ricmk
Lib Dem
Posts: 2,633 
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Post by ricmk on Feb 9, 2022 23:51:49 GMT
Hi All I generally view rather than post but the BCE publication of submissions is interesting. I have had an amateur look at the East Mids submissions and there is an Lab/LD agreement on changing the Northampton proposals. Anyone more expert than me have a view on this? Hi - welcome. No promises on any expertise but I'm fairly local and used to work in Northampton so I went to have a look at the Lib Dem proposal. I burst out laughing when I saw the map. We rarely get that creative on the pitchfork bait thread. Towcester and Rushden is a thing of beauty. Basically 8 wards in a chain with country lanes connecting the constituency in several places. Local ties nil, half facing Northampton, half facing Wellingborough. Daventry and Brackley is pretty special as well. In rural areas you might have to live with this (surely "West Northamptonshire" a better description) but Brackley faces along the A43 (and into Oxfordshire) and not north up to Daventry. I'm less confident about the effect of giving Wellingborough a large rural hinterland in North Northants (I don't know this side so well) my guess is that rural area doesn't really identify with anywhere so less important, but it still looks odd on the map. I can only assume all that effort is to get precisely the Northampton seats that they want. The ward split in Grange Park does make a lot of sense on the ground - the previous ward boundary was really poor there and splitting reflects community boundaries much better than the ward itself. But I can't imagine the Lib Dems being able to really target either, so I'm not quite sure why they bothered. (and this does not support Labour - see below) Finally, the submission is your one chance to sell the arrangements. Some choice quotes make it clear that the Lib Dems know they are proposing a turkey here: "Perhaps Rushden has grown to the point where it needs to be a major focus of its own constituency." "We are less enthusiastic about our proposed Daventry, Rushden and Towcester, and Wellingborough constituencies" "This radical reorganisation of seats (we wish we could devise a way to make it less radical)" The Labour proposal is in fact quite different. They accept the BCE draft for all the constituencies surrounding Northampton and just focus on the 2 Northamptons. In Northampton North they want Abington & Phippsville (safe Labour) and Castle (Safe Labour) & Dallington Spencer (safe Labour) wards, with Billing & Rectory Farm (2Con 1 Lab - but feels like an area Con should win) and Riverside Park (safe Con) going the other way. So it's a blatant attempt to get Northampton North as winnable for Labour as possible (and I'd make them strong favourites if they get their way) Leaves Northampton South oddly-shaped, but I don't think either constituency would be that bad, so well worth Labour's time proposing this. EDIT: I had a look at the Conservative proposals for Northants while fresh in my mind: They are very happy with Northampton (as they think they can win both seats on that configuration) They can live with West Northants (safe Tory seats) They muck about in the East a bit. This is the side I know less well, but they seem to really want Raunds in with Corby. I think this is about trying to shore Corby up by getting a safe Tory area into it - not convinced there are any real links between the two and it's pretty unsubtle. |
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Feb 10, 2022 10:45:15 GMT
There definitely aren't links between Raunds and Corby, although then again Corby has very poor links to almost everywhere in East Northants. The Conservative proposal does start from a logical place, since Irthlingborough fits better with Wellingborough than Raunds does, but it ruins that by splitting the town, which is entirely unnecessary. Fits with the massive lack of subtlety that seems to have characterised a lot of the more out there Tory proposals nationwide.
In Northampton the BCE proposal is definitely neater than the Labour counter-proposal, but the Labour proposal preserves more of the current orientation of the seats. In an ideal world you'd probably split the difference, with Billing & Rectory Farm and Riverside Park going into North, Abington staying there but splitting St. Georges ward so that Semilong stayed in South. At that point you might want to rename the seats NE/SW.
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YL
Non-Aligned
Either Labour leaning or Lib Dem leaning but not sure which
Posts: 4,915
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Post by YL on Feb 10, 2022 12:36:04 GMT
The Lib Dem Northants map is indeed a mess, especially that Rushden & Towcester. It looks like they're trying to minimise the ward splitting. As for the Tories, note how their attempt to get Raunds to stay with Corby involves removing some of Corby's closer hinterland by splitting the Corby Rural ward.
