The landslide of 1997 saw Keighley, one of nine West Yorkshire Conservative seats, fall into Labour's hands to give the party a clean sweep of all 23 constituencies in the county, and deliver Ann Cryer to Westminster on a 10% swing and a majority above 7,000. The Conservatives had originally won the seat in 1983 from Mrs Cryer's late husband Bob, who died in 1994 in a car crash whilst serving as MP for Bradford South.
Labour had held the seat for most of the period between 1945 and 1983, before boundary changes brought in new territories which swung the constituency decisively to the right. Two of the three new wards, Craven and Ilkley, are mighty Conservative strongholds, and the third, the picturesque and tourist-dependent Worth Valley, (which boasts the Bronte's Haworth), is usually staunchly Tory in local elections.
The two major towns in the constituency are markedly different. Keighley itself has tended to be strongly Labour, perhaps due in part to a sizeable Asian population. The town has a strong manufacturing tradition, particularly in machine tools and electrical goods. Like many others in the region, the neighbouring spa town of Ilkley is highly dependent on tourism following a general decline in West Yorkshire’s textile industry.