jamie
Top Poster
Posts: 7,069 
|
Post by jamie on Mar 27, 2020 17:10:01 GMT
I think not! (although the Labour gerrymander proposal for Teesdale would be entertaining). It would basically involve hacking both Middlesbrough and Stockton to pieces and combing the right bits of those with the right bits of Darlington and Redcar/Cleveland. The rest of Cleveland gets shoved in with Whitby, Scarborough takes in some of the current Thirsk and Malton seat. Eventually the aim is to have enough of a knock on effect to justify ripping a few Tory wards out of York and dividing it North/South rather than Central/Outer with both seats of the minimum size allowed. Good plan for Teesside but I was thinking of Teesdale! 😋 My presumption is that Labour stick very Tory Teesdale (Barnard Castle and surrounding farmers) into a Yorkshire based seat so that Bishop Auckland is pretty much only ex coal mining communities. |
|
Chris from Brum
Lib Dem
What I need is a strong drink and a peer group.
Posts: 9,771
|
Post by Chris from Brum on Mar 27, 2020 18:18:57 GMT
It would basically involve hacking both Middlesbrough and Stockton to pieces and combing the right bits of those with the right bits of Darlington and Redcar/Cleveland. The rest of Cleveland gets shoved in with Whitby, Scarborough takes in some of the current Thirsk and Malton seat. Eventually the aim is to have enough of a knock on effect to justify ripping a few Tory wards out of York and dividing it North/South rather than Central/Outer with both seats of the minimum size allowed. Good plan for Teesside but I was thinking of Teesdale! 😋 My presumption is that Labour stick very Tory Teesdale (Barnard Castle and surrounding farmers) into a Yorkshire based seat so that Bishop Auckland is pretty much only ex coal mining communities. Teesdale needs the boundary restoring to the centre of the river. |
|
jamie
Top Poster
Posts: 7,069
|
Post by jamie on Mar 27, 2020 20:59:22 GMT
Teesdale needs the boundary restoring to the centre of the river. Unpopular opinion - Basically everything in the Barnard Castle wards is Yorkshire anyways. |
|
|
|
Post by Peter Wilkinson on Mar 27, 2020 23:24:49 GMT
I had forgotten that the 2011 legislation did not actually prescribe the regions. The BCE did, and referred to them as European Parliamentary constituencies or some such. I remember being slightly surprised at this. I don't know what is meant by English standard regions nowadays. Short answer: For pretty well all practical purposes, I am fairly sure (unless I am corrected by anyone who knows better) that these are effectively exactly the same, until further notice, as what people here have been referring to as European Parliamentary constituencies (minus Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland). Longer answer: I haven't checked what the BCE said, but it probably said "European Electoral Regions" - that is what the Office of National Statistics (ONS) currently (or rather as of last December) calls them in a "Hierarchical Representation of UK Statistical Geographies" chart which is available from its Open Geography Portal. The chart shows a large number of geographical classifications at various levels (and their relationships to one another) that the ONS uses in official statistics, putting them into nine different groups. The "Eurostat" group, and also "European Electoral Regions" in the "Electoral" group, will presumably disappear in one of the next few revisions of the chart but, for the BCE's purposes, this is likely to be a difference that makes no difference - it will still leave another entry, "Regions" in the "Administrative" group, whose only definitional difference from "European Electoral Regions" is that it does not have entries for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, because it only covers England. And "Regions" is at the top of a hierarchy of local authorities, groupings and subdivisions which the BCE will be needing to take account of in its deliberations. Also, the BCE will find it useful to use them - it means that it can run the consultation in parallel with separate subteams in different regions rather than having to do the whole thing as one big job. There does seem to be some historical background behind this. British governments were using "standard statistical regions" (which might change from time to time) for regional breakdowns of government statistics from at least the second world war through to 1996. In 1994, the Major government had set up "government offices for the regions" to combine regional offices set up by various government departments, with all activities operating on the same set of regional boundaries - and in 1996, it instructed the ONS to use these regions and boundaries instead of the previous standard statistical regions. In 2011, the Coalition government abolished the government offices for the regions, with all their activities going to either central or local government - but explicitly allowed for the continued use of these regions by the ONS for official statistics, but referred to just as "regions" rather than "government office regions". The ONS is still using these. Meanwhile, when