Elsewhere in this region Labour don't like crossing the Leicester city boundary, but haven't found a solution for the rest of the county so add a few Harborough wards to Rutland & Stamford. Meanwhile the Tories do want to cross the city boundary, but not at Glenfield; instead they put a couple of Oadby wards (but not the whole town) into Leicester East. I guess they think it might be winnable for them like that.
In Notts Mansfield and Ashfield councils have a counterproposal which keeps Brick Kiln and Grange Farm wards in Mansfield. The idea is to instead move one polling district from Ransom Wood ward (I assume the bit which is contiguous with Rainworth) to Sherwood, and to move Hucknall West (which they say can be separated from the rest of Hucknall, though looking at comments in Hucknall West it's not clear the locals there agree) to Ashfield.
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Post by Pete Whitehead on Feb 10, 2022 12:49:14 GMT
I thought the BCE plans for Northants were absolutely fine and made a submission to tell them that (apart from including the name Raunds with Wellingborough rather than Rushden). Someone on here suggested it was a good idea to send positive feedback where appropriate as if all they get is negative comments they're prone to change a good initial plan. I took that advise to heart with their excellent proposals for Hertfordshire but also did so here because I was aware from this thread that various unsatisfactory alternatives were being mooted. There do seem to be quite a lot of objections to the Wellingborough scheme from Bozeat and Wollaston, which are understandable but fail to recognise the constraints the BCE are under. I thought their plan quite inspired in that area.
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Post by jm on Feb 10, 2022 12:53:52 GMT
Has anyone come up with proposals to cross the Lincolnshire/Nottinghamshire border? I've had a look through the thread but haven't found any.
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Post by islington on Feb 10, 2022 14:37:03 GMT
This plan allots three whole seats to Leicester and seven to the rest of Leics. The Labour Party's E Mids submission gives the impression that they were looking for something like this, but failed to find it. (And there are at least two other versions upthread.)
I might suggest this at the second phase consultation.
No seat is left unchanged but each is the clear successor of a current constituency. The BCE's horribly-distorted seats of Mid Leics and Blaby are greatly improved. Numbers, and brief notes, follow.
Leicester East - 74785. Loses Evington, gains Wycliffe.
Leicester South - 72687. Loses Aylestone and Wycliffe, gains Evington.
Leicester West - 72848. Gains Aylestone.
North West Leicestershire - 75867. Loses Ibstock, Measham and adjacent areas; gains Shepshed.
Loughborough - 76790. Loses Shepshed; expands to the east and unites the Mountsorrel area within the seat.
Mid Leicestershire - 76298. The successor of Charnwood: loses territory on its northern and southern flanks but expands to the west. Not the tidiest seat ever devised but a great improvement on the BCE's misshapen creation of the same name.
South Leicestershire - 76476. Actually the successor to Harborough, compared with which it loses Market Harborough itself but takes in territory to the west, including Lutterworth.
Blaby - 76426. The successor to S Leics, but it loses Lutterworth and other areas on its eastern side and gains territory to its west. It is much more compact than the very awkward proposal put forward by the BCE, and the name is simplified as well: Blaby was used as a constituency name 1974-2010.
East Leicestershire - 75756. Or 'Melton and Harborough' if you prefer. This is the Leics element of Rutland & Melton, brought up to size by the addition of Market Harborough and some rural bits in Harborough district.
Bosworth - 76616. Loses territory to Blaby and Mid Leics but gains Ibstock, Measham, &c, from NW Leics.
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Post by islington on Feb 10, 2022 15:15:31 GMT
Has anyone come up with proposals to cross the Lincolnshire/Nottinghamshire border? I've had a look through the thread but haven't found any. I'm not sure what the benefit would be.
If Lincs takes in Rutland, its entitlement is 7.93 and it is good for 8 whole seats. Admittedly if you omit Rutland its entitlement comes down to 7.52 and it needs to be paired, but in that case what do you do with Rutland?
