North East Fife (UK Parliament constituency)


North East Fife is a county constituency in Fife, Scotland, represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament by Wendy Chamberlain of the Liberal Democrats since the 2019 general election.
The seat was created in 1983, and was held by the Conservative Party for four years, before being represented by Menzies Campbell from 1987 to 2015. Campbell was elected as a member of the Liberal Party, which later merged with the Social Democratic Party to form the Liberal Democrats. At the 2015 general election, the seat was gained by Stephen Gethins of the Scottish National Party. Gethins held his seat at the 2017 general election by just two votes over Elizabeth Riches of the Liberal Democrats, making the seat the most marginal in the United Kingdom. In the 2019 general election, Chamberlain defeated Gethins to regain the seat for the Liberal Democrats; this was the SNP's only loss of the election.

Boundaries

1983–2005: North East Fife District.
2005–present: The area of the Fife Council other than those parts in the constituencies of Dunfermline and West Fife, Glenrothes, and Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath.
North East Fife constituency is in the region of Fife in Scotland. Fife has the River Tay on its northern coast, and the Firth of Forth to the south. The famous golf and university town of St Andrews is the major settlement in the seat. Others include Cupar, Newport-on-Tay, Newburgh, Auchtermuchty, and Anstruther.

Members of Parliament

Election results

Elections in the 2010s

The seat was notable in several respects in the 2019 general election: it was the SNP's only loss of the election, and was the seat with the largest decrease in vote share for the Conservative Party. The seat went from the most marginal seat in Britain at the 2017 general election to the fortieth most marginal in 2019. The seat was the second most marginal Liberal Democrat-held seat at the election, when measured by absolute majority.
North East Fife was the most marginal result in the country at the 2017 general election, with incumbent SNP MP Stephen Gethins seeing his majority cut from 4,344 votes to 2 votes ahead of the Liberal Democrat candidate, Elizabeth Riches. An alike result in Winchester at the 1997 general election was adjudicated and declared void and resulted in a legislative change in party naming rules.

Elections in the 2000s

In 2005 the ward of Leven East was incorporated into this constituency from what was Central Fife.

Elections in the 1990s

Elections in the 1980s