Post by Robert Waller on Oct 19, 2023 14:29:10 GMT
When the boundaries of a constituency appear oddly shaped, there may be a suspicion of a gerrymander. After all, the very name of that electoral and democratic abuse is a concatenation of Gerry, after the Massachusetts governor first accused of the practice in 1812, and salamander, the legendary-amphibian shape of a US congressional district. There have been many examples since, and indeed the situation has been exacerbated by the creation of ‘majority-minority’ districts influenced by the Voting Rights Act. In the UK, unlike the USA to this day, boundaries are drawn by an impartial commission, so neither partisan advantage nor the concentration of ethnic voters are likely to have been the purpose. However, as in the USA - though not to quite the absurd extent - equality of representation due to electorate targets or quotas is a goal. It is this that has led to some of the peculiar shapes and pairings that have emerged from the ‘2023’ review, although few can be as weird as what has ended up as Alloa and Grangemouth – though even this is not quite as strange as its earlier incarnation in the provisional recommendations of 2022.
Alloa and Grangemouth is a new constituency, in that it contained the majority of no previous seat. However the largest element is derived from Ochil and South Perthshire, so it makes sense to start with that seat. Essentially the Perthshire section has been removed, mostly to Perth and Kinross-shire. Therefore it is the ‘Ochil’ section that is included in Alloa & Grangemouth. This part is balanced between urban and rural sections. Although the word Ochil conjures up a bucolic image of the range of hills rising to the height of 2,365 feet at Ben Cleuch, with burns cutting through the glens of Dollar, Silver and Alva, in fact it is here a synonym for the bulk of Clackmannanshire. The political tone is given by the industrial past of its rather gritty small towns: Alloa (the largest, with over 14,000 inhabitants), Alva, Tillicoultry, Sauchie and Clackmannan itself. To understand the electoral tradition here it should be remembered that Clackmannanshire is adjacent to west Fife, and shares a (now defunct) coalfield.
brianfraser47.wixsite.com/walks/post/clackmannan-and-coal-mines
Alloa also has woollen yarn spinning, weaving, glassmaking, the brewing of beer and the distilling of malt. Tullibody was a coal mining and tanning town. In Alva there was textile manufacture and there still is brewing in the shape of Harviestoun. Tillicoultry had a colliery and was a centre of quarrying of whinstone (technically quartz-dolerite). Yes, the Ochil hills can be seen from these communities, but they are very much part of the Central Scottish industrial belt and they shared its commitment to Labour, until the rise of Nationalism from the 1970s onwards.
Labour were reduced to a extremely poor showing of 8.6% in Ochil & South Perthshire in December 2019, a dismal year for them in most regions but certainly in Scotland, but a consideration of the most recent local election results suggests that they may have suffered from ‘unionist’ tactical voting. In the Clackmannanshire council election results of May 2022, Labour finished second to the SNP candidates if the first references are tallied in South (Alloa), West (Tullibody) and Central (Sauchie) wards, achieving nearly 35% in the last named. The Tories were second in North (Alva, Tillicoultry and the hills) and first in East (Clackmannan and Dollar). Overall across Clackmannanshire the SNP took 39.5%, Labour 23.8% and the Conservatives 23.2%.
Therefore if Ochil & South Perthshire were still to exist at the time of the next General Election, Labour might well advance somewhat but the Conservatives would have a decent chance of retaining second place even given their recent and continuing travails in UK wide government and hence opinion polls. But new lines and new constituencies are to be in place by that time. Alloa & Grangemouth will actually encompass less than the whole of Clackmannanshire, as most of its East ward with Dollar and the Muckharts is placed in a Dunfermline and Dollar division. But it will also include two other significant sections.
The seat has been drawn to wind sinuously south and east across the river Forth and the M9 motorway, barriers ancient and modern, to take in the lion’s share of three wards of Falkirk unitary authority. These will account for about 36,000 voters, and is itself divided into two distinct parts. The first covers the communities of Stenhousemuir, Larbert and Carron, forming its south western extremity. All this previously accounted for 27.5% of the electorate of the present Falkirk seat.
