Wansbeck (UK Parliament constituency)

Wansbeck
County constituency for the House of Commons
Boundary of Wansbeck in Northumberland.
Location of Northumberland within England.
County	Northumberland
Electorate	62,395 (December 2010)
Major settlements	Morpeth
Current constituency
Created	1983
Member of parliament	Ian Lavery (Labour)
Number of members	One
Created from	Morpeth and Blyth
1885–1950
Number of members	One
Type of constituency	County constituency
Replaced by	Morpeth, Bedlington and Newbiggin-by-the-Sea
Created from	South Northumberland
Overlaps
European Parliament constituency	North East England

Wansbeck is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2010 by Ian Lavery, a member of the Labour Party.

1983–present: The District of Wansbeck, and the Borough of Castle Morpeth wards of Hebron Hepscott and Mitford, Morpeth Central, Morpeth Kirkhill, Morpeth North, Morpeth South, Morpeth Stobhill, and Pegswood.

Parliament accepted the Boundary Commission's Fifth Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies did not alter this constituency for the 2010 general election, thus since 1997 it has electoral wards:

The seat alternated in accordance with the national trend in mining-strong communities outside of South Yorkshire, which as such saw significant early Labour support, and led to, in the 1931 and 1935 elections, a general transfer of loyalty to the Conservative Party, and ushered in a return to Labour support in the next contested election in 1945.

Alfred Robens represented the area in the Attlee ministry and towards the end of the year of Attlee's more marginal victory (1950–51) served as Minister of Labour and National Service. He then in 1951 won instead the newly created Blyth seat to the immediate south. In 1955 he became Shadow Foreign Secretary until an unimpressive performance in predicting and reacting to events in the Suez Crisis in 1956. However, in a position which would span the period 1961 until 1971, he became Chairman of the National Coal Board (and Lord Robens) and oversaw substantial cuts in the mining industry. During this period he co-authored the Robens Report that followed his difficult but practical risk management of the coal mining sector, including accepting some culpability in the Aberfan Disaster. This led, with the ministry of Barbara Castle's adjustments, to the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 which set up the Health and Safety Executive and remains the foundation of this area of English law.