Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Feb 13, 2017 18:15:28 GMT
Where are you hosting the pictures? Either IKEA's wi-fi is blocking them or the upload has borked I typically use Imgur. I've opened up a private browsing window to check and I can still see them there, so it's probably at your end. At one point I did actually have a Photobucket account, but the login details I had for that place are now lost to the mists of time. I can see them now, so IKEA was indeed blocking imgur!
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piperdave
SNP
Dalkeith; Midlothian/North & Musselburgh
Posts: 909
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Post by piperdave on Feb 13, 2017 20:48:44 GMT
I can't make my fantasy constituency with Boundary Assistant. It won't let me cross European constituency boundaries. Crossborder Berwick? How did you guess? The issue is going to be how far does the border cross? I have three options: - To the banks of the Tweed
- the Berwick urban area, probably inclusive of Scremerston
- the wider Berwick-focussed area, potentially the Norham & Islandshires ward
I also lived in Yorkshire for a few years and wouldn't mind a shot at reuniting those areas 'lost' to Lancashire/Greater Manchester.
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Post by Pete Whitehead on Feb 13, 2017 21:35:12 GMT
How did you guess? The issue is going to be how far does the border cross? I have three options: - To the banks of the Tweed
- the Berwick urban area, probably inclusive of Scremerston
- the wider Berwick-focussed area, potentially the Norham & Islandshires ward
I also lived in Yorkshire for a few years and wouldn't mind a shot at reuniting those areas 'lost' to Lancashire/Greater Manchester. That's easily done. This sort of thing you mean? Colne Valley 77,183
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Feb 13, 2017 22:09:41 GMT
How did you guess? The issue is going to be how far does the border cross? In this case, that's a deliberate limitation of Boundary Assistant as it is only following the law. You can't have a seat that's partly in England and partly in Scotland, according to the relevant statutes. In the case of reuniting historic Yorkshire, I have more sympathy as that is not expressly forbidden, but rather a guideline that the BCE chooses to follow. Luckily Pete appears to have found a way around it anyhow.
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Feb 13, 2017 23:48:29 GMT
Well, to some extent this is born of frustration at a system that gives the electorate very little opportunity to reject a government that has failed. It's a thought experiment to some extent. There's certainly a case for IRV/AV rather than FPTP in Northern Ireland, as the informal round of picking which Unionist goes on the ballot paper would be more accountably be done formally via the secret ballot than via backroom deals. Whilst it is true that FPTP allows voters to 'throw the bums out', its effects can often be needlessly crude in giving the incoming party a dangerous supermajority and/or reducing the opposition to a tiny rump. The latter is unlikely on the scale of a 650-member chamber, but in smaller jurisdictions it can have that effect. I recall reading about a Canadian provincial election from decades ago after which it was remarked that the electorate had wanted to give the government a slap on the wrist, but ended up amputating both its arms! AV could be a good fit for NI, but it was rejected by the people there in 2011. We can also look to elsewhere in the Commonwealth to see a more recent example of how AV does not always preclude lop-sided swings in seat numbers either. I think you're underestimating or deliberately understating just how frequently under-nomination takes place for tactical reasons in multi-member wards on English and Welsh councils. I don't really like either of those systems, but I suppose open lists are less susceptible to manipulation as you say. Now why have you brought a Welsh city into all this?!
