Maidstone was a parliamentary constituency represented in the Parliament of England, Great Britain and from 1801 the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
The parliamentary borough of Maidstone returned two Members of Parliament (MPs) from 1552 until 1885, when its representation was reduced to one member. The borough was abolished in 1918 and replaced with a county division of the same name, which was abolished for the 1997 general election, and partially replaced by the new Maidstone and The Weald constituency.
History Before the 19th century Maidstone was first enfranchised as a parliamentary borough, electing two Members of Parliament, in 1552; at the time it was one of the largest English towns not already represented, and was one of a number of boroughs either enfranchised or re-enfranchised during the reign of Edward VI. However, barely had it won the right than its charter was cancelled after the accession of Mary I as a punishment for the town's part in Wyatt's Rebellion. This was the only recorded instance of a borough's right to return MPs being directly revoked until Grampound was disfranchised for corruption in the 1820s (although there were other cases of temporary suspension or of the right lapsing through disuse in medieval times, when representation was less valued).
After the death of Mary I, Maidstone's right were restored, and it elected members to the Parliament of 1560, since when the constituency has been continuously represented. The borough consisted of the whole parish of Maidstone, although the boundaries had no practical effect - the right to vote was vested in the freemen of the town, whether or not they were resident within the borough, provided they were not receiving poor relief. In 1833, just after this franchise was reformed by the Great Reform Act, it was estimated that there were 845 freemen, of whom more than 300 lived over seven miles from the town, and 31 of whom were disqualified from voting because they were in receipt of alms. At the 1831 general election, between 600 and 670 men voted.
A borough of this size was too large to fall under the dominance of a local landowner as was usual in the case of the smaller constituencies in the Unreformed Parliament, and Maidstone remained comparatively free with elections sometimes vigorously contested (and usually expensive for the candidates), although the Finch and Marsham families both had a degree of influence over results in the 18th century. Namier describes in detail the Maidstone election of 1761,Pages 113 to 118, Lewis Namier, The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III (2nd edition - London: St Martin's Press, 1957) showing how at this period the organised divisions among the rank-and-file voters in competitive constituencies tended to be religious rather than party-political; the Whig faction in Maidstone drew its strength from the Nonconformists while the Tories were the Anglican establishment. Yet so complicated was the politics of the period that although the local Whigs had asked Rose Fuller, a personal friend of the Whig Prime Minister The Duke of Newcastle, to stand as their candidate Newcastle refused to support him; indeed, Newcastle used his government patronage to force those of the electors employed in the naval dockyard at Chatham to vote for the incumbent Tory MPs, to whom he had already promised his support before Fuller's candidacy was mooted. In the event, though, Fuller succeeded in being elected, many of the government employees defying Newcastle to support him.
After the Reform Act At the time of the Reform Act, the population of the borough was 15,387, and it contained 3,018 houses. The boundaries of the borough remained unchanged until 1918. Under the reformed franchise, there were 1,108 electors registered to vote at the general election of 1832. The town continued to grow so that by 1865 the electorate had reached 1,817, and this was almost doubled by the extension of the franchise in the second reform act, so that there were 3,420 registered electors for the 1868 general election.
The borough retained two MPs until 1885, when its representation was halved; at the 1885 general election the franchise now extended to 6,530 electors, voting for a population of around 35,000. This was a relatively small electorate for the period and made bribery a practical proposition, and Maidstone was one of a small number of constituencies where corruption was proved after the tightening of election law in the 1880s. Generally a fairly safe Conservative seat, the constituency elected a Liberal candidate against the national tide in 1900, but it was clear that corrupt practices had contributed to his victory and he was unseated on petition; the voters seem to have resented the petition, however, and also elected the Liberal candidate in the ensuing by-election. At the following election in 1906, Maidstone again swung in the opposite direction to the country as a whole, electing a Conservative - one of only five Unionist gains across the country - and the victor was again charged with corruption; on this occasion the candidate was acquitted, but one of the judges noted that "there exists among the voters of this borough a number of the lower class who expect, and are known to respect, a payment or reward for their votes... The proved cases of bribery extend through all the wards."
The county constituency The borough was abolished with effect from the general election of 1918, but the Maidstone name was transferred to the new county division in which the town stood, which consisted of Maidstone itself and the Maidstone and Hollingbourne rural districts. These contained no towns of any size, but the villages collectively outvoted Maidstone. The new constituency was as safely Conservative as its predecessor, and its boundaries remained unaltered until 1983.
By the 1980s, population growth meant that the constituency was considerably oversized, with one of the largest electorates in England. In the 1983 boundary revisions, which for the first time reflected the local government boundary changes of the 1970s, the size of the Maidstone constituency was considerably reduced. The area to the north-east of the town, and two wards of the town itself, were moved into the new Mid Kent constituency; as these were strongly Conservative wards and there had been a Liberal surge in the area around the time the Liberal-SDP Alliance was formed, the Alliance had some hopes of making a breakthrough in the revised constituency. However, they could only cut the Tory majority to a little over 7,000 in 1983, John Wells taking over half the votes.
Boundary changes in 1997 saw the constituency abolished and replaced with a new Maidstone and The Weald county constituency. The Maidstone town wards which had been in Mid Kent since 1983 were included in the new seat, and a rural part of the Weald to the south of the town, previously in the Tunbridge Wells constituency was also included; but about a third of the electorate in the Maidstone constituency was transferred to the Faversham and Mid Kent constituency - this included the rural wards to the east of the town, but also the Shepway and Park Wood areas of Maidstone proper.