It is true that there is a precedent for pairing Clackmannan and the eastern part of Stirlingshire: there was a Westminster seat of that name between 1918 and 1983, which also included towns like Denny, as well as Larbert and Stenhouseuir, with Alloa et al. Indeed it was an early adopter of favour for the SNP, returning George Reid in both 1974 elections, when the Nationalists secured only seven and 11 MPs in February and October. The ‘Falkirk’ territory added is similarly composed of small largely working class industrial towns like those in Clackmannanshire, and shares the predominant pattern of contest, with the SNP ahead and Conservative and Labour vying for second. In May 2022 the Nationalists led in Carse, Kinnair & Tryst (centred on Stenhousemuir) with 40%, and in Bonnybridge & Larbert (34%) – the latter a split ward as Bonnybridge remains in Falkirk. Overall the 2022 totals are very similar to the 39-23-23 split in Clackmannanshire at the same time. Therefore this aspect of the new seat is not ridiculous. The stadium of Stenhousemuir FC is actually called Ochilview.
However at the Final Report stage another portion of Falkirk borough, to the south east, was added, though it had previously been in the Westminster constituency of Linlithgow & East Falkirk. This is Grangemouth, known originally as a port on the Forth and Clyde canal with access to the Firth of Forth, and since 1924 for its oil refinery, which grew post-war and through the discovery and exploitation of North Sea resources to become a giant landmark and a major employer; since 2014 it has been the only working oil refinery in Scotland and is one of the six largest in the UK. Grangemouth town has a population of over 16,000. It has slightly higher proportions on employment support and disability living allowances than average for Falkirk, and at 22%, nearly twice the average employed in manufacturing. Politically, it has been stronger in recent elections for the SNP than the norm of the rest of the seat, and weaker for the Tories; in May 2022 the Nationalists received a 45% share in Grangemouth ward, compared with 23% for Labour, 15% for the Conservatives and 15% for a local Independent, who took one of the four Falkirk council seats available to the SNP’s two and Labour’s one.
The really striking thing about the Falkirk sections being placed in Alloa & Grangemouth, though, can be seen from the constituency map.
www.bcomm-scotland.independent.gov.uk/sites/default/files/Alloa_and_Grangemouth.pdf
They are cut off from the rest of the seat by the breadth of the Forth, and there is no direct route to Clackmannan, for example Alloa. By road one would have to leave the southern part of the constituency to get to the north.
It could, though, be said that this iteration is not as bizarre as the previous one in the provisional recommendations, which included more of Falkirk district such as the towns of Denny and Dunipace, and also a northern extension to take in most of Strathallan ward, this stretching all the way to Gleneagles and Auchterarder. The inclusion of Grangemouth at the report stage has allowed the former (Denny-Dunipace) to remain in Falkirk constituency and the latter to become part of a redrawn Stirling & Strathallan. Those two seats both have reasonably regular shapes. However Alloa & Grangemouth looks very much like an assembly of disparate elements to enable other seats to fit both geography and the electoral quota comfortably.
In the new Alloa & Grangemouth opposition to the SNP looks as if it will be more divided, and thus less effective. Even in their current parlous state, this may mean that the Nationalists can lose a goodly share of their 2019 vote and still hold on as a minority. They, at least, may well be happy with its lines.
