2018 Review - East of England

[greatkingrat]

57 seats allocated

Bedfordshire 5.88
Cambridgeshire 7.42
Essex 17.05
Hertfordshire 10.72
Norfolk 8.64
Suffolk 7.04

So looks like Beds 6, Essex 17, Herts 11, Suffolk 7, Cambs+Norfolk 16

Beds and Herts can now keep their existing constituencies (with some ward shuffling) and no longer need a cross border seat.

[greenhert]

I live in the East of England region, and I have designed my own constituency maps using Plan Builder in the past.

Regarding the 2018 review, let us start with Hertfordshire (personal bias-I live in Hertfordshire and it is my native county):

Broxbourne borough is too small to forma constituency on its own, and in addition needs to lose that orphan ward of Northaw & Cuffley to Welwyn Hatfield (new electorate of 73,312 and now covering all of Welwyn Hatfield borough council's area). It therefore needs to gain wards from the existing Hertford & Stortford constituency, and these will likely be Hertford Rural North, Hertford Rural South, and Great Amwell. The constituency should then be renamed South East Hertfordshire (electorate 72,260).

Hertford and Stortford retains its name, but with those rural wards mentioned above lost, it will need to gain one ward from North East Hertfordshire to balance it out. This will likely be Little Hadham. which brings its new electorate to 72,943.

North East Hertfordshire in turn needs to gain another rural ward to bring it back up to quota having lost Little Hadham to Hertford and Stortford and Watton at Stone and Walkern to Stevenage (see below). I believe it should gain Chesfield from Hitchin & Harpenden, making its new electorate 70,911, with a split ward to put its electorate high enough.

Hitchin and Harpenden, having lost Chesfield ward which on its own has 5004 electors according to that Excel file, will now also need to gain a ward to bring it back up to quota. Watling is the least bad choice (given that the town of Harpenden was once in the Hemel Hempstead constituency until 1974), which makes its new electorate 72,589.

St Albans is now under quota, surprisingly enough. Giving it Abbots Langley & Bedmond (since the smaller Bedmond & Primrose Hill no longer exists due to boundary changes in Three Rivers) will be enough to bring its electorate to within the allowable range.

Hemel Hempstead , where I was the Green Party's parliamentary candidate in 2015, is a rather awkward situation regarding redrawing of constituency boundaries. It cannot simply take a ward westwards because that would split up an existing constituency which needs to form the base of a new one. It will therefore have to take in two northern wards of Three Rivers district, Leavesden and the replacement ward for Langleybury (is that Gade Valley?) to have a sufficient electorate of now around 75,000.

Hertsmere should be abolished as a constituency name, since the district of Hertsmere is no longer large enough to form a constituency on its own. It can however take in Carpenters Park from Watford. This creates South Hertfordshire, with a new electorate of 74,826.

Watford ,having lost its northern wards to Hemel Hempstead in this tabulation as well as Carpenters Park, will have to gain both Oxhey wards to be viable. It will retain its name however.

South West Hertfordshire should be renamed West Hertfordshire and will have an electorate of approx. 74000.

Stevenage will gain Watton at Stone ward and Walkern, putting its electorate up to 71,525.

[Pete Whitehead]

Very similar in all but a couple of details to the proposals I posted earlier on another thread. Don't see any particular need for the name changes you propose for Broxbourne and Hertsmere though although I agree that SW Herts should be West Herts and should have been since 1997.
(Broxbourne and Hertsmere are both silly names really, but they've been used for essentially the same areas for over 40 years in terms of the local authorities and for over 30 for the parliamentary constituencies)

[Pete Whitehead]

Feb 24, 2016 19:57:20 GMT greenhert said:

Hemel Hempstead , where I was the Green Party's parliamentary candidate in 2015, is a rather awkward situation regarding redrawing of constituency boundaries. It cannot simply take a ward westwards because that would split up an existing constituency which needs to form the base of a new one. It will therefore have to take in two northern wards of Three Rivers district, Leavesden and the replacement ward for Langleybury (is that Gade Valley?) to have a sufficient electorate of now around 75,000.

