Even though this seat covers a large area, there are only six Doncaster borough wards contained within it. Labour candidates have usually triumphed in these wards at local elections.
Allegations of corruption among leading Doncaster councillors led to the appearance of an anti-sleaze Labour candidate in 1997. Several of the councillors were later suspended by the party when it heard of luxurious and hedonistic free trips abroad and other abuses of power, and an anti-sleaze candidate received 1,181 votes in the 1997 election.
The countryside surrounding this seat is flat and unchanging, much like nearby Lincolnshire, and stretches away as far as the eye can see. Towns and villages rarely impose themselves on this landscape, with what communities there are based on farming or mining, although the seat's last two working pits at Stainforth and Thorne have now closed, adding to itss above average levels of unemployment.
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