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Feb 10, 2022 15:20:35 GMT
It's worth remembering that Loughborough is a Labour target seat. Even if they'd found that solution, I don't think they'd want to propose a solution that removed Shepshed and added towns and villages to the east where Labour has very little support or potential. For what it's worth, this was my submission for Northants: www.bcereviews.org.uk/node/84681/viewI made supportive remarks about the BCE proposals, but suggested that Northampton North should gain bits of Moulton ward and that Wellingborough should include northern and eastern extensions to the town that aren't in in the BCE proposals. The downside was that I had to split four wards. |
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Post by islington on Feb 10, 2022 15:22:20 GMT
In Notts Mansfield and Ashfield councils have a counterproposal which keeps Brick Kiln and Grange Farm wards in Mansfield. The idea is to instead move one polling district from Ransom Wood ward (I assume the bit which is contiguous with Rainworth) to Sherwood, and to move Hucknall West (which they say can be separated from the rest of Hucknall, though looking at comments in Hucknall West it's not clear the locals there agree) to Ashfield. Apart from splitting Hucknall, that makes means an orphan PD and makes Sherwood a four-district seat to boot.
A more sensible plan would be to put only one Mansfield ward in Ashfield - either Bull Farm or Oakham would seem a logical candidate - and get Ashfield's numbers up by including Brinsley ward from Broxtowe district (which is currently in the seat). This is a messy solution and means that Ashfield contains two orphan wards, but it minimizes the damage to Mansfield.
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YL
Non-Aligned
Either Labour leaning or Lib Dem leaning but not sure which
Posts: 4,915
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Post by YL on Feb 10, 2022 16:57:58 GMT
Has anyone come up with proposals to cross the Lincolnshire/Nottinghamshire border? I've had a look through the thread but haven't found any. I'm not aware of any. As islington said, Lincolnshire and Rutland work well together and so there isn't much motivation for trying anything else unless it really solves problems elsewhere in the region. Also, the northern part of the Lincs/Notts border along the Trent doesn't have many crossings. On previous numbers I did try a Grantham & Newark seat but I don't think there's any case for it this time. My East Midlands submission is reference 56943 (one of those under the "Useful Links"). It contains a Leicestershire-without-Leicester plan with the existing constituencies fairly recognisable for the most part and no split of Sileby or Mountsorrel; I don't know whether it suits Labour, though. Although I said I supported the BCE's Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire proposals, I did also outline an alternative with a cross-county Bolsover & Warsop seat which avoids the bite out of Mansfield and also the need for a Nottingham seat to grab either Kimberley or a bit of Beeston. It's a whole ward solution, and probably could be improved a bit by a couple of ward splits, especially in Nottingham city. The knock-on effects in Derbyshire are limited. |
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Feb 10, 2022 17:12:47 GMT
Labour can win council seats in Castle Donington, so it seems plausible they'd be happy with it. I suspect they'd probably have been better off accepting Glenfield in Leicester West though, because it would allow Loughborough to have around 70000 electors rather than 75000+ and hence would mean the votes of the eponymous town would be more likely to outweigh the remaining areas.
