History
Sir Edward Heath, prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1970 to 1974, held this seat and its predecessors from 1950, and announced his retirement at the end of the 1997-2001 parliament; at the age of 85 he was by now the nation's oldest member of parliament.
His successor was Derek Conway, elected as a Conservative Party candidate. However on 29 January 2008 the Conservative Party withdrew the whip from Derek Conway following alleged misuse of funds, and he became an Independent MP. He retired in 2010, and was succeeded by the Conservative James Brokenshire, who had transferred to this seat when his former seat of Hornchurch was abolished in boundary changes.
Read more about this topic: Old Bexley And Sidcup (UK Parliament Constituency)
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The one duty we owe to history is to rewrite it.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“Every generation rewrites the past. In easy times history is more or less of an ornamental art, but in times of danger we are driven to the written record by a pressing need to find answers to the riddles of today.... In times of change and danger when there is a quicksand of fear under men’s reasoning, a sense of continuity with generations gone before can stretch like a lifeline across the scary present and get us past that idiot delusion of the exceptional Now that blocks good thinking.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“History is the present. That’s why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product, myth.”
—E.L. (Edgar Lawrence)