This is one of the reasons I was discussing a complete redrawing. Ideally it could take the Bovingdon, Flaunden & Chipperfield ward which actually includes parts of Hemel proper (ie the part of the unparished area which is the old Hemel Hempstead MB). This does of course split the current SW Herts seat in two and would mean Berko and Tring linking up with Harpendent etc in a new West Herts seat (kinf ot eh pre-74 Hemel Hempstead seat without Hemel Hempstead itself) and Ricky ect relinking with Bushey in a recreation of the old SW Herts seat. So far so good, but the upshot of this probably involves splitting Welwyn from Hatfield (the upside at the other end of the county being reuniting Hitchin and Letchworth). Still mcuh work to be done I think. Another thing worth considering is that it is possible to bring the whole of St Albans city and Harpdenden within the same seat which would be another way of getting rid of the awful Hitchin & Harpenden seat, but again the knock on effects may not be all too pretty

[Pete Whitehead]

Uniting a few thoughts from other threads:

Feb 24, 2016 17:21:42 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Feb 24, 2016 10:24:10 GMT greatkingrat said:

East of England

Bedfordshire 5.88
Cambridgeshire 7.42
Essex 17.05
Hertfordshire 10.72
Norfolk 8.64
Suffolk 7.04

So looks like Beds 6, Essex 17, Herts 11, Suffolk 7, Cambs+Norfolk 16

Beds and Herts can now keep their existing constituencies (with some ward shuffling) and no longer need a cross border seat.

An early attempt with minimal changes



Welwyn Hatfield is a little undersized so picks up Northaw & Cuffley to become coterminous with the LA - electorate 73,296
Broxbourne gains Hertford Heath, Stanstead Abbots and Great Amwell - electorate 72,664
Hertford & Stortford is pushed below quota by losing the above wards so gains Hertford Rural South - electorate 72,620
NE Hertfordshire likewise pushed below by loss of that ward so has to gain Cadwell (Datchworth would be better but this creates insurmountable problems for Stevenage) electorate 72,533
Stevenage gains Chesfield - electorate 72,564
Hitchin & Harpenden is undersized from loss of Cadwell and Chesfield so gains Ashridge & Watling from Dacorum - electorate 72,932
St Albans loses Bedmond (which has been split) and instead takes the Three Rivers ward of Leavesden - electorate 72,210
Hemel Hempstead takes GAde Valley and Abbots Langley & Bedmond while losing Ashridge and Watling - electorate 74,363
SW Herts loses South Oxhey (inclusing those parts now in other wards) electorate 70,309 *
Watford loses the Three Rivers wards North of the town and gains South Oxhey - electorate 72,878
Hertsmere gains Carpenders PArk - electorate 74,831

* SW Herts here is just below quota so we would have to split a ward to resolve that. The best bet would be to take the DAF pollng district from Gade Valley (Hunton Bridge & Langleybury) which from memory contains about 1000 voters

Not an ideal solution at all but its difficult with the average being somewhat close to the lower limit. Ward boundary changes in Three Rivers have caused particular problems. I might attempt a complete redrawing

[Pete Whitehead]

Feb 24, 2016 19:57:20 GMT greenhert said:

I live in the East of England region, and I have designed my own constituency maps using Plan Builder in the past.

Regarding the 2018 review, let us start with Hertfordshire (personal bias-I live in Hertfordshire and it is my native county):

Broxbourne borough is too small to forma constituency on its own, and in addition needs to lose that orphan ward of Northaw & Cuffley to Welwyn Hatfield (new electorate of 73,312 and now covering all of Welwyn Hatfield borough council's area). It therefore needs to gain wards from the existing Hertford & Stortford constituency, and these will likely be Hertford Rural North, Hertford Rural South, and Great Amwell. The constituency should then be renamed South East Hertfordshire (electorate 72,260).

Hertford and Stortford retains its name, but with those rural wards mentioned above lost, it will need to gain one ward from North East Hertfordshire to balance it out. This will likely be Little Hadham. which brings its new electorate to 72,943.

North East Hertfordshire in turn needs to gain another rural ward to bring it back up to quota having lost Little Hadham to Hertford and Stortford and Watton at Stone and Walkern to Stevenage (see below). I believe it should gain Chesfield from Hitchin & Harpenden, making its new electorate 70,911, with a split ward to put its electorate high enough.

