West Central (London Assembly constituency)

West Central

Territorial constituency for the London Assembly
West Central shown within London
Created	2000 (2000)
Number of members	One
Member	James Small-Edwards
Party	Labour
Last election	2024
Next election	2028

West Central is a constituency represented on the London Assembly. The seat is currently held by James Small-Edwards from the Labour Party.

It covers the combined area of the City of Westminster, the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, much larger than the West Central postcode area.

History

Since the seat's creation in 2000, the elected Assembly Member (AM) until 2024 had always been a Conservative candidate: three have represented the seat in succession. Its first AM was Angie Bray, who subsequently served as MP for Ealing Central and Acton. She was followed by Kit Malthouse in 2008, who was elected as MP for North West Hampshire in 2015, thus acting as an AM and MP for the remainder of his term on the London Assembly. He was succeeded in 2016 by Tony Devenish, who has been a councillor for Knightsbridge and Belgravia in Westminster (part of the GLA seat) since 2006.

At the time of the 2016 London Assembly elections, two of the MPs for the five parliamentary constituencies covered by this seat were members of the Labour Party, and the other three from the Conservatives; Labour have always been the main challenger in the corresponding GLA seat. It includes a number of affluent areas which have tended to vote for Conservative candidates in local and general elections, accounting for the results to date.

After the 2016 election, defeated candidate Mandy Richards lodged an election petition claiming that the results showed a discrepancy in turnout and that 15,000–20,000 postal votes were missing. The case was heard on 8 and 9 December 2016; the result was that all aspects of the petition were dismissed.

Assembly members

Election		Member	Party
	2000	Angie Bray	Conservative
	2008	Kit Malthouse	Conservative
	2016	Tony Devenish	Conservative
	2024	James Small-Edwards	Labour

Mayoral election results

Below are the results for the candidate which received the highest share of the popular vote in the constituency at each mayoral election.

Year		Member	Party
	2000	Steven Norris	Conservative
	2004	Steven Norris	Conservative
	2008	Boris Johnson	Conservative
	2012	Boris Johnson	Conservative
	2016	Zac Goldsmith	Conservative
	2021	Shaun Bailey	Conservative
	2024	Sadiq Khan	Labour

Overlapping constituencies

The West Central Assembly constituency comprises all of the following UK Parliament constituencies:

• Chelsea and Fulham (Conservative)
• Hammersmith (Labour)
• Kensington (Conservative)
• Westminster North (Labour)
• Cities of London and Westminster (Conservative)

Assembly election results

2020s

2024 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Constituency			List
			Votes	%	±%	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	James Small-Edwards	46,831	37.7	+0.4	45,102	36.2	+3.5
	Conservative	Tony Devenish	42,578	34.2	-4.6	39,049	31.3	-5.0
	Liberal Democrats	Christophe Noblet	14,505	11.7	+2.2	11,223	9.0	+1.4
	Green	Rajiv Rahul Sinha	12,427	10.0	-1.6	11,717	9.4	-2.1
	Reform UK	Nicola Pateman	8,040	6.5	+5.1	5,856	4.7	+3.8
	Rejoin EU					4,533	3.6	+1.1
	Animal Welfare					1,967	1.6	-0.1
	Britain First					1,147	0.9	New
	CPA					1,014	0.8	0.0
	SDP					986	0.8	+0.5
	Independent	Laurence Fox				838	0.7	New
	Communist					528	0.4	+0.1
	Independent	Farah London				312	0.3	New
	Heritage					221	0.2	-0.4
	Independent	Gabe Romualdo				61	0.1	New
Majority			4,253
Valid Votes			124,381			124,554
Invalid Votes			1,143			983
Turnout			125,524	34.94		125,537	34.95
	Labour gain from Conservative		Swing

2021 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Constituency			List
			Votes	%	±%	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Tony Devenish	55,163	38.9	-5.3	51,435	36.3
	Labour	Rita Begum	52,938	37.3	+2.6	46,364	32.7
	Green	Zack Polanski	16,427	11.6	+2.4	16,320	11.5
	Liberal Democrats	Ted Townsend	13,462	9.5	+3.6	10,742	7.6
	Rejoin EU					3,591	2.5
	Women's Equality					2,630	1.9
	Animal Welfare					2,438	1.7
	Reform UK	Saradhi Rajan	1,954	1.4	New	1,332	0.9
	CPA					1,157	0.8
	Let London Live	Heiko Khoo	1,977	1.4	New	1,121	0.8
	London Real					1,082	0.7
	UKIP					998	0.7
	Heritage					903	0.6
	Communist					460	0.3
	SDP					423	0.3
	TUSC					312	0.2
	Londependence Party					268	0.2
	National Liberal					112	0.1
Majority			2,225	1.6	−7.9
Turnout			137,990
	Conservative hold		Swing
Notes

2010s

2016 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Tony Devenish	67,775	44.2	−6.2
	Labour	Mandy Richards	53,211	34.7	+4.2
	Green	Jennifer Nadel	14,050	9.2	+0.5
	Liberal Democrats	Annabel Mullin	10,577	5.9	−1.0
	UKIP	Clive Egan	7,708	5.0	+1.5
Majority			14,564	9.5	−10.4
Turnout			153,321	45.0	+5.8
	Conservative hold		Swing	-5.2

2012 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Kit Malthouse	73,761	50.4	−1.7
	Labour	Todd Foreman	44,630	30.5	+9.3
	Green	Susanna Rustin	12,799	8.7	−1.4
	Liberal Democrats	Layla Moran	10,035	6.9	−2.7
	UKIP	Elizabeth Jones	5,161	3.5	+1.7
Majority			29,131	19.9	–11.0
Turnout			149,419	39.2	−9.3
	Conservative hold		Swing	-5.5

2008 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Kit Malthouse	86,651	52.1	+7.4
	Labour	Murad Qureshi	35,270	21.2	+2.3
	Green	Julia Stephenson	16,874	10.1	+0.8
	Liberal Democrats	Merlene Emerson	15,934	9.6	–5.5
	UKIP	Paul Wiffen	3,060	1.8	–4.4
	English Democrat	Alex Vaughan	1,858	1.1	New
	Left List	Explo Nani-Kofi	1,630	1.0	New
	Independent	Abby Dharamsey	962	0.6	New
Majority			51,381	30.9	+5.1
Turnout			166,379	48.5	+15.6
	Conservative hold		Swing	+2.5

2004 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Angie Bray	51,884	44.7	+0.5
	Labour	Ansuya Sodha	21,940	18.9	–8.1
	Liberal Democrats	Francesco Fruzza	17,478	15.1	+1.9
	Green	Julia Stephenson	10,762	9.3	–2.2
	UKIP	Damian Hockney	7,219	6.2	New
	Respect	Kevin Cobham	4,825	4.1	New
	CPA	Jillian McLachlan	1,993	1.7	New
Majority			29,944	25.8	+8.6
Turnout			116,101	32.9	+2.0
	Conservative hold		Swing	+4.3

2000 London Assembly election: West Central

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Angie Bray	47,117	44.2
	Labour	Kate Green	28,838	27.0
	Liberal Democrats	Jon Burden	14,071	13.2
	Green	Julia Stephenson	12,254	11.5
	London Socialist	Christine Blower	2,720	2.6
	Homeless and Addicted	Stephen Smith	1,600	1.5
Majority			18,279	17.2
Turnout			106,600	30.9
	Conservative win (new seat)