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Post by jm on Feb 10, 2022 18:25:25 GMT
Has anyone come up with proposals to cross the Lincolnshire/Nottinghamshire border? I've had a look through the thread but haven't found any. I'm not aware of any. As islington said, Lincolnshire and Rutland work well together and so there isn't much motivation for trying anything else unless it really solves problems elsewhere in the region. Also, the northern part of the Lincs/Notts border along the Trent doesn't have many crossings. On previous numbers I did try a Grantham & Newark seat but I don't think there's any case for it this time. My East Midlands submission is reference 56943 (one of those under the "Useful Links"). It contains a Leicestershire-without-Leicester plan with the existing constituencies fairly recognisable for the most part and no split of Sileby or Mountsorrel; I don't know whether it suits Labour, though. Although I said I supported the BCE's Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire proposals, I did also outline an alternative with a cross-county Bolsover & Warsop seat which avoids the bite out of Mansfield and also the need for a Nottingham seat to grab either Kimberley or a bit of Beeston. It's a whole ward solution, and probably could be improved a bit by a couple of ward splits, especially in Nottingham city. The knock-on effects in Derbyshire are limited. North Nottinghamshire is an area of the world I know very well. I see no reason why Beckingham and Misterton cannot be moved to Gainsborough constituency - both look towards Gainsborough rather than Retford or Worksop despite being separated by the Trent. There is a crossing in Beckingham ward and both villages are only a few minutes drive from Gainsborough. They are the only parts of Bassetlaw within the Gainsborough/Lincoln 'Travel to work area' and most residents travel to Gainsborough for work/shopping/leisure activities. To accommodate the two extra wards and remain in quota, I would move Bardney ward from Gainsborough to Louth and Horncastle. All three consultation responses in Bardney oppose remaining a part of the Gainsborough constituency and indeed the local parish council propose that the ward be moved to Louth and Horncastle. This proposal allows a more sensible Bassetlaw seat without Newark needing to reach so far north. It may also allow some changes in the south of the county but I haven't investigated that possibility yet. I will be submitting this proposal during the next consultation period. |
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YL
Non-Aligned
Either Labour leaning or Lib Dem leaning but not sure which
Posts: 4,915
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Post by YL on Feb 10, 2022 19:05:48 GMT
Fair enough if you think it works, just saying why it didn't occur to me.
I think it would have a better chance if you could find a way of solving something elsewhere in Notts using it.
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Post by emidsanorak on Mar 9, 2022 10:50:06 GMT
Polling district and ward electorate errors in North Northamptonshire as described by the LibDems at the lead hearing in Nottingham:
Finedon: WEA should be 3567 electors, not 3577. WEB - not listed - should be 8 electors. WEC - not listed - should be 2 electors.
Earls Barton/Croyland & Swanspool: WGB (0 electors) omitted from Earls Barton list. WFA (103 electors) wrongly allocated to Earls Barton instead of Croyland & Swanspool.
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Post by willoughby on Mar 9, 2022 17:04:00 GMT
Thanks emidsanorak. Any other highlights?
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Post by islington on Mar 11, 2022 9:49:08 GMT
Thanks emidsanorak. Any other highlights? I've watched it and I don't know about highlights, but for me the lowlight was Labour's 'Rutland plus bits of Lincs and Leics' mash-up. This was justified on the grounds of the impossibility of dividing Leics into seven whole seats if you treat Leicester by itself for three. Well, I agree about treating Leicester separately but it's absolutely not the case that Leics can't be divided into seven. The electorate of 534229 = 7.28, avge 76318, makes it decidedly tricky but there are several plans upthread that achieve it. 202101080926 by YL 202101161614 by mattb 202101261110 by islington 202101261352 by East Anglian Lefty 202102182153 by YL again Moreover, YL made a submission including a 7-seat Leics, presumably based on one of his plans above. I'm definitely minded to make a submission at the second stage pointing this out, and perhaps also including my plan as well to demonstrate that there are more ways than one of skinning this particular cat. These plans may or may not suit Labour in electoral terms - I've no idea and in any case it's not a relevant consideration. But they do blow out of the water Labour's claim that treating Leicester city by itself forces a further crossing of the Leicestershire boundary. |
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Post by islington on Mar 11, 2022 18:15:27 GMT
Still in the E Mids, here's yet another non-split Nhants. (Apologies if anything along these lines has already been posted, I haven't checked the thread.) This is based fairly closely on the LibDems' plan and it even incorporates something akin to their much-derided Raunds-to-Towcester seat (although this version of it does not include Towcester). Corby, Kettering and Wellingborough are exactly as proposed by the LibDems, which means that as much as possible of the Corby seat is retained, Kettering is unaltered, and Wellingborough town is kept together, including its peripheral bits. Also like the LibDem scheme, it maintains recognizable No'ton N and S seats (the latter would be No'ton S & Towcester), and although in this scheme the No'ton seats omit two wards formerly in Northampton borough, I'd point out that those wards are currently not included in a No'ton seat so from their point of view it's no change - they remain in a seat that I'd be tempted to call S Nhants, although admittedly the rest of it is hugely changed from the current seat of that name.
