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Post by islington on Mar 13, 2016 14:07:02 GMT
I have been playing with boundary assistant in the W Midlands conurbation and I can report that I have a solution that gives 25 seats in the whole former metropolitan county (entitlement 24.91) without any ward splitting.
It was necessary to include Coventry, which means that the attractive solution of treating Coventry with Warwickshire is no longer available. Warwickshire (5.37) is too big for 5 so it will have to be merged with something else. I suggest Staffordshire (10.90). This is a shame, because Staffs could have stood by itself with 11; but in practice, the combination works well if the border town of Tamworth is treated with Warwickshire (458005 electors, or 6.13) receiving 6 seats, leaving the rest of Staffs (758638, 10.15) to get 10. The rest of the region (Worcs, Hereford, Salop) then sums to 12.17 for 12 seats.
I'm not saying that the 25-seat solution for the W Mids conurbation is the prettiest plan ever seen, but at least it shows it can be done. It's then possible to try to improve it by means of ward swaps to get the seats more compact and to try to avoid particularly ill-matched combinations. So I'm setting it out here, not as a final proposal but as a starting point from which I'll try to effect improvements.
Please don't get too much hung up about the names, which are for working purposes only. The names can be looked at again once the seat pattern is finalised.
SUTTON COLDFIELD (73172): Unchanged.
BIRMINGHAM ERDINGTON (77920): The present seat plus Perry Barr ward.
BIRMINGHAM HODGE HILL (77002): Hodge Hill, Stechford & YN, Sheldon, Shard End, Castle Bromwich.
BIRMINGHAM ASTON (73395): Aston, Washwood Heath, Bordesley Green, Nechells.
BIRMINGHAM LADYWOOD (74147): Ladywood, Soho, Lozells & EH, Handsworth Wood plus the Sandwell ward of Soho & Victoria.
BIRMINGHAM EDGBASTON (76801): The current seat plus Selly Oak.
BIRMINGHAM NORTHFIELD (71729): The current seat less Kings Norton but plus Bournville.
BIRMINGHAM BILLESLEY (71357): Kings Norton, Brandwood, Billesley, Springfield.
BIRMINGHAM SPARKBROOK (72993): Moseley & KH, Sparkbrook, Acocks Green, S Yardley. (I said it wasn't pretty.)
ALDRIDGE-BROWNHILLS (75866): The present seat less Pelsall and plus Pheasey PF and Oscott.
WALSALL NORTH (72944): The present seat plus Pelsall.
WALSALL SOUTH AND BILSTON (73724): The rest of Walsall borough plus the two Bilston wards.
WOLVERHAMPTON NORTH EAST (74833): The present seat plus East Park and St Peter's.
WOLVERHAMPTON SOUTH WEST (77288): The rest of Wolverhampton.
WEDNESBURY AND TIPTON (75443): Wednesbury N, Wednesbury S, Great Bridge, Princes End, Tipton Green (all from Sandwell) plus the 3 northernmost wards of Dudley.
DUDLEY (71108): The 3 wards of Dudley town centre, the 2 Kingswinford wards, plus Gornal and Brockmoor & P. This was the only workable combination I could find of wards wholly in Dudley and it proved to be the key to the whole Dudley/Sandwell area.
BRIERLEY HILL AND ROWLEY REGIS (76400): Brierley Hill, Wordsley, Quarry Bank & DW, Netherton &c from Dudley; Rowley, Tividale, Langley and Blackheath from Sandwell.
WARLEY AND HALESOWEN (73527): St Paul's, Smethwick, Old Warley, Bristnall, Abbey (all from Sandwell), plus the two Halesown wards and Belle Vale from Dudley.
STOURBRIDGE (78457): The remaining 7 wards of Dudley plus Cradley Heath & OH.
WEST BROMWICH (71221): The 8 remaining wards of Sandwell.
SOLIHULL SOUTH (74676): St Alphege, the 3 Shirley wards, Blyth, Dorridge & HH plus the Hall Green ward of Birmingham.
SOLIHULL NORTH (71131): The rest of Solihull except for Castle Bromwich (in B'ham Hodge Hill above) and two wards in the following seat.
COVENTRY SOUTH AND MERIDEN (76586): The current Coventry S seat less St Michael's and Binley & W but plus Woodlands and the two Solihull wards of Meriden and Knowle.
COVENTRY EAST (73304): The current Coventry NE less Foleshill and plus Binley & Willenhall.
COVENTRY NORTH (77745): The rest of Coventry.
That's it. At the moment it's very much a work in progress rather than a concrete proposal, but at least it proves it can be done. Comments are more than welcome, especially if they suggest practical improvements. (As opposed to simply pointing out the shortcomings.)