the EU insisted on the United Kingdom introducing some form of proportional representation for European Parliament elections, the Blair government had decided that the proportional representation should operate at regional level, using the "government office regions" together with Scotland, Wales and Northern Island (and the ONS introduced "European Electoral Regions" into their electoral statistics). But, beyond the EU's insistance on using some form of PR, this was entirely a British government choice and could have been changed at any time (or at least from the next European elections) - France has changed its method of electing members to the European Parliament at least twice since 1999, apparently with no pushback from the EU. So, one can see where the apparent EU connection came from - but it looks to have been a matter of convenience for the BCE to use "European Electoral Regions" last time, because it was in the "Electoral" group, rather than "Regions" from the "Administrative" group. There is, of course, nothing to stop the government from changing the list of regions which the ONS is supposed to use when producing administrative statistics, and I can quite see it choosing to do so at some time - but, with both the post-Brexit negotiations and Covid-19 to sort out this year, I can't see this year being the time. |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Mar 28, 2020 1:59:14 GMT
It would basically involve hacking both Middlesbrough and Stockton to pieces and combing the right bits of those with the right bits of Darlington and Redcar/Cleveland. The rest of Cleveland gets shoved in with Whitby, Scarborough takes in some of the current Thirsk and Malton seat. Eventually the aim is to have enough of a knock on effect to justify ripping a few Tory wards out of York and dividing it North/South rather than Central/Outer with both seats of the minimum size allowed. Good plan for Teesside but I was thinking of Teesdale! 😋 My presumption is that Labour stick very Tory Teesdale (Barnard Castle and surrounding farmers) into a Yorkshire based seat so that Bishop Auckland is pretty much only ex coal mining communities. Or you create some kind of "Durham West" constituency then use whatever's left to merge Consett with Chester-Le-Street; Bishop Auckland with Newton Aycliffe and Spennymoor and preserve the City of Durham? You could even stick the Tory bits of Darlington in your hypothetical Durham West seat but that would also require hacking Stockton to pieces |
|
|
|
Post by andrewteale on Mar 28, 2020 9:08:54 GMT
I had forgotten that the 2011 legislation did not actually prescribe the regions. The BCE did, and referred to them as European Parliamentary constituencies or some such. I remember being slightly surprised at this. I don't know what is meant by English standard regions nowadays. Short answer: For pretty well all practical purposes, I am fairly sure (unless I am corrected by anyone who knows better) that these are effectively exactly the same, until further notice, as what people here have been referring to as European Parliamentary constituencies (minus Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland). Longer answer: I haven't checked what the BCE said, but it probably said "European Electoral Regions" - that is what the Office of National Statistics (ONS) currently (or rather as of last December) calls them in a "Hierarchical Representation of UK Statistical Geographies" chart which is available from its Open Geography Portal. The chart shows a large number of geographical classifications at various levels (and their relationships to one another) that the ONS uses in official statistics, putting them into nine different groups. The "Eurostat" group, and also "European Electoral Regions" in the "Electoral" group, will presumably disappear in one of the next few revisions of the chart but, for the BCE's purposes, this is likely to be a difference that makes no difference - it will still leave another entry, "Regions" in the "Administrative" group, whose only definitional difference from "European Electoral Regions" is that it does not have entries for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, because it only covers England. And "Regions" is at the top of a hierarchy of local authorities, groupings and subdivisions which the BCE will be needing to take account of in its deliberations. Also, the BCE will find it useful to use them - it means that it can run the consultation in parallel with separate subteams in different regions rather than having to do the whole thing as one big job. There does seem to be some historical background behind this. British governments were using "standard statistical regions" (which might change from time to time) for regional breakdowns of government statistics from at least the second world war through to 1996. In 1994, the Major government had set up "government offices for the regions" to combine regional offices set up by various government departments, with all activities operating on the same set of regional boundaries - and in 1996, it instructed the ONS to use these regions and boundaries instead of the previous