2011 Census, Ochil and South Perthshire
Age 65+ 18.1% 226/650
Owner-occupied 67.1% 320/650
Private rented 10.2% 568/650
Social rented 20.8% 193/650
White 98.5% 49/650
Black 0.2% 526/650
Asian 0.9% 539/650
Managerial & professional 31.3%
Routine & Semi-routine 28.1%
Degree level 27.7% 252/650
No qualifications 24.6% 268/650
Students 6.5% 382/650
2022 Census, Alloa and Grangemouth
Age 65+ 19.7%
Other details not yet available
Boundary Changes
Alloa & Grangemouth consists of
45.1% of Ochil & South Perthshire
27.5% of Falkirk
14.1% of Linlithgow and East Falkirk
Map
www.bcomm-scotland.independent.gov.uk/sites/default/files/Alloa_and_Grangemouth.pdf
2019 Notional Results on New Boundaries (Professor David Denver for Rallings and Thrasher)
Alloa and Grangemouth is a new constituency, in that it contained the majority of no previous seat. However the largest element is derived from Ochil and South Perthshire, so it makes sense to start with that seat. Essentially the Perthshire section has been removed, mostly to Perth and Kinross-shire. Therefore it is the ‘Ochil’ section that is included in Alloa & Grangemouth. This part is balanced between urban and rural sections. Although the word Ochil conjures up a bucolic image of the range of hills rising to the height of 2,365 feet at Ben Cleuch, with burns cutting through the glens of Dollar, Silver and Alva, in fact it is here a synonym for the bulk of Clackmannanshire. The political tone is given by the industrial past of its rather gritty small towns: Alloa (the largest, with over 14,000 inhabitants), Alva, Tillicoultry, Sauchie and Clackmannan itself. To understand the electoral tradition here it should be remembered that Clackmannanshire is adjacent to west Fife, and shares a (now defunct) coalfield.
brianfraser47.wixsite.com/walks/post/clackmannan-and-coal-mines
Alloa also has woollen yarn spinning, weaving, glassmaking, the brewing of beer and the distilling of malt. Tullibody was a coal mining and tanning town. In Alva there was textile manufacture and there still is brewing in the shape of Harviestoun. Tillicoultry had a colliery and was a centre of quarrying of whinstone (technically quartz-dolerite). Yes, the Ochil hills can be seen from these communities, but they are very much part of the Central Scottish industrial belt and they shared its commitment to Labour, until the rise of Nationalism from the 1970s onwards.
Labour were reduced to a extremely poor showing of 8.6% in Ochil & South Perthshire in December 2019, a dismal year for them in most regions but certainly in Scotland, but a consideration of the most recent local election results suggests that they may have suffered from ‘unionist’ tactical voting. In the Clackmannanshire council election results of May 2022, Labour finished second to the SNP candidates if the first references are tallied in South (Alloa), West (Tullibody) and Central (Sauchie) wards, achieving nearly 35% in the last named. The Tories were second in North (Alva, Tillicoultry and the hills) and first in East (Clackmannan and Dollar). Overall across Clackmannanshire the SNP took 39.5%, Labour 23.8% and the Conservatives 23.2%.
Therefore if Ochil & South Perthshire were still to exist at the time of the next General Election, Labour might well advance somewhat but the Conservatives would have a decent chance of retaining second place even given their recent and continuing travails in UK wide government and hence opinion polls. But new lines and new constituencies are to be in place by that time. Alloa & Grangemouth will actually encompass less than the whole of Clackmannanshire, as most of its East ward with Dollar and the Muckharts is placed in a Dunfermline and Dollar division. But it will also include two other significant sections.
The seat has been drawn to wind sinuously south and east across the river Forth and the M9 motorway, barriers ancient and modern, to take in the lion’s share of three wards of Falkirk unitary authority. These will account for about 36,000 voters, and is itself divided into two distinct parts. The first covers the communities of Stenhousemuir, Larbert and Carron, forming its south western extremity. All this previously accounted for 27.5% of the electorate of the present Falkirk seat.
It is true that there is a precedent for pairing Clackmannan and the eastern part of Stirlingshire: there was a Westminster seat of that name between 1918 and 1983, which also included towns like Denny, as well as Larbert and Stenhouseuir, with Alloa et al. Indeed it was an early adopter of favour for the SNP, returning George Reid in both 1974 elections, when the Nationalists secured only seven and 11 MPs in February and October. The ‘Falkirk’ territory added is similarly composed of small largely working class industrial towns like those in Clackmannanshire, and shares the predominant pattern of contest, with the SNP ahead and Conservative and Labour vying for second. In May 2022 the Nationalists led in Carse, Kinnair & Tryst (centred on Stenhousemuir) with 40%, and in Bonnybridge & Larbert (34%) – the latter a split ward as Bonnybridge remains in Falkirk. Overall the 2022 totals are very similar to the 39-23-23 split in Clackmannanshire at the same time. Therefore this aspect of the new seat is not ridiculous. The stadium of Stenhousemuir FC is actually called Ochilview.
