List of Parliamentary constituencies in Leicestershire and Rutland
The ceremonial county of Leicestershire, is divided into 10 Parliamentary constituencies - 3 Borough constituencies and 7 County constituencies. One of these also includes the small historic county of Rutland, which was administratively a district of Leicestershire from 1974 to 1997. Since 1997, Rutland has been a separate unitary authority.
Constituencies
Historic constituencies
In the unreformed House of Commons, Leicestershire and Rutland were represented by two Knights of the Shire each, and the only parliamentary borough was Leicester, which sent two burgesses.Under the Reform Act 1832, Leicestershire was split into two divisions, North and South, which each elected two members. The Reform Act 1885 redistributed these seats into four single-member divisions: Melton, or Eastern, Loughborough, or Mid, Harborough, or Southern, and Bosworth, or Western.
At the 1918 general election, the four divisions of the county were retained, and the borough of Leicester was split into three single-member constituencies, Leicester East, Leicester South, and Leicester West. From 1950 to 1974 Leicester had four constituencies, these being Leicester North East, Leicester North West, Leicester South East and Leicester South West: the three seat arrangement of South, East and West was reverted to thereafter.
Rutland constituted a constituency on its own until 1918, when it became part of the Rutland and Stamford constituency, with nearby Stamford in Lincolnshire.
In 1983, seats in Leicestershire were redrawn. Rutland was merged with Melton to form Rutland and Melton, with Loughborough, Bosworth, and Harborough remaining as seat names. The new North West Leicestershire constituency was created. A further constituency, Charnwood was created in the north for the 1997 election.
Changes for the 2010 general election
Finalised proposals by the Boundary Commission for England retain the 10 constituencies, with changes to realign constituency boundaries with the boundaries of current local government wards, and to reduce the electoral disparity between constituencies. These changes were implemented at the 2010 United Kingdom general election. They have confirmed that the new constituency which almost corresponds to the existing Blaby is renamed South Leicestershire on the grounds that it does not match the borders of Blaby district, and the village of Blaby itself is not one of the major population centres.| No. on map | Constituency | 2005 boundaries | 2010 boundaries |
| 1 | Bosworth | ||
| 2 | Charnwood | ||
| 3 | Harborough | ||
| 4 | Leicester East | ||
| 5 | Leicester South | ||
| 6 | Leicester West | ||
| 7 | Loughborough | ||
| 8 | North West Leicestershire | ||
| 9 | Rutland and Melton | ||
| 10 | South Leicestershire |
Proposed boundary changes
The Boundary Commission for England submitted their final proposals in respect of the Sixth Periodic Review of Westminster Constituencies in September 2018. Although the proposals were immediately laid before Parliament they were not brought forward by the Government for approval. Accordingly, they did not come into effect for the 2019 election which took place on 12 December 2019, and which was contested using the constituency boundaries in place since 2010.Under the terms of the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011, the Sixth Review was based on reducing the total number of MPs from 650 to 600 and a strict electoral parity requirement that the electorate of all constituencies should be within a range of 5% either side of the electoral quota.
On 24 March 2020, the Minister of State for the Cabinet Office, Chloe Smith, issued a written statement to Parliament setting out the Government's thinking with regard to parliamentary boundaries. They propose to bring forward primary legislation to remove the statutory obligation to implement the 2018 Boundary Review recommendations, as well as set the framework for future boundary reviews in time for the next review which is due to begin in early 2021 and report no later than October 2023. It is proposed that the number of constituencies now remains at the current level of 650, rather than being reduced to 600, while retaining the requirement that the electorate should be no more than +/- 5% from the electoral quota.
Results history
Primary data source: House of Commons research briefing - General election results from 1918 to 20192019
The number of votes cast for each political party who fielded candidates in constituencies comprising Leicestershire and Rutland in the 2019 general election were as follows:| Party | Votes | % | Change from 2017 | Seats | Change from 2017 |
| Conservative | 281,019 | 53.3% | 4.4% | 7 | 0 |
| Labour | 169,475 | 32.1% | 8.0% | 3 | 0 |
| Liberal Democrats | 51,606 | 9.8% | 3.2% | 0 | 0 |
| Greens | 18,705 | 3.5% | 1.4% | 0 | 0 |
| Brexit | 4,050 | 0.8% | new | 0 | 0 |
| Others | 2,835 | 0.5% | 1.8% | 0 | 0 |
| Total | 527,690 | 100.0 | 10 |