This constituency is a longstanding bellwether, having elected the candidate of the winning party in the nine general elections since October 1974 (inclusive) which elected the Labour Government 1974-1979.
Party positions altered completely in 2010 with the Liberal Democrat candidate, Paul Harrod achieving second place with a slightly larger one party swing, of 11.4%, than winning candidate Charlotte Leslie and saw a fresh Labour Party candidate suffer a large decrease in percentage of the Labour vote of 20.8%.