The constituency was created in
1885 replacing the previous
East Staffordshire and
North Staffordshire constituencies. Burton upon Trent is a centre of the
brewing industry and for sixty years from 1885 to 1945, the MPs were from brewery-owning families. Despite the working class nature of Burton upon Trent from 1950 to 1997, the seat was held by the
Conservative Party, albeit often with relatively small majorities. Traditionally the brewing industry has been a strong supporter of the
Conservative Party. However, like many traditionally Conservative seats, it was lost to the
Labour Party at the
1997 general election, which they won in a landslide.
Janet Dean retained the seat until
2010, when the Conservative
Andrew Griffiths retook it. Griffiths retained the seat at the 2015 and 2017 general elections. In July 2018, he was suspended by the Conservative Party following allegations that he had sent up to 2,000 sexually explicit text messages to two female constituents. Although the
whip was reinstated in December 2018, he was not reselected to fight the seat at the
2019 general election, with local party members instead choosing his estranged wife, Kate. She was duly elected and, in 2022, reverted to her maiden name of
Kate Kniveton. At the
2024 election, Kniveton was defeated by
Jacob Collier of the Labour Party. ==Members of Parliament==