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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 13, 2016 14:13:25 GMT
Not splitting wards is seriously over-rated.
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Post by greatkingrat on Mar 13, 2016 16:28:52 GMT
Not splitting wards is seriously over-rated. It is still important to at least see what can be done without splitting. Only then can you make an informed decision as to whether splitting is necessary or not. |
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Mar 13, 2016 16:38:57 GMT
Not splitting wards is seriously over-rated. Maybe, but until there's reason to believe that the BCE agree with you, it remains a key criterion. |
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2016 17:50:32 GMT
If Ladywell could be renamed "Birmingham Soho" that'd be great
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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 13, 2016 18:05:01 GMT
Not splitting wards is seriously over-rated. Maybe, but until there's reason to believe that the BCE agree with you, it remains a key criterion. There is a reasonable amount of evidence that they will be more open to splitting than last time, both from their evidence to the Parliamentary enquiry and in the papers for their recent meetings. Now, whether that actually means they'll be prepared to split enough wards to get nine constituencies wholly within Birmingham, for example, I don't know. (But I think they ought to. The City of Birmingham's boundaries are much more worthy of being taking account of than those of a set of wards that will have been abolished before these constituencies are actually first used.) |
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Post by greenhert on Mar 13, 2016 19:17:29 GMT
Here's mischief.
Coventry South and Meriden
Figures from Electoral Calculus
CON LAB LD UKIP G Oth
Cheylesmore 11308 2555 2484 276 906 227 47
Earlsdon 11604 2868 2260 363 450 277 46
Wainbody 10670 3413 2143 447 672 338 251
Westwood 12244 2845 2443 347 1283 244 55
Woodlands 13156 3283 2379 387 1137 182 131
Bickenhill 8941 3398 1112 71 1379 78 4
Meriden 9421 3797 836 73 970 81 4
77344 22159 13657
CON Majority 8502. Leads in all seven wards.
 Could you tell me where you got the new data from Electoral Calculus for 2015 calculations? Some pages of Electoral Calculus do not appear to be working.... |
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Post by Arthur Figgis on Mar 13, 2016 20:32:49 GMT
If Ladywell could be renamed "Birmingham Soho" that'd be great That would be a strange thing to call a ward in Lewisham. |
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Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 13, 2016 20:34:27 GMT
I was about to say if it could be renamed Ladywood it would be a good start
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Post by islington on Mar 13, 2016 20:52:53 GMT
(ahem) Sorry, duly corrected.
I starting looking at the Birmingham area more as an academic exercise than anything, simply to see whether a solution without ward splits was even possible. I didn't expect it to result in a workable plan.
But now I've done it, I'm beginning to think it has merits...
Undoubtedly, there are some ugly constituencies here. But many of them work well. And even though I take YL's point above about the Birmingham City boundary, I still think I've given it as much respect as I could given my self-imposed discipline of not splitting wards. Birmingham does indeed get substantially nine constituencies. Two non-Birmingham wards (and only two) are joined with seats otherwise in Birmingham, and both of these are in places where the boundary is, frankly, pretty porous. Likewise, only two Birmingham wards find themselves in seats otherwise outside Birmingham - again, both in places with which the cross-border communications are good.
I'd also point out that throughout the whole West Midland conurbation, each seat lies within either one or two authorities. And all seats are wholly within the conurbation; I have no seats spilling into surrounding counties as the Commission did in the zombie review.
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Post by No Offence Alan on Mar 13, 2016 21:35:45 GMT
10. Redditch. The entire district of Redditch, plus the Wychavon wards of Inkberrow, Bowbrook, Upton Snodsbury, Drakes Broughton, and Pinvin. Electorate: 72,836. 11. Worcester. The entire city of Worcester plus the Wychavon ward of Norton & Whittington. Electorate: 72,912. 12. Evesham & Droitwich. All Wychavon wards except for Norton & Whittington, Inkberrow, Bowbrook, Upton Snodsbury, Drakes Broughton, and Pinvin. Centred on the towns of Evesham and Droitwich Spa. Electorate: 76,353. The main problem here is that Droitwich and the Evesham area would be completely detached from each other! |
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Post by greenhert on Mar 13, 2016 21:46:59 GMT
10. Redditch. The entire district of Redditch, plus the Wychavon wards of Inkberrow, Bowbrook, Upton Snodsbury, Drakes Broughton, and Pinvin. Electorate: 72,836. 11. Worcester. The entire city of Worcester plus the Wychavon ward of Norton & Whittington. Electorate: 72,912. 12. Evesham & Droitwich. All Wychavon wards except for Norton & Whittington, Inkberrow, Bowbrook, Upton Snodsbury, Drakes Broughton, and Pinvin. Centred on the towns of Evesham and Droitwich Spa. Electorate: 76,353. The main problem here is that Droitwich and the Evesham area would be completely detached from each other! This problem can be solved by instead stating that Redditch has the Wychavon wards of Inkberrow, Pinvin, Honeybourne & Pebworth, The Littletons, and Harvington & Norton, and that Evesham & Droitwich contains all Wychavon wards except for those (and the Norton & Whittington ward added to Worcester to put its electorate within the allowable parameters). Both the Evesham & Droitwich and redrawn Redditch constituencies will still be in quota. The only problem here geographically is the poor connections between the southeastern Wychavon wards and Redditch itself, but little can be done about that. |
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Post by An Sionnach Flannbhuí on Mar 13, 2016 23:23:56 GMT
Here's mischief.
