hemsworth

Hemsworth is a small town and civil parish on the edge of West Yorkshire, England. It forms part of the City of Wakefield, and has a population of 13,311. It was a one-industry town, where coal mining employed the vast majority of residents, and the closure of the pits during the 1980s led to huge levels of unemployment and deprivation in the area. Hemsworth, along with nearby villages such as Ackworth, Fitzwilliam, Havercroft, Ryhill, South Elmsall and South Kirkby was made into a special regeneration area, and fortunes have improved as a result. The Hemsworth constituency is famous for being the place where Labour votes were said to be "weighed rather than counted" during the 1960s and 1970s, but the town is not even so heavily Labour-voting as it once was. The town's Member of Parliament is Jon Trickett, a former leader of Leeds council. In May, 2005, the Office for National Statistics estimated that unemployment in Hemsworth was just 2.8%. This marks progress from periods in the...