2023 Review - The final verdict

[islington]

Now the chips are down, the dust has settled, or whatever other finality-related cliche tickles your fancy - what do you think?

[jakegb]

Any attempt to create more even constituencies (in terms of number of electors) is to be applauded: it is good for democracy.
Yes there are some some challenges in specific areas (e.g. cross county seats), but overall, the changes can be regarded as a very good thing.

[East Anglian Lefty]

The best attempt yet on the current rules, which is not the same thing as good.

[islington]

Despite asking the question, I haven't voted yet.

Overall, as I familiarize myself with the new electoral map I find that it's steadily growing on me, notwithstanding some significant blemishes here and there. So I'm hesitating between 'Very good' and 'Reasonable'.

I definitely agree it's better than either of the zombies.

[johnloony]

It is inevitable that there will be some bits less than ideal, when the requirement is to have approximately equal electorates under FPTP.
It is inevitable that there will be some bits less than ideal, when the margin of variation is only +/-5%.

[ricmk]

Good with some dodgy features.

Better than the previous 2 attempts by some margin. Inevitably it's struggled more in areas with larger wards, but there's been a more pragmatic choice about ward splits this time, even if some of the actual splits aren't ideal.

I think the previous 2 reviews have softened up some local opposition to measures driven by the numbers, as the moves have been talked about for so long - and removing national pitchfork issues such as a Devonwall seat has smoothed things along.

The less said about the name changes at the final stage the better (apart from the one we successfully argued for, of course.)

[John Chanin]

I generally think they have done a decent job, subject to two caveats. Firstly the avoidance of change has been elevated too far, at the expense of boundaries that pay more attention to communities. Secondly I am really pissed off at the mess they have made of Birmingham and Solihull. London on the other hand, they have done a decent job in difficult circumstances.

[sirbenjamin]

Too many LA boundary crossings, too many ward splits, too many knock-on effects, and a failure to permit the occasional exclave where it would be the least bad option.

[andrewp]

I voted reasonable/ acceptable but the avoidance of change principle is a problem. I’d like a review where they don’t treat that principle as so significant.

[islington]

Aug 7, 2023 12:05:23 GMT ricmk said:

Good with some dodgy features.

Better than the previous 2 attempts by some margin. Inevitably it's struggled more in areas with larger wards, but there's been a more pragmatic choice about ward splits this time, even if some of the actual splits aren't ideal.

I think the previous 2 reviews have softened up some local opposition to measures driven by the numbers, as the moves have been talked about for so long - and removing national pitchfork issues such as a Devonwall seat has smoothed things along.

The less said about the name changes at the final stage the better (apart from the one we successfully argued for, of course.)

I agree with this but I'd add that another factor is that the BCE has got better with practice.

When the 2011 Act was going through Parliament the Commission was very clear about its unhappiness with the strict 5% tolerance and frankly, this showed in the Commission's performance at the first zombie. I'm not suggesting that the BCE intentionally sought to discredit the process - they are far too professional for that - but their proposals in the first zombie certainly gave the impression of being drawn up by people that thought it was impossible to achieve a satisfactory outcome under these rules. But over time, the BCE seems to have realized that even under rules that are severely restrictive in terms of numbers, with a bit of time and ingenuity it is usually possible to come up with maps that have reasonable regard to other factors such as LA boundaries, community ties and compactness.

The same may be also true of the commissions elsewhere in the UK but I can't say because I don't follow their work so closely.

[YL]

I voted "Reasonable / acceptable on the whole". I don't think the Commissions have done too bad a job given the rules they were given to work with, and indeed I'm not sure that the outcome is that much worse in terms of divided communities or incoherent constituencies than previous reviews. That isn't to say that everywhere has good boundaries: the urban West Midlands seems poor as already mentioned, especially the Solihull area, and "Montgomeryshire & Glyndŵr" is a real monstrosity and has a stupid name to boot.

I agree that the minimal change criterion should be weakened, at least to give some standing to attempts to fix divided communities and incoherent constituencies from previous reviews. It's rather annoying that the rules will now suggest that the next review should preserve Tiverton & Minehead if it reasonably can.

Personally I would also prefer to weaken the 5% rule so that slightly adjusted English ceremonial counties (with the obvious exceptions of the City of London, Rutland and using the Mersey as a border rather than the Merseyside/Cheshire one) can be used as review areas again. I don't think the cross county constituencies have done much for the quality of the map.

