UK parliamentary boundary review

[EastAnglianLefty]

If there was a tool like DRA for the UK we could have some fun drawing maps or hilarious gerrymanders

Sadly, no such tool exists

https://boundaryassistant.org/

Huh, that is a very interesting and fun tool! Sadly, it has no election data of any kind which is half the fun of DRA

That’s because there are no official general election results released in the UK for anything below the constituency level. However, as TimTurner says, Electoral Calculus has ward-level estimates using regression modelling. Anyway, due to tactical voting, nominal results under new boundaries are often not particularly useful guides to how a seat might vote.

The quality of Electoral Calculus' ward-level estimates is in any case usually pretty poor, especially in areas where the major parties at Westminster level aren't the major competitors in local elections.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Is it possible to engineer a Labour seat in Cornwall? I think Truro, Falmouth and Redruth are more amenable.

It probably wouldn't be desirable. If Labour are in a position to form a government then Truro and Falmouth would be highly likely to fall and Camborne and Redruth would be marginal at worst, and there's not much point gerrymandering for a situation where you lack the ability to do something with your extra seats anyway.

[EastAnglianLefty]

For fun and to see just how badly I get piled upon, here is Wales. For the record I did not pay any attention to what the current constituencies look like though I did take a look at the primary authorities map.



North Wales inset



South Wales inset

When you're doing Wales, you really need to look at where the roads go. You've got a couple of constituencies which are joined together by mountain tracks as best.

[EastAnglianLefty]

If remotely accurate then what an absolute fiasco of a set of boundaries. Unhinged.

Which do you think is the area with the worst proposals?

The cross-Berwyn constituency is absolutely ludicrous - the easiest way to get from end of the constituency to the other is via Oswestry.

[EastAnglianLefty]

There are some bad seats in the Valleys, but it doesn't look like the worst option for Merthyr - the Heads of the Valleys Road is a moderately decent link.

I take the view that you can actually get from Meirionydd to Montgomeryshire in a reasonably direct fashion, and the only reason it's pitchforky is the belief of some Welsh nationalists that they should effectively have preserved seats. A lot of Meirionydd does in any case face similar issues and have similar demographics to Montgomeryshire.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Also, the Tory incumbent in Ynys Mon is weak and whilst party loyalty is weak on the island, Plaid are generally the most popular party there once you account for candidate effects.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Kelvin North and Kelvin South for what are basically the existing East Dunbartonshire and Cumbernauld, Kilsyth & Kirkintilloch East seats is another very odd choice, given that most people would associate Kelvin with northern Glasgow.

But when you're complaining about names, that's usually a sign that the proposal is tolerable. There are some odd choices, but overall it's remarkably coherent.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Pleased at the changes to the map in Co. Durham: goes from one of the very worst set of proposals in the entire country to about as good as you're likely to see under the present (bad, deficient, awful) rules: it's nice that they've listened to reason somewhere. Less pleased that the mess in the Urban West Midlands and the Potteries has not been sorted out, but that was always less likely.

Ironically one of the people they listened to in Co. Durham was me, even though I possess very little knowledge, whereas everywhere I did know what I was talking about I got ignored.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Percy is probably gone, unless David Davis or Martin Vickers decides to retire (and even then he wouldn't be sure of selection.)

Hart will probably face off against Crabb and given the latter's scandals he might well win. Carmarthenshire might have been close in 2019 but won't be in 2024.

Gwynne has been talked about as a likely retirement for a while. If Khan goes for Manchester Rusholme he'd win Gorton & Denton, but I'm not sure that he will.

Skidmore is dependent on musical chairs. Rees-Mogg has first claim on NE Somerset & Hanham, but may prefer Frome, especially since Warburton is unlikely to be allowed to stand again. If Rees-Mogg plumps for NE Somerset, Skidmore is screwed and even if he doesn't NE Somerset isn't going to be entirely easy going.

Reeves would probably be fine in Pudsey. She may try to pull rank, but I'm not sure she has to.

Blackford can probably pull rank on Hendry, and even if he can't there are plenty of anonymous SNP backbenchers who could be prevailed upon to step down.

Bill Cash is 82. He'd probably be happy with either the Stone or the Stafford seat and there are enough seats to go round in Staffordshire, but he's probably retiring anyway.

Vaz out to be fine in Walsall & Bloxwich. It's West Midlands Labour, so it's not entirely unloseable, but it's a lot better for her than the initial proposals were.

McGovern is pretty screwed. 40% of her seat goes into Ellesmere Port & Bromborough, but not 40% of the new seat so I'm unsure if she has a claim. Less than 40% goes into Wirral West but I suspect Greenwood would be easier to beat than Madders.