Coventry South and Meriden
Not very effective mischief. Good luck selling "Kenilworth and about half of Shirley". It was labelled mischief. But good luck selling anything too far off this, especially the stuff labelled 'Pitchfork Bait'. |
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Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 14, 2016 10:58:08 GMT
Here's another offering for the West Midlands which avoids splitting wards. I'm not sure if it might belong in the pitchfork thread. Several of the seats are the same as Islington's (in many areas there isn't much other choice). I wanted to keep the Coventry and Warwickshire arrangements that Greenchristian produced so to make up the numbers I've basically bastardised the Bromsgrove district. I don't know yet what kind of situation that will leave us in with the rest of Worcestershire/Herefordshire/Shropshire, but given Bromsgrove district overall is about the size of a quota I can't see it making much of a difference  Meriden 71,903 loses Castle Bromwich gains Wythall East from Bromsgrove Solihull 75,121 unchanged Birmingham Nortfield. 75,118 loses Kings Norton, gains Bartley Green and the Bromsgrove wards of Rubery North and South Birmingham Kings Norton 77,569 Billesley, Bournevill, Brandwood and Kings Norton and the Bromsgrove wards of Drakes Cross, Holywood and Wythall West Birmingham Edgbaston 76,294 Edgbaston, Harborne, Ladywood, Moseley, Selly Oak Birmingham Acocks Green 75,027 Acocks Green, Hall Green, South Yardley, Springfield Birmingham Stechford 77,002 Hodge Hill, Shard End, Sheldon, Stechford, Castle Bromwich Birmingham Bordesley 74,288 Bordesley Green, Nechells, Sparkbrook, Washwood Heath Birmingham Erdington 77,920 gains Perry Barr Birmingham Handsworth 76,535 Aston, Handsworth Wood, Lozells, Soho and Soho & Victoria Aldridge Brownhills 75,866 loses Pelsall, gains Pheasey and Oscott Walsall 73,037 Birchills Leamore, Blakenall, Bloxwich East & West Palfrey, PAddock and St Matthews Bilston & Willenhall 73,631- The two Bilston wards of Wolverhampton, plus PLeck, Short Heath and the Daralston and Willenhall wards of Walsall Wolverhampton East 77,239 loses Oxley (compared to NE) gains East PArk, Ettingshall and Spring Vale Wolverhampton West 74,882 gains Blakenhall and Oxley West Bromwich & Wednesbury 72,275 (compared to West Brom East) loses Greets Green, gains Wednesbury North and South Warley 78,147 loses Soho & Victoria, gains Blackheath and the Birmigham ward of Quinton Coseley & Tipton 77,246 - Sandwell wards of: Great Bridge, Pricnes End, Tipton Green, Dudley wards of: Brockmoor Pensnett, Coseley East, Gornal, Sedgeley, Upper Gornal Dudley & Rowley Regis 75,739 Sandwell wards of Cradley Heath, Greets Green, Oldbury, Rowley Regis, Tividale, Ddudley wards of: CAstle & Priory, St JAmes, St Thomas Brierley Hill 71,257 Amblecote, Brierley Hill, Kingswinford N & S, Netherton etc, Quarry Bank, Wordsley Stourbridge 73,248 Belle Vale, Cradley, Hayley Green, Lye, Norton, Pedmore, Wllaston and the Bromsgrove wards of Hagley East and West Bromsgrove & Halesowen 72,264 All of Bromsgrove district not included in the above seats plue Halesowen North and South One or two fairly hideous ones there, not least the last (though it is fairly well connected via the M5). Obviously splitting wards is going to be a better solution. In particular, as has alreeady been observed, Dudley is an absolute nightmare |
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Post by greenchristian on Mar 16, 2016 17:27:46 GMT
Here's what I came up with from splitting Leamington and Warwick down the middle. Nuneaton, North Warwickshire, and the three Coventry seats are identical to my previous map, so not shown. There may be some scope for swapping a few wards between the new Leamington and Rugby & Southam constituencies or between the Leamington and Warwick & Stratford ones, but the end result of that approach won't be too far removed from this map.  Next, I'm going to see if I can come up with a best-case scenario for Labour. I think it's possible to make four of the eight seats notionally Labour without the map looking too blatantly gerrymandered. |
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Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 16, 2016 17:36:39 GMT
Here's what I came up with from splitting Leamington and Warwick down the middle. Nuneaton, North Warwickshire, and the three Coventry seats are identical to my previous map, so not shown. There may be some scope for swapping a few wards between the new Leamington and Rugby & Southam constituencies or between the Leamington and Warwick & Stratford ones, but the end result of that approach won't be too far removed from this map. Next, I'm going to see if I can come up with a best-case scenario for Labour. I think it's possible to make four of the eight seats notionally Labour without the map looking too blatantly gerrymandered. Though it doesn't appear that way in terms of where the bulk of the population are, the Myton & Heathcote ward is actually part of Warwick rather than Leamington |
