Having previously stood unsuccessfully in Wakefield in 1959, Jopling was elected Conservative MP for Westmorland, now in Cumbria, in 1964 and became Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury from 1979 to 1983.
In his Diaries, the military historian and Tory member of Parliament Alan Clark famously quoted what he claimed was Jopling's "snobby but cutting" dismissal of the ambitious Conservative deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine: "The trouble with Michael is that he had to buy all his furniture".
[5] After over 32 years as a member of the House Commons, Jopling stood down at the 1997 general election and was succeeded by Tim Collins.
He was absent during the last few weeks of his Commons career as he was severely injured in a go-karting accident in February 1997.
Nicholas's son Caspar (Jopling's grandson) was married to singer Ellie Goulding from 2019 to 2024.