The new Lancaster & Wyre isn't that different from the old seat Wallace represented from 2005 until 2010, but if the election result in 2024 is what it looks like being, that will be no comfort to him. Possibly best off hoping that Nigel Evans gets offered a peerage and makes it through the approval process?

[EastAnglianLefty]

Kent

As Sussex gets a Sussex Weald, Kent gets a Weald of Kent, a new seat which covers a lot of mostly rural territory in the south of the county between Tunbridge Wells and Ashford.  The largest single part of it comes from the existing Ashford constituency, including the town of Tenterden; without it Ashford gains some rural territory to the east of the town from Folkestone & Hythe.

Another large part of Weald of Kent comes from Maidstone & the Weald, and Maidstone now is in a much more compact constituency called Maidstone & Malling, taking East and West Malling from Tonbridge & Malling, whose name thus becomes simply Tonbridge.

In the east of the county, the Thanet seats are completetly reorganised.  South Thanet loses Sandwich and gains the rest of Margate and is renamed East Thanet, while North Thanet takes Sandwich and is renamed Herne Bay & Sandwich, also gaining some territory from Canterbury.

There are only minor changes to the remaining constituencies, including the Medway area ones, though Chatham & Aylesford becomes a bit more urban, by gaining territory from Rochester & Strood.

As for partisan effects, the new Weald of Kent seat looks monstrously Tory.  Its creation and the knock-on effects do turn Ashford and Folkestone & Hythe into Labour long shots, though probably no more than that.  Elsewhere, the new East Thanet looks significantly easier for Labour than the old South; the flip side of that is that Herne Bay & Sandwich is safer for the Tories than the old North Thanet (not that Labour won that even in 1997).  Canterbury becomes slightly safer for Labour.  The changes to Rochester & Strood make that a little easier for Labour to win, but it's still a long way off.

I'm mildly surprised that Labour didn't try to get a rearrangement of the seats round Medway, by recreating the old Rochester & Chatham and putting Aylesford with Strood, which would have given them a seat in Medway that they ought to win in an even year.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Weaver Vale is another name which disappears.  Northwich joins Winsford from Eddisbury and Middlewich from Congleton in Mid Cheshire, while Frodsham, Helsby and the parts of Runcorn in the constituency join with the rest of Runcorn from the existing Halton constituency and smaller parts of Ellesmere Port & Neston and Eddisbury to form Runcorn & Helsby.

The new Mid Cheshire looks like a marginal which would have voted Tory by a modest margin in 2019.

For our international posters, ‘Mid’ is another term for ‘Leftovers’ i.e. the places that were left once you drew coherent constituencies around it. In this case, it’s actually and very unusually ended up producing a logical constituency, certainly more so than either of its 2 main predecessors (especially Weaver Vale). ‘Northwich and Winsford’ would have been a perfectly decent name.

Although in this case, Mid Cheshire was picked as a name because the initial suggestion of 'Northwich' was shot down during the consultation.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Greater Manchester

This is another area where there is an abolished constituency and a new one.  The abolished constituency is Denton & Reddish: Reddish is absorbed into Stockport, Audenshaw and Dukinfield go to Ashton under Lyne and Denton is added to much of the existing Manchester Gorton to form Gorton & Denton.  The new constituency is Manchester Rusholme, a revival of a name used before 1950, taking the west of Manchester Gorton (Rusholme, Fallowfield, Whalley Range) and the southern parts of Manchester Central (Hulme, Moss Side, Ardwick).

Knock-on effects from all that see Hazel Grove extend further into Stockport and Manchester Central gain Failsworth from Ashton under Lyne.  (That Failsworth, in Oldham borough, is in a constituency called Manchester Central is a curiosity.)  Oldham West & Royton sees no changes to its boundaries, but is renamed Oldham West, Chadderton & Royton.

Blackley & Broughton loses its Salford wards but extends instead into Rochdale borough, taking southern Middleton and becoming Blackley & Middleton South.  Having lost that area, Heywood & Middleton becomes Heywood & Middleton North and extends further into Rochdale town.  Salford & Eccles becomes simply Salford again and shifts eastward, regaining Broughton but losing Eccles to Worsley & Eccles South which becomes Worsley & Eccles, also taking one ward from Leigh.

Bury South takes Kersal from Blackley & Broughton and loses northern Radcliffe to Bury North.  Bolton South East takes Walkden from Worsley & Eccles South and becomes Bolton South & Walkden; it also loses Hulton to Bolton West and Little Lever and Darcy Lever to Bolton North East.  Bolton West then loses Atherton to Leigh, renamed Leigh & Atherton, which also donates a rather strange looking salient, involving two split wards, to Makerfield.  (In spite of the temptations they must have had when they looked at the map of this area, the BCE have not renamed the latter seat as "Makerfield & Dangerous Corner".)

