Let the great boundary rejig commence

[minionofmidas]

If it helps that's how 2002 felt to me. To such an extent it made me detached. I only care about the Holyrood arragement and don't particularly care what happens up here next month. You'll probably feel the same with Wales when that monstrosity is unveiled :/

I'm really dreading what they draw for my part of the world, put it that way... can we rule out the horrible possibility of Anglesey being split?

"Bangor, East Anglesey & Conwy Valley", "Caernarfon & Holyhead" and "Merionydd, Dwyfor & West Anglesey", coming right up!

[minionofmidas]

A work of beauty.

[minionofmidas]

Northern Ireland's proposals are out. Quite sensible geographically. Demographically though...

from Nicholas Whyte's site http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1816829.html.

Unnecessary fiddling with Newry/Armagh, South Down and Upper Bann, all of which are already within the quota and don't need to be changed.

I'd go with a different set of wards to add to Fermanagh/South Tyrone, and "Mid Ulster" is a better name than "Mid Tyrone".

The one really daft seat is Mid Antrim. Ballymena has much better communication links with Antrim town to its south than to Larne. East Antrim could largely be left intact with the addition of an area around Ballyclare, and with the rural area to the south of Antrim town being added to Lagan Valley instead.

In Belfast, the Lagan might make a more natural boundary between the new South East and South West, with attendant shuffling around of wards in Castlereagh and Lisburn.

The casualties will be the SDLP in Belfast South and the DUP in the old East L'Derry (once you take out Coleraine town and points east you remove the Unionist majority in the seat).

"Glenshane"? Heh. A seat named after an executed outlaw.

[minionofmidas]

Oh, by their standards that stuff is pretty tame... it's a little bit embarrassing though. There are enough decent lefty arguments against this whole thing without needed to resort to bizarre and rambling conspiracy theories.

Like this gem from Emily Thornberry MP

"In my constituency the problems are stark. Nearly 80,000 adults live in Islington South and Finsbury – but when the new boundaries were drawn up fewer than 67,000 "counted". Because the 8,000 Europeans who live in Islington can't vote in general elections, they were ignored. Many who come from outside the Commonwealth or aren't on the electoral register weren't counted either. The government shouldn't pretend these people don't need an MP, and they deserve to be counted as my constituents."

Well, she's right.

It does affect only certain types of areas, by no means all Labour-voting inner city areas, and it hasn't been made an issue of in the past. But maybe it should be addressed, in the reform this deform will hopefully lead to eventually.

[minionofmidas]

Obviously hitting a 7500 corridor with building bricks of an average population of 10,000 is utterly, non-negotiably impossible. At least if there are any other considerations (sense, shape, higher-up political boundaries).

I think I have said everything that needs be said about this commission's work in urban areas here.

[minionofmidas]

The Mersey thing was apparently drawn as the only way to avoid splitting Chester... why is that worth more than avoiding splitting Ellesmere Port?

[minionofmidas]

And yeah, as close to the status quo would be what they should be aiming for though, surely?

No. That's excised from the rules as a one-off for this review only.
Of course, that didn't stop them discussing how they kept constituencies roughly or exactly alike in those parts of the country where it's easier to do (don't blame'em) or even where they at least kept 3/4 together in Birmingham's four-ward seats (lol), and with no regard to whether existing constituencies actually made sense or not (which ought to have been the point of the rules change. They kept Corby as is, lol.)

[minionofmidas]

After reading the introductory part with two part-York constituencies, I figured "ah, probably sort of back to pre-2010 then". Wrong guess...

[minionofmidas]

Ah really? What info have they given?

http://www.bcomm-scotland.gov.uk/6th_westminster/initial_proposals/public_hearings/

As these groupings don't make much sense otherwise... presumably, yeah.

[minionofmidas]

Ah really? What info have they given?

http://www.bcomm-scotland.gov.uk/6th_westminster/initial_proposals/public_hearings/

As these groupings don't make much sense otherwise... presumably, yeah.

Looking at the quota's though, I'm thinking there may be more to it. The Highlands/Grampian grouping hs a quota of 7.51, which whether it's 7 or 8 seats ends up above or below quota.

One of these is the empty parts of Highlands seats essentially prescribed by the legislation. Sum the others, if they're all workable and collectively round down by .5... (oh wait, the Northern and Western Isles seats are also not excised from the quota, right? How much above the remnant-of-Scotland average can they go? 1000?)

[minionofmidas]

Looking at all the regions now, I think some will be completely changed, not a single proposal will remain

There are some regions where I suspect the changes will be only minimal or not changed at all - I'm going to predict that Eastern England, East Midlands and North East England are falling in this last category.

North East? Seriously? That map is atrocious.

I've been playing around with Cheshire... it is certainly possible to keep Chester together without splitting Ellesmere Port. Chester constituency would have to jut out to Eddisbury, though. It seems to be impossible to keep both Chester and Ellesmere Port together, and not split wards, without doing the random-Mersey-cross thing, though. Of course, they did that and split Ellesmere Port.

[minionofmidas]

The parties are, presumably, the very same bodies who didn't warn the commission in advance that ward splitting would be necessary in the unitaries.

[minionofmidas]

Proposing an obvious gerrymander seems a bit silly given the UK system where the rules generally suggest that such things should be ignored; any idea what they're playing at?