A significant drawback of this plan, which it shares with the LibDem version, is that there are two seats crossing the UA boundary whereas it is possible to have a non-split plan with only one.
Edited to add: Or, maybe better, compared with the above:
Corby (75232) loses Irthlingborough, gains Ise; S Nhants (76552) loses Raunds, gains Deanshanger; Daventry (75354) loses Deanshanger, gains Long Buckby; Kettering (74999) loses Ise and Burton, gains Brixworth and Moulton. This leaves Wellingborough (76174) to lose its W Nhants wards and gain Buton, Irthlingborough, Raunds. This is a much more compact Wellingborough seat than the LibDem version, and wholly within N Nhants UA. Kettering now takes over the role of the second seat (other than S Nhants) extending into both UAs but it takes only two wards from W Nhants and doesn't look quite such as sprawl as the LibDems' W'boro.
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YL
Non-Aligned
Either Labour leaning or Lib Dem leaning but not sure which
Posts: 4,915
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Post by YL on Mar 11, 2022 18:28:00 GMT
I've watched it and I don't know about highlights, but for me the lowlight was Labour's 'Rutland plus bits of Lincs and Leics' mash-up. This was justified on the grounds of the impossibility of dividing Leics into seven whole seats if you treat Leicester by itself for three. Well, I agree about treating Leicester separately but it's absolutely not the case that Leics can't be divided into seven. The electorate of 534229 = 7.28, avge 76318, makes it decidedly tricky but there are several plans upthread that achieve it. 202101080926 by YL 202101161614 by mattb 202101261110 by islington 202101261352 by East Anglian Lefty 202102182153 by YL again Moreover, YL made a submission including a 7-seat Leics, presumably based on one of his plans above. I'm definitely minded to make a submission at the second stage pointing this out, and perhaps also including my plan as well to demonstrate that there are more ways than one of skinning this particular cat. These plans may or may not suit Labour in electoral terms - I've no idea and in any case it's not a relevant consideration. But they do blow out of the water Labour's claim that treating Leicester city by itself forces a further crossing of the Leicestershire boundary. In fact there are really quite a lot of ways of doing it. The one I submitted was, I think, the same as the second one of mine mentioned above, and was essentially one which prioritised retaining recognisable versions of the existing constituencies. There are also versions which have a constituency coterminous with Blaby district and versions, which I rather like in most respects but decided were too radical, with a ring of three mostly outer suburban constituencies forming a ring round the city. Maybe I'm wrong here, but I doubt the Labour three county seat has much chance of being adopted, which makes me wonder why they proposed it. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 11, 2022 20:47:19 GMT
Still in the E Mids, here's yet another non-split Nhants. (Apologies if anything along these lines has already been posted, I haven't checked the thread.) This is based fairly closely on the LibDems' plan and it even incorporates something akin to their much-derided Raunds-to-Towcester seat (although this version of it does not include Towcester). Corby, Kettering and Wellingborough are exactly as proposed by the LibDems, which means that as much as possible of the Corby seat is retained, Kettering is unaltered, and Wellingborough town is kept together, including its peripheral bits. Also like the LibDem scheme, it maintains recognizable No'ton N and S seats (the latter would be No'ton S & Towcester), and although in this scheme the No'ton seats omit two wards formerly in Northampton borough, I'd point out that those wards are currently not included in a No'ton seat so from their point of view it's no change - they remain in a seat that I'd be tempted to call S Nhants, although admittedly the rest of it is hugely changed from the current seat of that name.
A significant drawback of this plan, which it shares with the LibDem version, is that there are two seats crossing the UA boundary whereas it is possible to have a non-split plan with only one.