Boundaries 1885-1918: The existing parliamentary borough, excluding a detached part of the parish of Maidstone known as Lodington.
Members of Parliament Maidstone borough MPs 1560-1660 ParliamentFirst memberSecond member 1562–3 Nicholas Barham Henry Fisher 1571 Thomas Walsingham Nicholas St Leger 1572 Nicholas St Leger Thomas Dannett 1584 Thomas Randolph Michael Sondes 1586 John Astley Thomas Randolph 1588 John Astley Thomas Randolph 1593 Sir Thomas Fludd Lewen Buffkyn 1597 Sir Thomas Fludd Sir John Leveson 1601 Sir Thomas Fludd Sir John Leveson 1604-1611 Sir Francis Fane Laurence Washington 1614 Sir Francis Fane Sir John Scott 1621-1622 Sir Francis Fane Sir Francis Barnham 1624 Sir George Fane Thomas Stanley 1625 Edward Mapleton Thomas Stanley 1626 Sir George Fane Francis Barnham 1628 Sir George Fane Francis Barnham 1629–1640No Parliaments summoned 1640 (Apr) Sir George Fane Sir Francis Barnham 1640 (Nov) Sir Francis Barnham,died Nov 1646 Sir Humfrey Tufton 1645 Thomas TwisdenSir Humfrey Tufton not sat after Pride's Purge, Dec 1648 1648 Thomas Twisden excluded in Pride's Purge, Dec 1648 1653 Maidstone was unrepresented in the Barebones Parliament 1654 Sir John Banks(One seat only) 1656 Sir John Banks(One seat only) 1659 Sir John Banks Andrew Broughton
MPs 1660-1885 YearFirst memberFirst partySecond memberSecond partyApril 1660 Thomas Twisden Robert Barnham August 1660 Sir Edward Hales 1661 Sir Edmund Pierce 1668 Thomas Harlackenden February 1679 Sir John Tufton Sir John Darell August 1679 Thomas Fane March 1685 Archibald Clinkard November 1685 Edwin Wyatt 1689 Sir Thomas Taylor Caleb Banks 1690 Thomas Rider 1695 Sir John Banks 1696 Thomas Rider 1698 Sir Robert Marsham Thomas Bliss July 1702 Sir Thomas Roberts October 1702Writ suspended - both seats vacantAt the election of 1702, Marsham and Roberts were returned as elected, and their opponents, Sir Thomas Twisden and Thomas Bliss, petitioned against the result. The Commons on investigation found all four candidates guilty of "bribery and other unlawful practices", declared the election void and resolved that no writ for a new election should be issued until the end of the session 1704 Heneage Finch Thomas Bliss 1705 Sir Thomas Culpeper 1708 Sir Robert Marsham 1713 Sir Samuel Ongley 1715 Sir Thomas Culpeper 1716 Sir Barnham Rider 1722 John Finch 1723 Sir Barnham Rider 1727 Thomas Hope 1734 William Horsemonden-Turner 1740 Robert Fairfax 1741 Lord Guernsey John Bligh 1747 William Horsemonden-Turner Robert Fairfax 1753 Gabriel Hanger Tory 1754Lord Guernsey 1757 Savile Finch 1761 Rose Fuller Whig William Northey Tory 1768 Hon. Charles Marsham Robert Gregory 1774 Sir Horatio Mann Lord Guernsey 1777 Hon. Charles Finch 1780 Clement Taylor Whig 1784 Gerard Edwardes Tory 1788 Sir Matthew Bloxham Tory 1796 Major General Oliver de Lancey Tory 1802 John Hodsdon Durand Whig 1806 George Simson Tory George Longman Whig 1812 Egerton Brydges Tory 1818 Abraham Wildey Robarts Whig George Longman Whig 1820 John Wells Tory 1830 Henry Winchester Tory 1831 Charles James Barnett Whig 1835 Wyndham Lewis Conservative 1837 Benjamin Disraeli Conservative 1838 John Minet Fector Conservative 1841 Alexander Hope Conservative George DoddDodd was re-elected in 1852 but the election was declared void on the petition, and a by-election was held Conservative 1852 James Whatman Radical 1853 William Lee Radical 1857 Alexander Beresford Hope Conservative Edward Scott Conservative 1859 Charles Buxton Liberal William Lee Liberal 1865 James Whatman Liberal 1870 Sir John Lubbock Liberal 1874 Sir Sydney Waterlow Liberal 1880 Alexander Henry Ross Conservative John Evans Freke-Aylmer Conservative1885Representation reduced to one member
MPs 1885-1918 ElectionMemberParty 1885 Alexander Henry Ross Conservative 1888 Fiennes Cornwallis Conservative 1895 Sir Frederick Hunt Conservative 1898 Fiennes Cornwallis Conservative 1900 John Barker Liberal 1901 Sir Francis Evans Liberal 1906 Viscount Castlereagh Conservative 1915 Carlyon Bellairs Conservative1918Borough abolished; county division created
Maidstone County Constituency (1918–1997) ElectionMemberParty 1918 Carlyon Bellairs Conservative 1931 Alfred Bossom Conservative 1959 John Wells Conservative 1987 Ann Widdecombe Conservative1997constituency abolished: see Maidstone and The Weald
Elections Elections in the 1830s
Lewis' death caused a by-election.
The by-election was declared void, causing another by-election.
Elections in the 1840s
Elections in the 1850s
Dodd's election was declared void on petition due to treating by his agents, causing a by-election.
Elections in the 1860s
Elections in the 1870s Lee's resignation caused a by-election.
Elections in the 1880s