I would guess that any attempt to not split wards and not make the Labour heartlands look totally ridiculous will pretty inevitably be a Labour gerrymander.

[minionofmidas]

Plus proposing silly gerrymanders seems a good way of having your ideas rejected, which may well mean more subtle gerrymanders from the other parties being accepted.

Indeed.

[minionofmidas]

It's not as if the commission had much alternative in the Highlands anyways. They pretty much could either a) use the rule for an oversized-by-area, undersized-by-population constituency, cutting their already lower tolerance further, or b) draw exactly what they did (add the Black Isle/Cromarty Firth populated parts to the northern seat and the southwestern empty parts to the Inverness seat).
*hasn't read the report yet, maybe they did see a third alternative. I certainly didn't*

[minionofmidas]

Uh... Midlothian is a Labour seat at current. It doesn't change that much, really.

[minionofmidas]

The site also contains all stages of the process including alternate but dismissed arrangements for some seats.

They had four initial Edinburgh maps - the one they eventually used, one with a more genuinely easterly Edinburgh East that I like a tad better at first glance, one that appears just plain bizarre, and one that crosses the boundary by dumping Portobello into East Lothian (which in turn gives up a bit of territory to Midlothian & Tweeddale).

[minionofmidas]

The site also contains all stages of the process including alternate but dismissed arrangements for some seats.

They had four initial Edinburgh maps - the one they eventually used, one with a more genuinely easterly Edinburgh East that I like a tad better at first glance, one that appears just plain bizarre, and one that crosses the boundary by dumping Portobello into East Lothian (which in turn gives up a bit of territory to Midlothian & Tweeddale).

Their Appendix B proposal is quite sensible and I know my side might push for that. In their Edinburgh South seat, I would have salivated at Tory prospects as it includes Meadows/Morningside in full with Sighthill/Gorgie kicked out. The rest of the city is divided sensibly. The current one isn't great.

Dundee is still the big concern. There was a rejected proposal that linked West with Gowrie as agreed but one that linked East with 'Letham' taking in the footprint of the current Dundee seats and Arbroath. They then had an Angus North and Kincardine seat. Why they didn't go for that I have no idea.

EDIT: Just noticed one that united Dundee except two wards.

I suppose the only reason they didn't do something like that is they didn't see any parts of the city to "naturally" crop out.

The split of Dunfermline looks like it's probably just about avoidable if Rosyth & Cowdenbeath (or whatever else it would be called once it can't be Dunfermline East anymore) curves around the city a bit. Obviously some of the town splits in Lanarkshire are also unfortunate even though the general setup is sensible.

[minionofmidas]

Except for the target seats, the party essentially collapsed. In part this was due to the removal of Tony Blair - and of the issues that people had opposed him from the left for - and the fact that Labour were neither winning nor being clobbered. But it also was policy - the brand owners gave up on building a political party and instead attempted to become independent MPs.

[minionofmidas]

the tickled trout? Okay.

[minionofmidas]

There's really no excuse for drawing something awful except in Cardiff and Swansea, where ward sizes provide one, and in either Brecon or Powys Wenwynwyn where something's got to give.

[minionofmidas]

All in all, anything outside of Glamorgan and Monmouthshire looks okay to me, actually. Even Machynlleth makes sense. Though I wonder why they moved that one Carmarthenshire ward into Ceredigion & Preseli. And clearly "South & West Pembrokeshire" should be just named "Pembroke"?

EDIT: That's Newcastle Emlyn. It does have links to the north, and moving it improves population equality, but it's still an unnecessary split of local government boundaries. Keeping it in Carmarthen does not make that too large; removing it from Ceredigion makes that too small but it could easily have taken Llanrhian and optionally Saint David's as well from Pembroke instead without that in turn becoming too small.

[minionofmidas]

There are absolutely no grounds on which a decision not to draw the self-evident wholly urban Newport seat can be rationalized, of course.

[minionofmidas]

The electorates are from one year before, but this is what Gwent should look like:

Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney 77,253
Current constituency and the Bargoed area further down the Rhymney Valley, which is currently in Caerphilly and Islwyn constituencies (two wards in this area succesfully fought being transferred to Islwyn at the last review. What will they make of being put in with Merthyr? Though other wards were transferred, never had their position in doubt, or were in Islwyn from the start.) ie Aberbargoed, Bargoed, Gilfach, Saint Cattwg, Pengam, Cefn Fforest and Blackwood wards.
Blaenau Gwent 77,580
Similarly expanded down the valley of the Ebbw (and admittedly the edges of the Rhymney Valley as well) to take in Argoed, Penmaen, Crumlin, Newbridge, Abercarn and Pontllanfraith.
Caerphilly 77,935
Remainder of Caerphilly (most) and Islwyn (five wards); Newport wards of Rogerstone and Graig.
Torfaen 75,051
Borough; Caerleon ward of Newport
Monmouth 74,603
Borough; Langstone and Llanwern wards of Newport
Newport 77,320
Remainder

[minionofmidas]

Most of that is just a ward or two off from what they drew; all the weirdness arises from the unfortunate decision to carve up Cynon Valley instead of the obvious candidate, Pontypridd.