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Feb 14, 2017 1:01:50 GMT
Well, to some extent this is born of frustration at a system that gives the electorate very little opportunity to reject a government that has failed. It's a thought experiment to some extent. There's certainly a case for IRV/AV rather than FPTP in Northern Ireland, as the informal round of picking which Unionist goes on the ballot paper would be more accountably be done formally via the secret ballot than via backroom deals. Whilst it is true that FPTP allows voters to 'throw the bums out', its effects can often be needlessly crude in giving the incoming party a dangerous supermajority and/or reducing the opposition to a tiny rump. The latter is unlikely on the scale of a 650-member chamber, but in smaller jurisdictions it can have that effect. I recall reading about a Canadian provincial election from decades ago after which it was remarked that the electorate had wanted to give the government a slap on the wrist, but ended up amputating both its arms! AV could be a good fit for NI, but it was rejected by the people there in 2011. We can also look to elsewhere in the Commonwealth to see a more recent example of how AV does not always preclude lop-sided swings in seat numbers either. I think you're underestimating or deliberately understating just how frequently under-nomination takes place for tactical reasons in multi-member wards on English and Welsh councils. I don't really like either of those systems, but I suppose open lists are less susceptible to manipulation as you say. Now why have you brought a Welsh city into all this?! 1. At a population of ~18,000, Bangor (Gwynedd) is not a city (and no, I don't care about whether or not it has a bloody cathederal!) 2. There're actually two Bangors in Wales, the other being Bangor-on-Dee, located to the south east of Wrexham
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Feb 14, 2017 1:09:20 GMT
1. At a population of ~18,000, Bangor (Gwynedd) is not a city (and no, I don't care about whether or not it has a bloody cathederal!) 2. There're actually two Bangors in Wales, the other being Bangor-on-Dee, located to the south east of Wrexham 1. Yeah, I know you wouldn't get those sorts of electorate figures for the Welsh city (and yes, it jolly well is a city even if most visitors mistake the Main Arts Building of the uni for a cathedral). 2. Yes, I know. I've never been there, but it sometimes comes up in traffic and horse racing reports on the radio. I might get to visit yet another Bangor next month!
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Feb 14, 2017 1:14:53 GMT
1. At a population of ~18,000, Bangor (Gwynedd) is not a city (and no, I don't care about whether or not it has a bloody cathederal!) 2. There're actually two Bangors in Wales, the other being Bangor-on-Dee, located to the south east of Wrexham 1. Yeah, I know you wouldn't get those sorts of electorate figures for the Welsh city (and yes, it jolly well is a city even if most visitors mistake the Main Arts Building of the uni for a cathedral). 2. Yes, I know. I've never been there, but it sometimes comes up in traffic and horse racing reports on the radio. I might get to visit yet another Bangor next month! I suppose you think the small town of St. Asaph (pop. ~3,300, and also with a cathedral) is also a city then? For me a city is always a settlement with population of 100,000+. There really needs to be a more consistent standard for these things...
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Feb 14, 2017 1:20:42 GMT
1. Yeah, I know you wouldn't get those sorts of electorate figures for the Welsh city (and yes, it jolly well is a city even if most visitors mistake the Main Arts Building of the uni for a cathedral). 2. Yes, I know. I've never been there, but it sometimes comes up in traffic and horse racing reports on the radio. I might get to visit yet another Bangor next month! I suppose you think the small town of St. Asaph (pop. ~3,300, and also with a cathedral) is also a city then? For me a city is always a settlement with population of 100,000+. There really needs to be a more consistent standard for these things... Yes, I do. I do not accept that I graduated from a poxy university town. I also spent my semesters abroad in cities with populations of 90,000-95,000 inhabitants (which is about the perfect size before a settlement becomes too unwieldy and overwhelming, in my opinion). Should we force the governments of Belgium, Austria and Spain to remove their city status too? Possession of a Royal Charter declaring a place a city is a consistent enough standard for my liking. Whether such charters should be awarded on the basis of population size is another matter, however.