standard statistical regions. In 2011, the Coalition government abolished the government offices for the regions, with all their activities going to either central or local government - but explicitly allowed for the continued use of these regions by the ONS for official statistics, but referred to just as "regions" rather than "government office regions". The ONS is still using these. Meanwhile, when the EU insisted on the United Kingdom introducing some form of proportional representation for European Parliament elections, the Blair government had decided that the proportional representation should operate at regional level, using the "government office regions" together with Scotland, Wales and Northern Island (and the ONS introduced "European Electoral Regions" into their electoral statistics). But, beyond the EU's insistance on using some form of PR, this was entirely a British government choice and could have been changed at any time (or at least from the next European elections) - France has changed its method of electing members to the European Parliament at least twice since 1999, apparently with no pushback from the EU. So, one can see where the apparent EU connection came from - but it looks to have been a matter of convenience for the BCE to use "European Electoral Regions" last time, because it was in the "Electoral" group, rather than "Regions" from the "Administrative" group. There is, of course, nothing to stop the government from changing the list of regions which the ONS is supposed to use when producing administrative statistics, and I can quite see it choosing to do so at some time - but, with both the post-Brexit negotiations and Covid-19 to sort out this year, I can't see this year being the time. The boundary change legislation (the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986) currently defines the English regions by reference to the European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002. An Order was made in 2018 to repeal the 2002 Act; once that comes into force at the end of this year, a consequential change is that the current definition of the regions will be copied into the 1986 Act so it can still work as presently. |
|
|
|
Post by La Fontaine on Mar 28, 2020 10:06:41 GMT
The boundary change legislation (the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986) currently defines the English regions by reference to the European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002. An Order was made in 2018 to repeal the 2002 Act; once that comes into force at the end of this year, a consequential change is that the current definition of the regions will be copied into the 1986 Act so it can still work as presently. Yes, I have now found the reference to the European electoral regions in the 2011 Act. It only says that the BC "may take into account" such regions (which they did), but nevertheless it seems unlikely that the BC will deviate from them, even in the north east and Yorkshire. I note, however, that the BC final 2018 report calls them "Administrative Regions", though what administration they had in mind is not clear - just the ONS? |
|
|
|
Post by Peter Wilkinson on Mar 28, 2020 13:01:05 GMT
The boundary change legislation (the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986) currently defines the English regions by reference to the European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002. An Order was made in 2018 to repeal the 2002 Act; once that comes into force at the end of this year, a consequential change is that the current definition of the regions will be copied into the 1986 Act so it can still work as presently. Yes, I have now found the reference to the European electoral regions in the 2011 Act. It only says that the BC "may take into account" such regions (which they did), but nevertheless it seems unlikely that the BC will deviate from them, even in the north east and Yorkshire. I note, however, that the BC final 2018 report calls them "Administrative Regions", though what administration they had in mind is not clear - just the ONS? This may well be administration s, as in the various levels of local authorities. The ONS uses the following as an "Administrative" hierarchy, and I think that every entry except for Regions and Metropolitan Counties (which presumably are still useful groupings for statistical purposes) still represents an actual formal administrative level: | Regions (9) | Greater London Authority (1)
| London Boroughs (33)
| Electoral Wards (7,219) | Metropolitan Counties (6)
| Metropolitan Districts (36) | Civil Parishes (10,464) | Counties (26)
| Non-metropolitan Districts (192)
| | Unitary authorities (56) | Combined Authorities (10)
|
(and thanks to andrewteale for his clarification about the relevant legislation - I had been working entirely from Wikipedia and my own inferences from ONS documents). |
|
|
|
Post by La Fontaine on Mar 28, 2020 14:03:34 GMT
What does the regional "formal administrative level" consist of? As far as I know, there is no such thing in the north east. Health, housing, for example, are merged with Yorkshire etc. and have been for a long time now.