[Khunanup]

Aug 7, 2023 16:23:08 GMT YL said:

I voted "Reasonable / acceptable on the whole". I don't think the Commissions have done too bad a job given the rules they were given to work with, and indeed I'm not sure that the outcome is that much worse in terms of divided communities or incoherent constituencies than previous reviews. That isn't to say that everywhere has good boundaries: the urban West Midlands seems poor as already mentioned, especially the Solihull area, and "Montgomeryshire & Glyndŵr" is a real monstrosity and has a stupid name to boot.

I agree that the minimal change criterion should be weakened, at least to give some standing to attempts to fix divided communities and incoherent constituencies from previous reviews. It's rather annoying that the rules will now suggest that the next review should preserve Tiverton & Minehead if it reasonably can.

Personally I would also prefer to weaken the 5% rule so that slightly adjusted English ceremonial counties (with the obvious exceptions of the City of London, Rutland and using the Mersey as a border rather than the Merseyside/Cheshire one) can be used as review areas again. I don't think the cross county constituencies have done much for the quality of the map.

Mostly agree with this, but I think a complete blank slate approach (including split wards on demand, no regard to local authority boundaries and obviously not English regions, which don't exist at all now anyway) is a far better way to go. Far too little regard is given to specific geographical oddities which this time round did not really raise its head but will likely become more of an issue at future reviews. As for the 5% issue, with a blank slate you can make that work to a significant extent better than has even been possible despite the growing propensity to split wards etc. especially if you put at the heart of it a desire to prioritise community ties (which are not necessarily the same as local authority ties) as opposed to any other consideration.

Ultimately all of our internal political boundaries are artificial constructs, boundary commissions should have that impressed on them when considering how their decisions can best instead facilitate elected representation for communities that are more natural and reflect people's day to day experiences.

[bjornhattan]

Aug 7, 2023 17:06:34 GMT Khunanup said:

Aug 7, 2023 16:23:08 GMT YL said:

I voted "Reasonable / acceptable on the whole". I don't think the Commissions have done too bad a job given the rules they were given to work with, and indeed I'm not sure that the outcome is that much worse in terms of divided communities or incoherent constituencies than previous reviews. That isn't to say that everywhere has good boundaries: the urban West Midlands seems poor as already mentioned, especially the Solihull area, and "Montgomeryshire & Glyndŵr" is a real monstrosity and has a stupid name to boot.

I agree that the minimal change criterion should be weakened, at least to give some standing to attempts to fix divided communities and incoherent constituencies from previous reviews. It's rather annoying that the rules will now suggest that the next review should preserve Tiverton & Minehead if it reasonably can.

Personally I would also prefer to weaken the 5% rule so that slightly adjusted English ceremonial counties (with the obvious exceptions of the City of London, Rutland and using the Mersey as a border rather than the Merseyside/Cheshire one) can be used as review areas again. I don't think the cross county constituencies have done much for the quality of the map.

Mostly agree with this, but I think a complete blank slate approach (including split wards on demand, no regard to local authority boundaries and obviously not English regions, which don't exist at all now anyway) is a far better way to go. Far too little regard is given to specific geographical oddities which this time round did not really raise its head but will likely become more of an issue at future reviews. As for the 5% issue, with a blank slate you can make that work to a significant extent better than has even been possible despite the growing propensity to split wards etc. especially if you put at the heart of it a desire to prioritise community ties (which are not necessarily the same as local authority ties) as opposed to any other consideration.

Ultimately all of our internal political boundaries are artificial constructs, boundary commissions should have that impressed on them when considering how their decisions can best instead facilitate elected representation for communities that are more natural and reflect people's day to day experiences.

Out of curiosity, where do you draw the line - would you accept a seat crossing the Solent, or one that included Chepstow in an English seat (or Sedbury in a Welsh one)? Would you seek to avoid crossing county boundaries?

[Khunanup]

Aug 7, 2023 17:42:34 GMT bjornhattan said:

Aug 7, 2023 17:06:34 GMT Khunanup said:

Mostly agree with this, but I think a complete blank slate approach (including split wards on demand, no regard to local authority boundaries and obviously not English regions, which don't exist at all now anyway) is a far better way to go. Far too little regard is given to specific geographical oddities which this time round did not really raise its head but will likely become more of an issue at future reviews. As for the 5% issue, with a blank slate you can make that work to a significant extent better than has even been possible despite the growing propensity to split wards etc. especially if you put at the heart of it a desire to prioritise community ties (which are not necessarily the same as local authority ties) as opposed to any other consideration.

