Stepney was a parliamentary constituency centred on the Stepney district of the East End of London. It returned one Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, elected by the first past the post system.

History

The constituency existed for two separate periods:

• it was first created under the Redistribution of Seats Act 1885, for the 1885 general election, and abolished for the 1918 general election
• from the 1950 general election until its abolition for the February 1974 general election, when it was largely replaced by the new constituency of Stepney and Poplar.

Boundaries

The constituency was first created in 1885, as a division of the parliamentary borough of Tower Hamlets, centred on the Stepney neighbourhood in the East End of London. The area was administered as part of the Tower division of the county of Middlesex.

In 1889 there were administrative changes. The territory of the constituency was severed from Middlesex and included in the new County of London. The lower tier of local government in the area continued to be administered by parish vestries and local boards of works.

In 1900 local government in London was rationalised. The Stepney Board of Works was abolished and the civil parish of Stepney became part of a larger Metropolitan Borough of Stepney.

In the redistribution of parliamentary seats in 1918, the Metropolitan Borough was divided between three constituencies - Limehouse, Mile End and Whitechapel and St George's. The previous Stepney constituency was abolished and largely replaced by Whitechapel and St George's.

In the next major redistribution of parliamentary seats, which took effect for the United Kingdom general election, 1950, the Stepney constituency was re-created. The 1950 version of the seat comprised the whole of the Metropolitan Borough of Stepney.

In 1965 Stepney became part of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and Greater London. When parliamentary constituencies were next redistributed, for the February 1974 general election, the area was included in the Stepney and Poplar seat.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1885	John Charles Durant	Liberal
	1886	Frederick Wootton Isaacson	Conservative
	1898	William Charles Steadman	Liberal-Labour
	1900	Sir William Eden Evans-Gordon	Conservative
	1907	Frederick Leverton Harris	Conservative
	1910	William Samuel Glyn-Jones	Liberal
	1918	constituency abolished
	1950	constituency recreated
	1950	Walter Edwards	Labour
	1964	Peter Shore	Labour
	1974	constituency abolished

Elections

Elections in the 1970s

Elections in the 1960s

Elections in the 1950s

References