent of its pupils gained at least five GCSEs at grades A*–C including English and maths, ranking it 103rd out of 120 Kent secondary schools. The school failed the 30% GCSE target. Many secondary students living in Birchington-on-Sea commute to schools in nearby towns, especially to the grammar schools in Ramsgate and Broadstairs. The village's primary school is Birchington Church of England Primary School, which is a state school owned by the Church of England but run by Kent