Hitchin and Harpenden, having lost Chesfield ward which on its own has 5004 electors according to that Excel file, will now also need to gain a ward to bring it back up to quota. Watling is the least bad choice (given that the town of Harpenden was once in the Hemel Hempstead constituency until 1974), which makes its new electorate 72,589.

St Albans is now under quota, surprisingly enough. Giving it Abbots Langley & Bedmond (since the smaller Bedmond & Primrose Hill no longer exists due to boundary changes in Three Rivers) will be enough to bring its electorate to within the allowable range.

Hemel Hempstead , where I was the Green Party's parliamentary candidate in 2015, is a rather awkward situation regarding redrawing of constituency boundaries. It cannot simply take a ward westwards because that would split up an existing constituency which needs to form the base of a new one. It will therefore have to take in two northern wards of Three Rivers district, Leavesden and the replacement ward for Langleybury (is that Gade Valley?) to have a sufficient electorate of now around 75,000.

Hertsmere should be abolished as a constituency name, since the district of Hertsmere is no longer large enough to form a constituency on its own. It can however take in Carpenters Park from Watford. This creates South Hertfordshire, with a new electorate of 74,826.

Watford ,having lost its northern wards to Hemel Hempstead in this tabulation as well as Carpenters Park, will have to gain both Oxhey wards to be viable. It will retain its name however.

South West Hertfordshire should be renamed West Hertfordshire and will have an electorate of approx. 74000.

Stevenage will gain Watton at Stone ward and Walkern, putting its electorate up to 71,525.

[Pete Whitehead]

Feb 25, 2016 0:56:53 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Very similar in all but a couple of details to the proposals I posted earlier on another thread. Don't see any particular need for the name changes you propose for Broxbourne and Hertsmere though although I agree that SW Herts should be West Herts and should have been since 1997.
(Broxbourne and Hertsmere are both silly names really, but they've been used for essentially the same areas for over 40 years in terms of the local authorities and for over 30 for the parliamentary constituencies)

Feb 25, 2016 1:09:15 GMT Pete Whitehead said:

Feb 24, 2016 19:57:20 GMT greenhert said:

Hemel Hempstead , where I was the Green Party's parliamentary candidate in 2015, is a rather awkward situation regarding redrawing of constituency boundaries. It cannot simply take a ward westwards because that would split up an existing constituency which needs to form the base of a new one. It will therefore have to take in two northern wards of Three Rivers district, Leavesden and the replacement ward for Langleybury (is that Gade Valley?) to have a sufficient electorate of now around 75,000.

This is one of the reasons I was discussing a complete redrawing. Ideally it could take the Bovingdon, Flaunden & Chipperfield ward which actually includes parts of Hemel proper (ie the part of the unparished area which is the old Hemel Hempstead MB). This does of course split the current SW Herts seat in two and would mean Berko and Tring linking up with Harpendent etc in a new West Herts seat (kinf ot eh pre-74 Hemel Hempstead seat without Hemel Hempstead itself) and Ricky ect relinking with Bushey in a recreation of the old SW Herts seat. So far so good, but the upshot of this probably involves splitting Welwyn from Hatfield (the upside at the other end of the county being reuniting Hitchin and Letchworth). Still mcuh work to be done I think. Another thing worth considering is that it is possible to bring the whole of St Albans city and Harpdenden within the same seat which would be another way of getting rid of the awful Hitchin & Harpenden seat, but again the knock on effects may not be all too pretty

[John Chanin]

We should remember the emphasis the Boundary Commission puts on minimising change. A complete redrawing where the seat entitlement is unchanged is therefore not going to happen. Pete's suggestion is well motivated, and I'll look in more detail at East region when I return from holiday.

[andrewteale]

Could AdminSTB please merge the two East of England 2018 threads?

[Pete Whitehead]

Feb 25, 2016 1:30:52 GMT John Chanin said:

We should remember the emphasis the Boundary Commission puts on minimising change. A complete redrawing where the seat entitlement is unchanged is therefore not going to happen. Pete's suggestion is well motivated, and I'll look in more detail at East region when I return from holiday.