Both the abolished Denton & Reddish and the new Manchester Rusholme are Labour.  The extra territory in Rochdale probably flips Heywood & Middleton North notionally to Labour, but further west the narrow Tory wins in 2019 in Bury North, Bury South, Bolton North East and Leigh all stay narrowly Tory.  The extension of Hazel Grove into Stockport might make it easier for the Lib Dems to win if the Labour voters in the area are persuadable with bar charts.

Although in practice Afzal Khan is going with the western half of his seat to Rusholme and Andrew Gwynne is going with the core of his to Gorton & Denton, so there's no change there in terms of incumbent effects (albeit that the successor seats, though both safely Labour, are rather different in character than the ones they now represent.)

[EastAnglianLefty]

The figures are very obviously wrong, as there's no way that a constituency including the entire postindustrial coastal strip other than Maryport would have had a majority only slightly lower than the Workington constituency.

I asked Pete in the other place about the final boundaries, and he gave a Tory majority of 2073.

Which sounds a bit more believable, though maybe still slightly on the high side.

I note that Labour held up well in Cockermouth Keswick in the Allerdale local elections in 2019, whereas they did substantially less well in Workington. Given that that probably wasn't replicated in the general election, it's easy to see how that might affect notionals.

[EastAnglianLefty]

It used to be the case that inner urban seats had smaller electorates, whilst suburban seats had lower electorates due to housing shifts. Similarly, poorer industrial areas tended to depopulate, whilst wealthier constituencies attracted new migrants.

Stagnant housing construction has meant that fewer people are moving out of the inner suburbs to the outer suburbs; urban cores have begun to grow again and with some rapidity; and the Conservatives have done much better in poorer industrial areas in the last couple of elections. Those have removed a lot of the "structural" advantage to Labour.

It's also the case that boundary changes usually look advantageous to parties that have just won an election, because they're more likely to have a seat with a large majority near an opposition party seat with a small majority. They always look particularly bad for the Lib Dems because their vote is highly contingent and based on tactical voting, but this is almost always misleading.

[EastAnglianLefty]

How often does the government do a boundary review?

It varies. The current process (where reviews are carried out by external Boundary Commissions) was established in 1949 and it was intended that it should operate every five years, so some seats were created by Act of Parliament in 1950 but abolished in 1955. This was unpopular and a new system was implemented where it would happen approximately every 10-15 years.

The Coalition went back to five year reviews, but the final proposals required parliamentary approval, which neither of the previous two attempts got. It's now been changed so that the changes take place automatically, with five year reviews going forward, but I wouldn't bet against that being changed to 10 or 15 years by a future government to minimise disruption.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Taking it all with a pinch of salt of course. But there are still some pretty wild results in there that are highly engaging if nothing else. Both Isle of Wight seats going Labour for one. Rees-Mogg and Coffey going down to a narrow defeats. Frome and East Somerset turning into a true three-way marginal that costs the Lib Dems victory over the Tories. Rosie Duffield somehow winning a 20k majority. I could go on.

I would say that Rees-Mogg losing would not be a massive surprise. It's less Labour than the old Wansdyke, but that was comfortably Labour in 1997 and it's full of the sorts of voters the Tories have spent the past two years pissing off. Similarly, much as she's mad, I don't think a stonking majority in Canterbury is at all unlikely.

There are definitely issues with a lot of the random rural seats going Labour, however. To me the classic example is Central Devon - I just don't understand the theory of change for how a seat whose largest towns are Okehampton and Crediton and which has no historic or present industry is supposed to be a viable Labour target.

[EastAnglianLefty]

There are definitely issues with a lot of the random rural seats going Labour, however. To me the classic example is Central Devon - I just don't understand the theory of change for how a seat whose largest towns are Okehampton and Crediton and which has no historic or present industry is supposed to be a viable Labour target.

I agree, but Labour have done relatively well there the past couple of elections so clearly there’s some Labour potential, even if UNS ignores there’s probably also a relatively low ceiling.

It’s also a case of people being priced out of Exeter and moving out to the suburbs/rural dormitories. I don’t think we’ll win Central Devon, but if we get to ~430 seats it should be on the list.

But this seat doesn't really have any of those (except for maybe Kenn Valley ward and at a real stretch Okehampton). People may move to Torquay or Exmouth or Honiton because they can't afford Exeter, they don't move to the middle of Dartmoor. I don't know how we overperformed the demographics so much in 2019, but it's not an edge of conurbation seat as I would understand it.