Political history The vote share and majority for the Conservative MP, Nick Gibb, who won the first six general elections in this seat, grew since 2001 to reach over 22,000 votes. At the first three general elections, the
Labour Party candidate was runner-up, notably denting Gibb's winning margin to 5,632 votes in 2001. In 2010, the
Liberal Democrat candidate took second place, more than 4,000 votes ahead of Labour and 13,063 short of Gibb's total. Mirroring nationwide performance, the Lib Dem vote share fell in
2015, whilst the
UKIP vote share rose in this constituency, becoming the runner-up, but 13,944 votes short of Gibb's tally. In June 2016, an estimated
64.8% of local adults voting in the EU membership referendum voted to Leave the European Union. This was matched in two January 2018 votes in Parliament by MP Nick Gibb. In
2017, Labour's candidate of 2015 was reselected to stand and took second place. The year 2017 saw an independent candidate,
Paul Sanderson, the chaplain of
The Littlehampton Academy come within 1% of retaining his
political deposit and ahead of the UKIP and
Green candidates. Gibb was re-elected for a seventh time in
2019, with an increased majority of 22,503 votes and a vote share of 63.5%. He did not stand at the
2024 general election and his successor as the Conservative candidate,
Alison Griffiths, was elected with a drastically reduced majority of 1,765, having suffered an adverse swing of 19.8%.
Contents and regional context The seat was created from the western, more populous part of the
Arundel seat on its 1997 abolition. Before the latter's creation in 1974, Bognor Regis was part of the
Chichester seat and Littlehampton part of the
Arundel and Shoreham seat.
Notable representatives From its creation in 1997 until 2024, the seat was represented by
Nick Gibb of the
Conservative Party. Gibb had worked for the party for over ten years, and became an MP at his third attempt. After thirteen years in opposition, he joined
David Cameron's coalition government after the
2010 general election, becoming
Minister of State for School Standards, working under
Education Secretary Michael Gove. He left the government in a 2012 reshuffle, being replaced by
David Laws. He then returned to the same department, now run by
Nicky Morgan, as
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Childcare, Education and School Reform in 2014. The following year, he again took up his previous post, which he then held under three Prime Ministers (Cameron,
Theresa May and
Boris Johnson) and five Education Secretaries (Gove, Morgan,
Justine Greening,
Damian Hinds and
Gavin Williamson). He was dismissed from this position in 2021. ==Members of Parliament==