Yes you are absolutely right - its an important lesson I learned from the last review where I drew up a whole load of seats in this region and presented them at the enquiry in Luton and of course they went absolutely nowhere because of their desire to minimise change (or alternatively because they were just crap). This does of course unfortunately apply equally to obviously rubbish seats such as Hitchin & Harpenden (which they contrived not only to preserve but to extend right into the heart of Bedfordshire) as much as any other .
On the other hand some last minute amendments I suggested to a few of the seats in NW Middlesex were actually adopted in the revised review (which you were kind enough to send me an email congratulating me for). It's a very good lesson - I spent so many hours on this region for absolutely no purpose (except of course my own entertainment). It's all about the art of the possible

[East Anglian Lefty]

I took a look at Cambridgeshire last night, and whilst I don't want to say anything definite until I've checked Norfolk works too, here are some initial thoughts:

Cambridge must become co-extensive with the city council area, as IER has decimated the rolls. If it's ever fixed, we can expect some fairly major changes at the next review, because there's no way the eligible population has dropped in the last 5 years.

For Peterborough, they've given the old boundaries, which makes things difficult. If you want to keep the new wards together you can no longer add Fletton and the seat is slightly too small if the only rural areas you take are Newborough and Eye & Thorney. Instead I think you'd need to go west, leaving Newborough and Eye & Thorney to go into a Fenland seat. Liable to be a slight boon to the Conservatives. Or you can ignore the new ward boundaries, but if that's the case then all bets are off.

The challenge in Huntingdonshire is to wrap NW Cambs round Huntingdon without dividing any of the towns or producing anything too stupid-looking. That probably means continuing south down the A1(M) corridor, but losing Ramsey, Warboys and Somersham.

You can then keep all the urban bits of Huntingdonshire together. It's likely to look ugly, but it'll work.

In South Cambridgeshire, you'll want to adjust the boundaries round Cottenham to avoid dividing Northstowe as it's built. It depends on exactly how least change an approach you want to take, but if you're balancing that with logical boundaries then the best option is to make the A14 the northern boundary on both sides of the city.

In East Cambridgeshire, the issue is making sure you don't split Ely, or cut it off from its major transport connections. It looks like it'll just be able to stay in SE Cambs (which may need a name change).

The Fenland seat then takes in most of Fenland, the north-western bit of East Cambs and a few Huntingdonshire wards. That means it couldn't also add Eye & Thorney, because the BCE don't like seats containing wards from 4 districts. But that should be OK, because aside from Peterborough their best links are along the A47 to Wisbech instead.

Map and specific numbers once I've sorted out Norfolk.

[AdminSTB]

Threads now merged.

[East Anglian Lefty]

OK, here's what I've got for Cambridgeshire and Norfolk:

Authorities by electorate and quotas:

Cambridgeshire	554887	7.42
Peterborough	117844	1.58
Cambridge	72757	0.97
East Cambridgeshire	60605	0.81
Fenland	69319	0.93
Huntingdonshire	124073	1.66
South Cambridgeshire	110289	1.48
Norfolk	645761	8.64
Breckland	97669	1.31
Broadland	94862	1.27
Great Yarmouth	69691	0.93
King's Lynn & West Norfolk	110945	1.48
North Norfolk	80922	1.08
Norwich	93077	1.24
South Norfolk	98595	1.32
Total	2401296	16.06

Current seats:

Cambridge	67266
South Cambridgeshire	81368
South East Cambridgeshire	82557
Huntingdon	81308
North West Cambridgeshire	89986
Peterborough	70623
North East Cambridgeshire	81779
North West Norfolk	70679
South West Norfolk	72246
Mid Norfolk	81606
South Norfolk	78552
Norwich South	68963
Norwich North	63487
Broadland	72897
North Norfolk	67640
Great Yarmouth	69691

(N. B. I assigned the new wards in Breckland according to which current constituency takes in the majority of their electorate. In each case that was Mid Norfolk, so you may want to adjust the figures by a few thousand accordingly.)

So only South West Norfolk and Broadland are currently within the quota and neither can really remain unchanged. Effectively you need to move half a constituency from Norfolk to Cambridgeshire, and South West Norfolk therefore ends up more or less split. And Broadland needs to give up territory at both ends to Norwich North and to North Norfolk.