|
|
|
|
Post by greenchristian on Mar 28, 2020 14:09:40 GMT
Yes, I have now found the reference to the European electoral regions in the 2011 Act. It only says that the BC "may take into account" such regions (which they did), but nevertheless it seems unlikely that the BC will deviate from them, even in the north east and Yorkshire. I note, however, that the BC final 2018 report calls them "Administrative Regions", though what administration they had in mind is not clear - just the ONS? This may well be administration s, as in the various levels of local authorities. The ONS uses the following as an "Administrative" hierarchy, and I think that every entry except for Regions and Metropolitan Counties (which presumably are still useful groupings for statistical purposes) still represents an actual formal administrative level: | Regions (9) | Greater London Authority (1)
| London Boroughs (33)
| Electoral Wards (7,219) | Metropolitan Counties (6)
| Metropolitan Districts (36) | Civil Parishes (10,464) | Counties (26)
| Non-metropolitan Districts (192)
| | Unitary authorities (56) | Combined Authorities (10)
|
(and thanks to andrewteale for his clarification about the relevant legislation - I had been working entirely from Wikipedia and my own inferences from ONS documents). Some of the Metropolitan Counties are, once again, administrative levels due to the introduction of Metro Mayors. |
|
|
|
Post by Peter Wilkinson on Mar 28, 2020 14:58:48 GMT
What does the regional "formal administrative level" consist of? As far as I know, there is no such thing in the north east. Health, housing, for example, are merged with Yorkshire etc. and have been for a long time now. Please note that I said - these two are former administrative levels which are still being used for statistical purposes, but probably nothing else. (As greenchristian has said, some of the metropolitan counties have in effect been partially revived - however, strictly speaking, I think that whenever this has been done formally, the revived setup has been classified as a combined authority. This certainly applies where there is a metro mayor in control.) |
|
Harry Hayfield
Green
Cavalier Gentleman (as in 17th century Cavalier)
Posts: 2,922
|
Post by Harry Hayfield on Mar 28, 2020 16:57:33 GMT
Doing some preliminary calculations using the data published by Electoral Calculus yesterday, it looks as if Dyfed will go back to four constituencies again (just as it did between 1918 and 1997) however actually making those four is not as easy as it sounds (especially Llanelli)
|
|
|
|
Post by La Fontaine on Mar 28, 2020 18:10:07 GMT
What does the regional "formal administrative level" consist of? As far as I know, there is no such thing in the north east. Health, housing, for example, are merged with Yorkshire etc. and have been for a long time now. Please note that I said - these two are former administrative levels which are still being used for statistical purposes, but probably nothing else. (As greenchristian has said, some of the metropolitan counties have in effect been partially revived - however, strictly speaking, I think that whenever this has been done formally, the revived setup has been classified as a combined authority. This certainly applies where there is a metro mayor in control.) OK! |
|
|
|
Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 28, 2020 18:14:08 GMT
Doing some preliminary calculations using the data published by Electoral Calculus yesterday, it looks as if Dyfed will go back to four constituencies again (just as it did between 1918 and 1997) however actually making those four is not as easy as it sounds (especially Llanelli) Yes it is - pretty much add the wards in an around Ammanford  |
|
Harry Hayfield
Green
Cavalier Gentleman (as in 17th century Cavalier)
Posts: 2,922
|
Post by Harry Hayfield on Mar 28, 2020 20:51:34 GMT
Doing some preliminary calculations using the data published by Electoral Calculus yesterday, it looks as if Dyfed will go back to four constituencies again (just as it did between 1918 and 1997) however actually making those four is not as easy as it sounds (especially Llanelli) Yes it is - pretty much add the wards in an around Ammanford Ah, I was trying to get them as close to the quota as possible, making them smaller than the quota never crossed my mind. |
|
|
|
Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 28, 2020 21:07:15 GMT
Actually I think Wales would get 32 seats on this arrangement (just) so you're looking aty an average electorate of 68,183, so these are all pretty close to that but obviously the average size of four Dyfed constituencies is 67,845 which is somewhat lower than the UK quota (a little over 69k), so unless you were planning to add wards from outside, you couldn't do other than have seats which are smaller than the quota
|
|
|
|
Post by 🏴☠️ Neath West 🏴☠️ on Mar 29, 2020 10:44:59 GMT
Actually I think Wales would get 32 seats on this arrangement (just) so you're looking aty an average electorate of 68,183, so these are all pretty close to that but obviously the average size of four Dyfed constituencies is 67,845 which is somewhat lower than the UK quota (a little over 69k), so unless you were planning to add wards from outside, you couldn't do other than have seats which are smaller than the quota I'm not sure you've got the quota right (although it actually should make it easier – there's no need to cross the Carmarthenshire/Pembrokeshire boundary, although there are entertaining gerrymanders available if one does). It should be the UK less the four island constituencies divided by 646 (rather than 596), for which I get 68,982, with lower and upper bounds of 65,533 and 72,431. |
|
|
|
Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 29, 2020 11:29:04 GMT
I had it as 69,173 which seemed to be based on the figure for the Welsh regional quota rather than the national one - I should have looked at the minimum or maximum and got the number from there (since BA doesn't give the national electorate figure and I couldn't be bothered to hunt around for it). So obviously that gave me a slightly higher minimum number which annoying my Carmarthen seat was just under before I added a bit of Pembs
|
|
|
|
Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 29, 2020 11:32:34 GMT
So put the two Pembs wards back with Pembroke and Carmarthen takes Penygroes from Llanelli. The Cardigan seat is unchanged
|
|
|
|
Post by 🏴☠️ Neath West 🏴☠️ on Mar 29, 2020 15:47:03 GMT
Here's the really blatant Dyfedmander that I was alluding to:  |
|