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Feb 14, 2017 1:39:59 GMT
I suppose you think the small town of St. Asaph (pop. ~3,300, and also with a cathedral) is also a city then? For me a city is always a settlement with population of 100,000+. There really needs to be a more consistent standard for these things... Yes, I do. I do not accept that I graduated from a poxy university town. I also spent my semesters abroad in cities with populations of 90,000-95,000 inhabitants (which is about the perfect size before a settlement becomes too unwieldy and overwhelming, in my opinion). Should we force the governments of Belgium, Austria and Spain to remove their city status too? Possession of a Royal Charter declaring a place a city is a consistent enough standard for my liking. Whether such charters should be awarded on the basis of population size is another matter, however. I'll leave it up to the individual as to whether or not a given settlement is "poxy" in anyway, but what's wrong with a place being a "university town"? I gave the figure of 100,000 merely as a guideline, and whilst I could accept a settlement of population 90,000-95,000 being called a city, at the same time a line has to be drawn somewhere (though not necessarily at 100,000). As for "city status", I've always been more inclined to view the term "city" more as a technical description (i.e. a settlement meeting a certain size criteria), rather than a ceremonial one (e.g. a writ bestowed upon a location for any (and possibly arbitrary) reason). Example criteria: (devised on the fly, consider this nothing more than a draft proposal only) 1 <= 100 people - Hamlet (with certain structural requirements, perhaps) 100 <= 3000 : Village 3000 <= 10,000 : Small Town 10,000 <= 45,000 : Medium Town 45,000 <= 90,000 : Large Town 90,000+ : City
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nitory
Conservative
Posts: 931
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Post by nitory on Feb 14, 2017 3:46:36 GMT
LISBURN AND CASTLEREAGH Dundonald 13,992 Newtownbreda 14,063 Mid Down 14,109 Hillsborough 11,830 Ballinderry 13,388 Lisburn North 14,434 Lisburn South 14,576 Once more we have seven constituencies and seven DEAs. Five are in quota, and moving a single ward (Carryduff West) – admittedly slightly brutally – sorts out the other two. Personally, I wouldn't bother adhering to the new councils boundaries when drawing constituencies, most are a hotchpotch of the old councils combined to satisfy an arbitrary number, along with some bipartisan gerrymandering and just plain oddness (If Dundonald isn't going to be in a Greater Belfast council area it should go with Ards, not Lisburn, though I believe that was done with the intention of continuing the DUP Castlereagh fiefdom...). Belfast for example was expanded just enough so the rest of west Belfast put into the council was neutralised with DUP/Alliance areas in Castlereagh, along with no expansion in the north of the city, keeping the council in NOC between unionists and nationalists. There's also the 'hilarious' way the Galwally ward is drawn, every other ward around it uses the A25 as a dividing line, yet Galwally hops over it, to keep Forrestside shopping centre (and their lucrative rates) in the Lisburn and Castlereagh Council. Great work though, I had the idea to start something similar before, but soon quit out of frustration with the Falls' constituencies having to cross the M1 or go into the Shankill! Taking in Musgrove is the best solution around that.
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Feb 14, 2017 4:52:45 GMT
I'll leave it up to the individual as to whether or not a given settlement is "poxy" in anyway, but what's wrong with a place being a "university town"? The university tends to dominate the town rather than just be one of many things it has to offer. The latter, of course, is totally the case in Bangor.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Feb 14, 2017 5:16:41 GMT
City status is city status is city status. St Asaph is a city. So is Preston. Population size doesn't count. (Size rarely does, it's what you do with it...Etc...)
