Ripon (constituency)

Ripon was first represented in the Model Parliament of 1295, and also returned members in 1307 and 1337, but it was not permanently represented until 1553, after which it returned two Members of Parliament. It was a parliamentary borough consisting only of the town of Ripon itself until the Great Reform Act 1832; the right to vote was vested in the holders of the tightly controlled burgage tenements — count-of-head polls were accordingly rare — for, the last contested election in Ripon before the Reform Act 1832 was in 1715. By 1832 it was estimated that there were 43 men qualified to vote; the total of adult males over age 20 in the township in 1831 was recorded at 3,571.^[2]

Such a burgeoning middle class population when considered under the Reform Act 1832 made for Ripon a relatively major borough; its qualifying freehold-owning or more expensive house-leasing electorate were supplemented by such electors in neighbouring Aismunderby-cum-Bondgate. The sum of these male electors returned two members to each parliament. The Reform Act 1867 which came into force at the 1868 election reduced Ripon's representation from two MPs to one and enfranchised many of the under-represented high-growth areas of Britain.

The Redistribution of Seats Act 1885 abolished the borough of Ripon; instead the county constituency in which the town was placed as a result was named Ripon (strictly speaking, at first, "The Ripon Division of the West Riding of Yorkshire"), and this continued as a single member constituency, with intervening boundary changes until it was abolished before the 1983 general election. Until 1950 it included, as well as Ripon itself, the towns of Harrogate and Knaresborough; the post-1950 guise took in Ilkley and Otley.

1885–1918: The Borough of Ripon, the Sessional Divisions of Claro and Kirkby Malzeard, and the Liberty of Ripon.

1918–1950: The Boroughs of Ripon and Harrogate, the Urban District of Knaresborough, the Rural Districts of Knaresborough, Pateley Bridge, and Ripon, and part of the Rural District of Great Ouseburn.

1950–1983: The Borough of Ripon, the Urban Districts of Ilkley and Otley, and the Rural Districts of Ripon and Pateley Bridge, and Wharfedale.

• Constituency re-created (1553)

• 1973 Ripon by-election