Looking at authorities, Cambridge can stand alone but everywhere else needs a partner. Great Yarmouth and North Norfolk make an obvious two-seat pairing - I think a lot of locals would rather Great Yarmouth added Acle instead, but I can't see the Commission going for that when there's such a clean alternative. The rest of Cambridgeshire plus King's Lynn and West Norfolk can be assigned 8 seats, and then central Norfolk can take the remaining 5 seats.

So here's what I came up with:



After its rather artificial fall in electorate, Cambridge (72657) needs to add Queen Edith's to get within the acceptable range. Theoretically that might flip the seat, but it's going to be a less important consideration than personal votes next time, particularly now that Labour regularly gets a decent vote-share there.

South Cambridgeshire (78,319) is too large, and the obvious place to start chopping is its large northern panhandle. This exists in order to ensure that the communities most affected by the construction of Northstowe are all in the same seat, and as that logic applies more than ever you don't just want to slice off a ward or two without further consideration. I therefore elected to excise everything north of the A14 bar Girton (which if it doesn't now, will definitely have a majority of its electorate to the south in 2020). To make up the numbers, I then added four wards in the east of the district, almost reaching the A14 on the other side. This is a bit more than least change, but I think it's all easily defensible and it made things easier further north.

East Cambridgeshire (75,658) is the successor to South East Cambridgeshire. In addition to realigning its southern border, I excised Haddenham ward. I'm not overjoyed about that, but it's impossible to get all of Ely's hinterland in the seat and I could probably kick together a halfway plausible justification for it on community grounds if the mood took me.

Huntingdon (76,291) has to shrink slightly, so it loses Alconbury & The Stukeleys and Kimbolton & Staughton. The latter isn't really a problem, the former is a little awkward given that the new settlements being constructed there are very Huntingdon-focused. But numbers are too tight here to avoid a little awkwardness.

I could see the appeal of the Peterborough South & Whittlesey seat the zombie review initially proposed, but locals hated it and so the present orientation of North West Cambridgeshire (71,377) is likely to continue. But at present it's way too large, so I've chopped off its northern end and an area of fenland round Earith.

The present Peterborough (73,203) is just under quota, but if you're taking account of the new wards there then it's a little harder to fix than it would have been. No ward south of the Nene resembles the present Fletton & Woodston, and you can either add both of the new rural western wards or neither. So I went for the easy option here, which was to excise Eye & Thorney and Newborough and then to add the rural western wards. Traditional counties bores will no doubt complain about Newborough being in a Cambridgeshire seat, but I'm not about to start caring about that.

North East Cambridgeshire (73,735) might be due a name change, but historically people have complained when Fenland is suggested instead and that's even more likely this time. We lose the northern portion of the seat round Wisbech, in exchange for Huntingdonshire wards in the south. UKIP would probably be the main beneficiaries of this, though less in terms of notional vote share and more in terms of improved organisation (though Ramsey isn't included.)

Wisbech & Downham Market (72,017) stitches the south of King's Lynn & West Norfolk district together with the north of Fenland district and a little of Peterborough, creating a fairly cohesive seat along the A47 and A1122 roads. Both Liz Truss and Steve Barclay live here, but I imagine the latter would move south under this map (and probably most others, because without splitting March it's hard to make the cross-border seat majority Fenland.)

North West Norfolk (72,475) loses one rural ward on its southern end and gains two more in order to ensure electoral equality. This may also improve community representation, but that's based off nothing more profound than a brief glance at roads on an Ordnance Survey map.

Mid Norfolk (76,858) shifts south, swapping Dereham for Thetford. The northern border is illustrative rather than strictly accurate, because the new ward boundaries aren't on Boundary Assistant. In reality, the line is a little closer to the A47. And I'm not keen on the name, but don't bet against inertia.

Considered on its own, South Norfolk (77,398) could simply lose Old Costessey and be fine. But in order to accommodate neighbouring seats, it's also had to lose Wymondham and Cringleford. The former is fine, I would undo the latter if I could find a neat way to do so.

