Barking (UK Parliament constituency)
Barking is a constituency formed in 1945, and represented since then by a member of the Labour Party in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament. Since 1994, its Member of Parliament has been Margaret Hodge. Political history. The area has elected Labour MPs since its creation in 1945, on strong majorities of 20.4% of the vote or greater, except for the results in 1983 and 1987. The rise in support for the British National Party since the turn of the 21st century saw the party attain 17% of the vote at the 2005 general  election. Party members and supporters were optimistic that the party would soon make the breakthrough into UK parliament, and party leader Nick Griffin stood in Barking for the 2010 general election. However, his performance in Barking was poor, as he polled 14.8% of the vote (which actually represented a decline in percentage terms compared to 2005), and Margaret Hodge retained the seat with more than half of the vote. During the run-up to the 2010 election, filmmaker Laura Fairrie had access to the British National Party and Labour Party campaigns, and later produced a documentary "The Battle for Barking