Ultimately all of our internal political boundaries are artificial constructs, boundary commissions should have that impressed on them when considering how their decisions can best instead facilitate elected representation for communities that are more natural and reflect people's day to day experiences.

Out of curiosity, where do you draw the line - would you accept a seat crossing the Solent, or one that included Chepstow in an English seat (or Sedbury in a Welsh one)? Would you seek to avoid crossing county boundaries?

I specifically said English regions, mentioned that difficult geography is not given enough basic consideration (tangentially that fits in with real community links and identity) and counties are generally local authority boundaries so yes, should completely be crossed when real community ties are served by doing so.

[greenhert]

I accept that the 5% quota, enshrined in law, hamstrung the 4 Boundary Commissions throughout the review, but even then they could have done much better.

Many counties could have seen much less change than what has transpired e.g. Hampshire even if it was not possible for practical purposes to avoid a cross-county constituency with Surrey and whatever change needed to happen there could have been more sensible.

In Scotland, splitting Moray could have easily been avoided, inter alia.

In Wales, they did the best they could generally with the exception of placing too many non-Cardiff wards in Cardiff constituencies.

The BCE could have done far better regarding Greater Manchester and Merseyside. The 3 Sefton constituencies could and should have been left alone. The Manchester Central constituency did not need to extend to Failsworth which is not even in the City of Manchester, the fact it was part of the defunct Manchester Openshaw (which the redrawn Central seat resembles considerably) constituency notwithstanding and the City of Manchester's northern constituencies could have been drawn much better. That said, a map acceptable to enough people was difficult to draw.

The South West was their lowest point. Their inability to let go of Avon, which has not existed as a county since 1996 anyway as has been pointed out on this forum at least 20 times this year alone, caused unnecessary disruption to constituencies everywhere in the South West except in Dorset and Cornwall. The naming of many constituencies (e.g. North and South Cotswolds) was also inexcusable; even Mid Gloucestershire and Cirencester & Malmesbury (again, neither of which needed to be created) would have been better. Splitting Thornbury & Yate would have been a fair sacrifice, since at least one of it and/or Kingswood and/or Filton & Bradley Stoke had to go, no two ways about it, and it would have also allowed for better redrawing of the Somerset constituencies.

[YL]

Aug 7, 2023 17:58:21 GMT Khunanup said:

Aug 7, 2023 17:42:34 GMT bjornhattan said:

Out of curiosity, where do you draw the line - would you accept a seat crossing the Solent, or one that included Chepstow in an English seat (or Sedbury in a Welsh one)? Would you seek to avoid crossing county boundaries?

I specifically said English regions, mentioned that difficult geography is not given enough basic consideration (tangentially that fits in with real community links and identity) and counties are generally local authority boundaries so yes, should completely be crossed when real community ties are served by doing so.

And how do you think that boundary commissioners (a group of civil servants, from what we're told not terribly interested in the job, disproportionately based in one part of the country) are going to work out what these "real community ties" are, especially when you've made it harder to organise a workable consultation by treating the whole of England as a single unit and so allowing for knock-on effects all over the place?

I see how you might think that your suggestion would produce better boundaries in theory but I think it would be a potential disaster in practice.

[Khunanup]

Aug 7, 2023 18:19:41 GMT YL said:

Aug 7, 2023 17:58:21 GMT Khunanup said:

I specifically said English regions, mentioned that difficult geography is not given enough basic consideration (tangentially that fits in with real community links and identity) and counties are generally local authority boundaries so yes, should completely be crossed when real community ties are served by doing so.

And how do you think that boundary commissioners (a group of civil servants, from what we're told not terribly interested in the job, disproportionately based in one part of the country) are going to work out what these "real community ties" are, especially when you've made it harder to organise a workable consultation by treating the whole of England as a single unit and so allowing for knock-on effects all over the place?

I see how you might think that your suggestion would produce better boundaries in theory but I think it would be a potential disaster in practice.

That the protocol is that you have a framework for initial proposals and then you effectively have no opinion with the decisions taken later on being based on a professional consideration of the arguments made.

It's not exactly hard, and it's how you are mandated to make delegated decisions as civil servants (as well I know).