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Sept 18, 2017 19:14:13 GMT
Ah, I was hoping to find this thread again. So, I've decided to re-visit my idea of an enlarged Welsh Assembly with 50 constituencies. I'm still using the electorate figures that are used on the Boundary Assistant site, with the quota adjusted accordingly for a 50 constituency map. Hopefully some of my re-worked boundaries should be a slight improvement on what I produced during my previous attempt, though there are a couple of obvious "leftover seats" in there. Total Electorate: 2,181,841 Ynys Mon electorate: 49,287 rWales electorate: 2,132,554 Quota: 43,521 (with a 10% tolerance) Ynys Mon has special status, the quota here is more of a general guideline, and for my revised map there are a few constituencies that have been allowed to remain over/undersized for the purpose of maintaining reasonable looking boundaries, with such seats being the exception (and aren't they that much larger/smaller than the tolerance limits anyway). So, here's a revised map: I've been working on this on-and-off for several weeks now. I've also been working on some (very) rough notionals for the 2016 elections, for an 85-member assembly with these boundaries. Electoral region map: The constituency names that I've assigned are as follows: NORTH WALES:Aberconwy Arfon Buckley & Wrexham North Colwyn Denbigh Flint Hawarden Rhuddlan Wrexham Ynys Mon MID & WEST WALES:Brecon & Radnorshire Carmarthen Ceredigion Dinefwr Dwyfor Meirionnydd Llanelli Montgomeryshire (North) Pembrokeshire (South) Pembrokeshire SOUTH WALES WEST:Bridgend Gowerton Maesteg & Port Talbot East Neath North Neath South & Port Talbot West Porthcawl Swansea North Swansea South Swansea South West SOUTH WALES CENTRAL:Aberdare Barry & Penarth South Cardiff Adamsdown Cardiff Leckwith & Penarth North Cardiff Llandaff Cardiff Llanishen Cardiff Llanrumney Cardiff Tongwynlais Pontypridd Rhondda Vale of Glamorgan SOUTH WALES EAST:Caerphilly East & Blackwood Caerphilly West Cwmbran & Newport North Ebbw Vale Merthyr Tydfil (North East) Monmouthshire (South West) Monmouthshire Newport East Newport West Pontypool Rhymney For my notionals, a few wards will have been added to a constituency in a different region to where they were previously, but from what I can gather this should only be a minimal amount of wards; any changes in the list vote had these boundaries been put into use for real should also be minimal. 2016 notional map: Notes on the following seats: * Modified Vale of Glamorgan- I suspect that with the removal of Barry into its own constituency, this seat would likely go Conservative * Denbigh, and Buckley & Wrexham North- For both of these I think they could go either which way between Labour and the Conservatives, so I've had them go where on the balance of probabilities I think they would've voted had they actually existed on May 2016. I would class both as Labour/Tory marginals. And of course, the final seat tally under this arrangement would be: Labour: 36 Plaid Cymru: 19 Conservatives: 16 UKIP: 10 Liberal Democrats: 4
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Sept 18, 2017 19:40:37 GMT
Ynys Mon has special status, the quota here is more of a general guideline, and for my revised map there are a few constituencies that have been allowed to remain over/undersized for the purpose of maintaining reasonable looking boundaries, with such seats being the exception (and aren't they that much larger/smaller than the tolerance limits anyway). [ ...] Buckley & Wrexham North Maesteg & Port Talbot East Neath South & Port Talbot West Cardiff Leckwith & Penarth North Caerphilly East & Blackwood Cwmbran & Newport North
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Sept 18, 2017 20:03:44 GMT
Ynys Mon has special status, the quota here is more of a general guideline, and for my revised map there are a few constituencies that have been allowed to remain over/undersized for the purpose of maintaining reasonable looking boundaries, with such seats being the exception (and aren't they that much larger/smaller than the tolerance limits anyway). [ ...] Buckley & Wrexham North Maesteg & Port Talbot East Neath South & Port Talbot West Cardiff Leckwith & Penarth North Caerphilly East & Blackwood Cwmbran & Newport North You got better ideas for names? (You may have forgotten Barry & Penarth South, BTW) I'm also surprised that you didn't mention the Porthcawl seat I drew up, that one was definitely a "leftovers seat" in my view.
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Sept 18, 2017 20:20:09 GMT
You got better ideas for names? (You may have forgotten Barry & Penarth South, BTW) I'm also surprised that you didn't mention the Porthcawl seat I drew up, that one was definitely a "leftovers seat" in my view. Apart from the aforementioned Porthcawl constituency they all look very neat on the map, but if those are the best names you can think of for supposedly coherent communities, then I think the boundaries themselves need more work. I'm not convinced that 50 FPTP seats + 35 top-up seats is the best solution for the Assembly anyway, although it's not a bad starting point if you want to avoid tumbling into STV.
