UK fantasy parliamentary boundaries - population-based apportionment

[afleitch]

For the apportionment by county, are we looking at the immediate pre-1974 counties (so, for example - including Huntingdon & Peterborough; Cambridgeshire & Isle of Ely; Dudley transferred to Staffordshire; Smethwick transferred to Worcestershire; Greater London being in existence, etc) or boundaries further back? And within these 'new' old counties, are we looking at administrative boundaries within them as they are now, or as they might have existed at some previous date?

I'd go with the boundaries as existed (virtually) unchanged from the farreaching reforms in the 30s on to the mid-sixties changes (in Teesside and Shropshire, apart from the things you listed, possibly elsewhere that I'm forgetting); also for the next level in so far as available.

That's essentially what I was thinking. Certainly, in real life there would no doubt have been some changes as indeed there were in London and in the Birmingham area but the idea I had would be to look at the pre-74 boundaries at close of play and construct seats out of the boroughs and districts that existed then. This would have little impact really in places like Kent or Norfolk or even Nottinghamshire but a significant impact on the areas later covered by the mets, Scotland and Wales.

I'm working on figures for Scottish counties.

[stepney]

It's missing a trick not to be able to move back to there being an LCC area, a Middlesex County Council, etc. Otherwise it's somewhat formulaic in the SE area. If we take a date like 1960, most of the anomalies haven't been ironed out and it becomes more fun.

[YL]

1974 counties wouldn't be different enough from what the Commission actually did last time to be interesting, IMO.

Certainly in the north they would be. Bear in mind that not only have you the differing county boundaries, you have boroughs and districts which to some extent are different in feel from what we have today. I'll see if I can pull something together for Lancashire for example.

Ah, sorry, I was thinking of "1974 counties" as meaning the counties created in 1974 and abolished in the 1990s: H*mb*rs*d*, "Avon", Cleveland, Hereford & Worcester.  Immediately pre-1974 counties would indeed be more interesting.  I'd suggest going back a bit further than that, perhaps along the lines Stepney suggested.

[afleitch]

In drawing up figures for Scotland I've used the ward electorates, but due to rather huge differences between now and then I've also used the civil parish figures for 2001 (age 16+) While the electorate has increased of course the changes have been fairly consistent. For example the 16+ population of the old Aberdeen Burgh was 127,957 which would entitle it to two seats at Holyrood. Dundee was 119,757, also two seats. Stirlingshire is 189,659 which with Clackmannan would give it 4 seats etc. I'll work on it

[stepney]

I think this is a 1960 county map:



Not much change from 1970, except the four main points highlighted above: creation of Greater London, mucking about in what is now Cambridgeshire, creation of Teesside CB, swaps in the Black Country.

Either way, we haven't clarified whether this exercise goes on to use the current (2013) districts and wards within each old-time county, or the urban/rural districts existing at the time. If the latter, it'll be a nightmare.

[afleitch]

Not much change from 1970, except the four main points highlighted above: creation of Greater London, mucking about in what is now Cambridgeshire, creation of Teesside CB, swaps in the Black Country.

Either way, we haven't clarified whether this exercise goes on to use the current (2013) districts and wards within each old-time county, or the urban/rural districts existing at the time. If the latter, it'll be a nightmare.

Not so difficult. The best thing to do is not get too bogged down in the districts (they don't get too bogged down in the today!) but try and create natural seats. Some of them will be broadly similar to what existed up until 1983.

In drawing up figures for Scotland I've used the ward electorates, but due to rather huge differences between now and then I've also used the civil parish figures for 2001 (age 16+) While the electorate has increased of course the changes have been fairly consistent. For example the 16+ population of the old Aberdeen Burgh was 127,957 which would entitle it to two seats at Holyrood. Dundee was 119,757, also two seats. Stirlingshire is 189,659 which with Clackmannan would give it 4 seats etc for example. I'll work on it

I'm working from this;

[YL]

There are some maps from the 1954 boundary review on the Vision of Britain website which show county and district boundaries in detail.