And I would make the time period involved for a review be longer, with initial proposals being effectively via algorithm (and being literally a marker for how the pattern would look and be out very quickly) with the workers doing on the ground work including community engagement so they can evaluate directly the competing responses.

They should of course also second some ordnance survey staff who can advise them about geographical considerations.

It's not hard, it just requires forethought.

So it won't happen...

[Foggy]

I confess I have paid too little attention to Scotland, Northern Ireland and the 3 English regions where I didn't make any submissions at this Review, so some of the names and boundaries are going to come as a surprise to me in those areas on GE night itself. And you could say that puts me in a poor position to make a judgement.

But I do think this was a good time to make such a poll, around five weeks after the final proposals were published and we've all had time to calm down. If I think of where I've lived since the last completed Review, all the actual seats those places have ended up in are tightly drawn and have nice and succinct names.

It's only the failure to mitigate some of the potential worst knock-on effects in the rest of southern England and the rest of Wales that bother me: yes to the new Bangor Aberconwy, Bath, Bridgwater, Eastbourne and Weston-super-Mare but wasn't there a way to keep those and not end up with Tiverton & Minehead, Somerset NE & Hanham, Brecon Radnor & Cwm Tawe or Farnham & Bordon??

Overall it looks like a better effort than the previous two abandoned Reviews, and something needed to be forced through by this point anyhow. I can't bring myself to vote higher than 'neither good nor bad' though.

[carlton43]

I know that my preferred criteria for good constituencies do not match those of the majority, but that does not make them invalid or even wrong, so I set them out here.

My fundamental preference is for as near to numerical conformity as is possible. That is the one pivotal item. That the size of the electorate be nearly the same in every seat. I am prepared to endure all any any distortions to achieve that goal. For me the 'equal value' of every voter's vote is the near sole objective. Thus I would group most Scottish islands into the one seat 'Scottish Islands' and do away with Western Isles and Orkney & Shetland. And I would treat IOW and Anglesey as parts of the mainlaind to achieve better figures as found to be necessary.

I don't think there should be any cross-border seats between England and either Wales or Scotland, or London and England. I have no objection to moving across county boundaries or to ward splitting or town splitting or community splitting at all. If it gets us close to the goal of seats with equal electorates. The areas of rapid expansion or continual contraction should be considered carefully with an attempt to get the estimated median electorate size correct for the life of that consituency on those borders. There will be errors and we live with those few errors and do better at the next review.

Naming should be as close to historical continuation as possible. With a marked preference to the one single place name. The relative size and supposed importance of communaties should play no part at all in considerations with an absolute preference for continuity, history and simplicity. I am happy to have a sole name of historic integrity even though that place is smaller than four other communities in the constituency. Continuity and universal recognition throughout the realm are far more important that the petty susceptabilities of a few vociferous locals who should be totally ignored.

On balance this effort seems reasonable to good except for the issue of naming where a significant minority are entirely woeful. I have a preference for place names over county names with compass points. I prefer names in cities to compass points.

[East Anglian Lefty]

Aug 7, 2023 16:23:08 GMT YL said:

I voted "Reasonable / acceptable on the whole". I don't think the Commissions have done too bad a job given the rules they were given to work with, and indeed I'm not sure that the outcome is that much worse in terms of divided communities or incoherent constituencies than previous reviews. That isn't to say that everywhere has good boundaries: the urban West Midlands seems poor as already mentioned, especially the Solihull area, and "Montgomeryshire & Glyndŵr" is a real monstrosity and has a stupid name to boot.

I agree that the minimal change criterion should be weakened, at least to give some standing to attempts to fix divided communities and incoherent constituencies from previous reviews. It's rather annoying that the rules will now suggest that the next review should preserve Tiverton & Minehead if it reasonably can.

Personally I would also prefer to weaken the 5% rule so that slightly adjusted English ceremonial counties (with the obvious exceptions of the City of London, Rutland and using the Mersey as a border rather than the Merseyside/Cheshire one) can be used as review areas again. I don't think the cross county constituencies have done much for the quality of the map.

My personal view is that the 5% rule should be modified, so all seats within a county should be within 5% of the average, and just assign each county/review area a whole number of seats. I think it's a big issue that eg the two current Northampton seats have about 30,000 electors fewer than the neighbouring South Northants seat, but it's not a great problem if the average seat in one county has a few thousand electors more than the average seat in another county, especially if it gets rid of cross-county seats that are almost never going to be anything more than the least worst option.