South West England is a constituency of the European Parliament. For 2009 it elects 6 MEPs using the d'Hondt method of party-list proportional representation, reduced from 7 in 2004.

Boundaries

The constituency consists of the South West England region of the United Kingdom, comprising the ceremonial counties of Bristol, Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Somerset and Wiltshire. From the 2004 election onwards, the constituency also includes Gibraltar.

History

It was formed as a result of the European Parliamentary Elections Act 1999, replacing a number of single-member constituencies. These were Bristol, Cornwall and West Plymouth, Devon and East Plymouth, Dorset and East Devon, Somerset and North Devon, Wiltshire North and Bath, and parts of Cotswolds.

Dedicated Euro-constituency and MEP for Cornwall

Currently, the Cornish political party Mebyon Kernow is campaigning for a dedicated Euro-constituency and MEP for Cornwall. In May 2009 leader Dick Cole said, “This European election represents a huge democratic deficit for the people of Cornwall. Our distinct needs are ignored in the massive South West constituency and we have been poorly served by MEPs not resident in Cornwall. We consider it a nonsense that the European parliamentary constituency stretches from the Isles of Scilly to Bristol via Gibraltar. We hope voters will support our campaign for proper Cornish representation in Europe including a European Parliamentary constituency for Cornwall.” Until 1994 Cornwall was represented by the much smaller Cornwall and Plymouth .

Members of the European Parliament

1999 - 2004

	MEP's Name	Political Party
	Graham Booth (Appointed in 2002 to replace Michael Holmes)	UKIP (2002 onwards)
	Giles Chichester	Conservative
	Glyn Ford	Labour
	Michael Holmes (Resigned in 2002)	UKIP (1999 - 2002)
	Caroline Jackson	Conservative
	Alexandar Macmillan	Conservative
	Neil Parish	Conservative
	Graham Watson	Liberal Democrat

2004 - 2009

	MEP's Name	Political Party
	Graham Booth (Retired on 1 October 2008)	UKIP (until 2008)
	Giles Chichester	Conservative
	Trevor Colman (Appointed in 2008 to replace Graham Booth)	UKIP (2008 onwards)
	Glyn Ford	Labour
	Caroline Jackson	Conservative
	Roger Knapman	UKIP
	Neil Parish	Conservative
	Graham Watson	Liberal Democrat

2009 - 2014

	MEP's Name	Political Party
	Giles Chichester	Conservative
	Trevor Colman	UKIP
	Ashley Fox	Conservative
	Julie Girling	Conservative
	William Dartmouth	UKIP
	Graham Watson	Liberal Democrat

Election results

Elected candidates are shown in bold. Brackets indicate the number of votes per seat won.

References