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Post by greenchristian on Mar 16, 2016 17:54:25 GMT
Here's what I came up with from splitting Leamington and Warwick down the middle. Nuneaton, North Warwickshire, and the three Coventry seats are identical to my previous map, so not shown. There may be some scope for swapping a few wards between the new Leamington and Rugby & Southam constituencies or between the Leamington and Warwick & Stratford ones, but the end result of that approach won't be too far removed from this map. Next, I'm going to see if I can come up with a best-case scenario for Labour. I think it's possible to make four of the eight seats notionally Labour without the map looking too blatantly gerrymandered. Though it doesn't appear that way in terms of where the bulk of the population are, the Myton & Heathcote ward is actually part of Warwick rather than Leamington Changing that doesn't require switching any other wards around, though it does make Leamington look a much less natural shape. |
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Mar 16, 2016 22:24:01 GMT
Here's what I came up with from splitting Leamington and Warwick down the middle. Nuneaton, North Warwickshire, and the three Coventry seats are identical to my previous map, so not shown. There may be some scope for swapping a few wards between the new Leamington and Rugby & Southam constituencies or between the Leamington and Warwick & Stratford ones, but the end result of that approach won't be too far removed from this map. Next, I'm going to see if I can come up with a best-case scenario for Labour. I think it's possible to make four of the eight seats notionally Labour without the map looking too blatantly gerrymandered. Though it doesn't appear that way in terms of where the bulk of the population are, the Myton & Heathcote ward is actually part of Warwick rather than Leamington That's where the parish boundaries go, but in every other term you're stretching the meaning of the word 'actually' far beyond the stress it'll bear. Warwick Gates is a damn good argument (not that the argument is needed) for not splitting the two towns, but in terms of links it's actually got closest ties to Whitnash. It goes without saying that splitting Warwick and Leamington is seriously stupid, but if you were going to insist on that this isn't the way I'd do it. There are reasonably decent links between Leamington and Southam, and whilst the latter town has to go with Rugby, you could at least grab more of the villages to its south (Harbury in particular is a must). But the combination chosen makes it quite complicated to go from the northern to the southern half of the constituency without travelling outside it. |
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Post by Pete Whitehead on Mar 16, 2016 22:36:30 GMT
That's where the parish boundaries go, but in every other term you're stretching the meaning of the word 'actually' far beyond the stress it'll bear. Warwick Gates is a damn good argument (not that the argument is needed) for not splitting the two towns, but in terms of links it's actually got closest ties to Whitnash. Oh sure it doesn't appear to remotely belong to Warwick and I'm aware parish boundaries can be fairly meaningless. It confused the frack out of me initially when I was doing the notionals for this area and was like 'what's this ward the Tories have won in South Leamington?' |
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Post by East Anglian Lefty on Mar 25, 2016 17:35:34 GMT
Shropshire, Worcestershire and Herefordshire:   Wrekin South (77621) Wrekin North (72785) North Shropshire (77768) - unchanged Shrewsbury (75528) - unchanged Ludlow & Leominster (76083) Hereford (74764) Malvern (75809) - alternative suggestions for the name welcome Wyre Forest (75226) - unchanged Bromsgrove (78121) - working out where Droitwich goes looks to be the key decision when drawing Worcestershire Redditch and Wythall (77756) Worcestershire South (75535) Worcester (72912) This is not the least change option for the Telford area - you can get Telford up to quota by adding either Donington and Muxton or Apley Castle and Hadley & Leegomery, then put Bridgnorth (but not Broseley) in the Wrekin seat, but I felt that made the Wrekin seat a bit too sprawling. YMMV. |
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