That arrangement in Northampton perfectly makes the case for ward splitting |
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Post by islington on Mar 12, 2022 10:47:36 GMT
Still in the E Mids, here's yet another non-split Nhants. (Apologies if anything along these lines has already been posted, I haven't checked the thread.) This is based fairly closely on the LibDems' plan and it even incorporates something akin to their much-derided Raunds-to-Towcester seat (although this version of it does not include Towcester). Corby, Kettering and Wellingborough are exactly as proposed by the LibDems, which means that as much as possible of the Corby seat is retained, Kettering is unaltered, and Wellingborough town is kept together, including its peripheral bits. Also like the LibDem scheme, it maintains recognizable No'ton N and S seats (the latter would be No'ton S & Towcester), and although in this scheme the No'ton seats omit two wards formerly in Northampton borough, I'd point out that those wards are currently not included in a No'ton seat so from their point of view it's no change - they remain in a seat that I'd be tempted to call S Nhants, although admittedly the rest of it is hugely changed from the current seat of that name. A significant drawback of this plan, which it shares with the LibDem version, is that there are two seats crossing the UA boundary whereas it is possible to have a non-split plan with only one.
That arrangement in Northampton perfectly makes the case for ward splitting Interesting that you should say that because it's actually based quite closely on the existing seats on Northampton. In fact arguably it is an improvement, because currently the eastern end of Northampton S is relatively isolated from the rest of the seat; adding in Abington actually helps consolidate the seat, and I think one of the political parties suggested this at the public hearing. And as for the two southern wards of the former Northampton borough - these are currently in the S Nhants seat, not in a Northampton seat at all, and this plan merely continues that arrangement. So while I agree the proposal isn't great in Northampton, and on the whole it's not my preferred plan, I don't see that it's as bad as all that, and I'm not sure (but am willing to be advised) how a ward split would help. The reason I posted this was essentially to support the LibDems by suggesting a variant of their plan that gets rid of the ward split and makes the Raunds-to-Towcester concoction slightly more manageable by excluding Towcester. And the LibDems merit support here because their objection to the BCE scheme is absolutely sound. The BCE has ignored its own guidance in the matter of ward splits as set out in para 32 of the guide to the review: first, by having too many (three, when alternatives with one or even zero are available); and second, by placing part of a split ward (Irchester) in a seat otherwise lying wholly in a different different local authority (and electors in the affected area are rightly up in arms over it). So the first and third bullets of para 32 have been breached: the LibDems are quite right to cry foul.
The thinking behind the BCE scheme, of course, is to try at all costs to preserve something akin to the existing seat pattern. This is obviously a legitimate aim, but not at the expense of jettisoning everything else. The LibDem scheme is a compromise, and not an unreasonable one: it maintains the current pattern quite closely in the east of the county and keeps two Northampton seats, but pays a big price in the form of Raunds/Towcester.
If it were left to me, I think I'd probably have decided that in the particular circumstances of Nhants maintaining anything resembling the current seat pattern (something I'm normally quite keen on) presents too many problems in terms of the other rules and the published guidance so it's probably better to go for a complete reset, thus:
The S Nhants seat is much more compact and manageable than the current sprawling and oversized version, and I'd point out that much of the area on the southern and western fringes of the former Northampton borough is already in the seat. This arrangement means a single Northampton seat rather than two. That seat is kept within range by the exclusion of three wards in the north east of the former borough, which I agree is unfortunate, but at least they are placed in a seat with associated places in the immediate hinterland of Northampton such as Moulton and Earls Barton. Having only one Northampton seat allows the creation of a new 'Mid Nhants' which is the only seat straddling the two UAs. Elsewhere, the Daventry seat is more or less the area west of Watling Street; Corby is much better nested in its seat rather than being at one end of it; Kettering has the converse experience; and although I embarked on this as a total reset, I ended up with Wellingborough completely unchanged after ward realignment.
Unfortunately (sigh) it's not being left to me.
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