Sussex is bucking the trend in the declining national membership of the Tory party.
The region has the third highest number of party members in the country - beaten only by Hampshire and the Isle of Wight and London Western, according to figures released by Conservative Central Office.
Sussex has 16 Parliamentary seats, which until the last election had mostly been held by Tories.
In 1997 Labour gained the three Brighton and Hove seats, Hastings and Crawley, and Norman Baker took Lewes for the Liberal Democrats.
The figures show there are 16,869 paid-up members of the party for the ten Tory-held seats in Sussex, compared with 17,755 members for the five Tory held seats in the London Western area and 19,282 for the ten Tory seats in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.
Membership of the Tory Party was more than a million when Mrs Thatcher ruled in the Eighties but declined while John Major was Prime Minister.
The latest figures show there are 301,413 members.
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