The constituency is located in the hilly Pennines of West Yorkshire , which are characterized by services, industry, wholesale and retail and whose population is mostly working or retired. The proportion of social housing is lower than the regional average, although social housing is available in most of the larger settlements in the constituency. The constituency's population is mixed. Cleckheaton and many of the villages in the Spen Valley have few residents of non-European descent, while Batley has a larger number of residents of South Asian immigrant backgrounds, mostly Pakistani (9.2%) and Indians (Gujarati) (15.9%). There is also a South Asian community in Heckmondwike , with 16.9% of residents being of Pakistani origin.
Election results over the past 50 years have resulted in only small majorities for Labor and Conservatives.
Constituency area
1983–1997: The Wards Batley East, Batley West, Birstall and Birkenshaw, Cleckheaton, Heckmondwike and Spen belonging to the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees .
1997–2010: The Wards Batley East, Batley West, Birstall and Birkenshaw, Cleckheaton and Spen belonging to the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees.
2010 – present: Wards Batley East, Batley West, Birstall and Birkenshaw, Cleckheaton, Heckmondwike and Liversedge and Gomersal, all part of the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees.
The constituency was formed in 1983 from parts of the constituencies Batley and Morley , Brighouse and Spenborough and Dewsbury . The constituency is in West Yorkshire and includes Batley, Birkenshaw , Birstall , Cleckheaton, East Bierley, Gomersal , Hunsworth and Liversedge . Traditionally, Batley and Heckmondwike tend to vote for Labor, while the other localities tend to vote for the Conservatives. Cleckheaton is an exception; here the Liberal Democrats were elected for the local council.
Labor increased its share of the vote in the 1997, 2001 and 2005 elections, while in 2010 the Conservatives reduced Labor's lead.
history
Before 1983 the constituency did not exist in its current form. Constituency boundaries have not changed insubstantially since then, most noticeably in 1997 when Heckmondwike was spun off into Dewsbury constituency and in 2010 when the town was re-incorporated.
Heckmondwike, which is also in the valley of the River Spen , but did not belong to the former urban district of Spenborough , has leaned towards Labor and BNP in recent years , especially in local elections. The representation of the BNP in the city parliament was halved in 2008 due to a Labor-led widespread election campaign, and since then the BNP's share of the vote has not exceeded 7.1% (2010) in the general election.