However at the Final Report stage another portion of Falkirk borough, to the south east, was added, though it had previously been in the Westminster constituency of Linlithgow & East Falkirk. This is Grangemouth, known originally as a port on the Forth and Clyde canal with access to the Firth of Forth, and since 1924 for its oil refinery, which grew post-war and through the discovery and exploitation of North Sea resources to become a giant landmark and a major employer; since 2014 it has been the only working oil refinery in Scotland and is one of the six largest in the UK. Grangemouth town has a population of over 16,000. It has slightly higher proportions on employment support and disability living allowances than average for Falkirk, and at 22%, nearly twice the average employed in manufacturing. Politically, it has been stronger in recent elections for the SNP than the norm of the rest of the seat, and weaker for the Tories; in May 2022 the Nationalists received a 45% share in Grangemouth ward, compared with 23% for Labour, 15% for the Conservatives and 15% for a local Independent, who took one of the four Falkirk council seats available to the SNP’s two and Labour’s one.
The really striking thing about the Falkirk sections being placed in Alloa & Grangemouth, though, can be seen from the constituency map.
www.bcomm-scotland.independent.gov.uk/sites/default/files/Alloa_and_Grangemouth.pdf
They are cut off from the rest of the seat by the breadth of the Forth, and there is no direct route to Clackmannan, for example Alloa. By road one would have to leave the southern part of the constituency to get to the north.
It could, though, be said that this iteration is not as bizarre as the previous one in the provisional recommendations, which included more of Falkirk district such as the towns of Denny and Dunipace, and also a northern extension to take in most of Strathallan ward, this stretching all the way to Gleneagles and Auchterarder. The inclusion of Grangemouth at the report stage has allowed the former (Denny-Dunipace) to remain in Falkirk constituency and the latter to become part of a redrawn Stirling & Strathallan. Those two seats both have reasonably regular shapes. However Alloa & Grangemouth looks very much like an assembly of disparate elements to enable other seats to fit both geography and the electoral quota comfortably.
In the new Alloa & Grangemouth opposition to the SNP looks as if it will be more divided, and thus less effective. Even in their current parlous state, this may mean that the Nationalists can lose a goodly share of their 2019 vote and still hold on as a minority. They, at least, may well be happy with its lines.
2011 Census, Ochil and South Perthshire
Age 65+ 18.1% 226/650
Owner-occupied 67.1% 320/650
Private rented 10.2% 568/650
Social rented 20.8% 193/650
White 98.5% 49/650
Black 0.2% 526/650
Asian 0.9% 539/650
Managerial & professional 31.3%
Routine & Semi-routine 28.1%
Degree level 27.7% 252/650
No qualifications 24.6% 268/650
Students 6.5% 382/650
2022 Census, Alloa and Grangemouth
Age 65+ 19.7%
Other details not yet available
Boundary Changes
Alloa & Grangemouth consists of
45.1% of Ochil & South Perthshire
27.5% of Falkirk
14.1% of Linlithgow and East Falkirk
Map
www.bcomm-scotland.independent.gov.uk/sites/default/files/Alloa_and_Grangemouth.pdf
2019 Notional Results on New Boundaries (Professor David Denver for Rallings and Thrasher)
| SNP | 24050 | 52.7% |
| Con | 11323 | 24.8% |
| Lab | 6626 | 14.5% |
| LD | 2426 | 5.3% |
| Green | 678 | 1.5% |
| Brexit | 177 | 0.4% |
| Oth | 382 | 0.8% |
| Majority | 12727 | 27.9% |
