Member of Parliament
At the next election, 1997 general election, Gray was elected to the House of Commons as Member for the North Wiltshire constituency, following the retirement of the former Conservative Member Richard Needham. Gray won the seat with a majority of 3,475 and has represented the constituency since.
Gray made his maiden speech on 11 June 1997, in which he spoke of his constituency's largest town of Chippenham, and of his sadness at the massacre in his childhood home town of Dunblane.
In the 2010 general election, James Gray once again stood for election in the constituency of North Wiltshire. He won by a majority of 7,483 votes, winning 25,114 votes and securing 51.6% of the 48699 who voted. The amount of votes he received had risen by 1.9% since the last election, whilst support for the Labour party had fallen by 5.3% in his constituency.
Read more about this topic: James Gray (British Politician)
Famous quotes containing the words member of, member and/or parliament:
“If you attack the establishment long enough and hard enough, they will make you a member of it.”
—Art Buchwald (b. 1925)
“The essence of man is, discontent, divine discontent; a sort of love without a beloved, the ache we feel in a member we no longer have.”
—José Ortega Y Gasset (1883–1955)
“A Parliament is that to the Commonwealth which the soul is to the body.... It behoves us therefore to keep the facility of that soul from distemper.”
—John Pym (1584–1643)