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Sept 18, 2017 20:34:19 GMT
You got better ideas for names? (You may have forgotten Barry & Penarth South, BTW) I'm also surprised that you didn't mention the Porthcawl seat I drew up, that one was definitely a "leftovers seat" in my view. Apart from the aforementioned Porthcawl constituency they all look very neat on the map, but if those are the best names you can think of for supposedly coherent communities, then I think the boundaries themselves need more work. I'm not convinced that 50 FPTP seats + 35 top-up seats is the best solution for the Assembly anyway, although it's not a bad starting point if you want to avoid tumbling into STV. I have heard rumours that there are possibly plans to increase the size of the Assembly, possibly to somewhere in the region of 87. Of course if they do want to enlarge the Assembly then of course the easiest thing would be just to simply add more list seats. What I came up with here is just a hypothetical. Also, the ratio of constituencies-to-list seats in this scenario should be similar to what's used in the Scottish parliament. I've just had another look at the boundaries, and for most of them what I've done shouldn't be too much of a stretch, particularly Buckley & Wrexham North, the Caerphilly Seats, or the Port Talbot seats (though perhaps I could move the rest of Port Talbot into the Neath South seat (or the Maesteg seat, for that matter), but I didn't want to create too many "out-of-tolerance" seats). Additionally, Penarth has shared parliamentary representation with Cardiff for decades now, and whilst I would have preferred not to split it and group it all with Barry, once again I wanted "out-of-tolerance" seats to be exceptions here, not the norm. The only odd one out here would possibly be Cwmbran & Newport North, but once again it shouldn't be too much of an ask. Additionally, I figured I'd provide the rough Boundary Assistant workings here, if anyone wanted to look at them:
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Foggy
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Post by Foggy on Sept 18, 2017 20:43:58 GMT
Apart from the aforementioned Porthcawl constituency they all look very neat on the map, but if those are the best names you can think of for supposedly coherent communities, then I think the boundaries themselves need more work. I'm not convinced that 50 FPTP seats + 35 top-up seats is the best solution for the Assembly anyway, although it's not a bad starting point if you want to avoid tumbling into STV. I have heard rumours that there are possibly plans to increase the size of the Assembly, possibly to somewhere in the region of 87. Of course if they do want to enlarge the Assembly then of course the easiest thing would be just to simply add more list seats. What I came up with here is just a hypothetical. Also, the ratio of constituencies-to-list seats in this scenario should be similar to what's used in the Scottish parliament. The 87 figure was based on the 29-seat plan at the current Westminster boundary review that looks like it might be about to be cancelled, although there are increasingly compelling reasons for some kind of increase in the number of AMs. I agree that the ratio of FPTP to top-up seats should be more proportional than the current 2:1, but you probably wouldn't find too many people in your party arguing the same! I don't really like the template [place] & [other place] + [compass direction] for the names of seats.
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Post by Lord Twaddleford on Sept 18, 2017 20:51:08 GMT
I have heard rumours that there are possibly plans to increase the size of the Assembly, possibly to somewhere in the region of 87. Of course if they do want to enlarge the Assembly then of course the easiest thing would be just to simply add more list seats. What I came up with here is just a hypothetical. Also, the ratio of constituencies-to-list seats in this scenario should be similar to what's used in the Scottish parliament. The 87 figure was based on the 29-seat plan at the current Westminster boundary review that looks like it might be about to be cancelled, although there are increasingly compelling reasons for some kind of increase in the number of AMs. I agree that the ratio of FPTP to top-up seats should be more proportional than the current 2:1, but you probably wouldn't find too many people in your party arguing the same!Needless to say the current arrangement benefits Labour a bit too much for it to get changed any time soon. Had Plaid Cymru or any of the other parties been seen as a big a threat in Wales as the SNP were/are in Scotland, a more proportional formula would've probably been used, not that it stopped the SNP gaining an absolute majority in Holyrood in 2011 mind you... Those sorts of names can be quite clunky at times.
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