Were I aiming to maximise Labour chances, I wouldn't have done this arrangement of Norwich. Gaining Cringleford and Old Costessey is fine, because under post-coalition circumstances there ought to be sufficient margins in the rest of the seat to absorb them. But the demands of electoral equality forced me to swap Thorpe Hamlet for Mile Cross, which gives Labour a boost in Norwich South (78,249) it doesn't need but weakens them in North. Again, I'd undo this if I could find a way, but the numbers are a little tight.

(N. B. It just now strikes me that that might be fixable if instead of adding Cringleford you added Stoke Holy Cross, but that would cause minor knock-on changes at least as far as Mid Norfolk. To be investigated further.)

In addition to that swap in Norwich itself, Norwich North (76,208) also gains Drayton and Taverham, making it that much more challenging a target for 2020. But I guess we all knew that was going to happen anyway.

Broadland (75,490) now resembles the pre-2010 Mid Norfolk seat, as it loses Fakenham and Norwich suburbia in exchange for Dereham and parts of its hinterland. I guess Keith Simpson is one of the likelier Norfolk MPs to retire next time, so if that happens then this may allow the losers of any selection contests to find a bolthole.

North Norfolk (77,387) then becomes almost co-extensive with the eponymous district. I don't think there are enough votes in Fakenham to put Norman Lamb under any particular threat.

I've chosen to just add one ward, Waterside, to Great Yarmouth (73,226). If you particularly dislike orphan wards, there's room for one or two more.

[East Anglian Lefty]

Further investigation showed that it you swap Mile Cross and Thorpe Hamlet back; swap Stoke Holy Cross for Cringleford; pass Bressingham & Burston from South to Mid Norfolk and then pass Necton from Mid Norfolk to Broadland, you've got a working arrangement. Norwich South looks a bit uglier but functions a little better, everywhere else the impact is fairly negligible. So that works.

Moving on to Essex, my initial thoughts are that Thurrock and Chelmsford don't need any changes, and the most Colchester needs is to add East Donyland to realign to the incoming ward boundaries. Elsewhere, you can get two seats out of the rest of Colchester and Tendring districts, and ward shapes force you to reunite Clacton and Harwich (I can demonstrate this if required). So very much like the pre-2010 situation.

Uttlesford, Braintree and Maldon could combine for three seats, restoring Saffron Walden to its pre-2010 orientation and possibly leaving Priti Patel favoured over John Whittingdale in the game of musical chairs.

Harlow and Epping Forest have a little over 2.08 quotas, which is tight but not impossible. A little tinkering suggests that if you add Epping to Harlow then both seats are just below the upper limits.

Then in the south of the county you've got 2 possible options. Thurrock and Basildon can go with either Castle Point or Brentwood, for four seats in either case, whilst the remaining 5 seats are assigned to the rest of the county. Personally I like the latter option, for two reasons. The first is that there's no obvious break on a map between West Leigh and Hadleigh, whereas there's a very clear one between South Benfleet and Pitsea.

The second is that it allows you to reunite the Basildon New Town into a single constituency. Admittedly this has knock-on consequences elsewhere, as you have to carve Hutton and Shenfield out of Brentwood to get Billericay and Wickford up to quota, and the new Brentwood & East Thurrock seat would never win any beauty contests, but I figure that Basildon always loses out where constituency boundaries are concerned and it'd be nice to change that for once.

In practice, I find it unlikely the Commission will go for that, because I very much doubt it's the least change option. But in either case Labour should be slight beneficiaries in Basildon, because if the pairing is with Castle Point then SB&ET will be trading moderately Tory Pitsea SE for usually Labour central Basildon.

[greatkingrat]

Bedfordshire

Bedford (75943) - adds Bromham & Biddenham
Mid Bedfordshire (71814) - takes all of Arlesey (currently split), loses Barton-le-Clay, Toddington and Westoning, Flitton & Greenfield
North East Bedfordshire (71032) - loses Bromham & Biddenham and Arlesey
South West Bedfordshire (74509) - unchanged apart from losing part of Caddington
Luton North (74395) - loses Barnfield, gains Barton-le-Clay, Toddington and Westoning, Flitton & Greenfield
Luton South (71881) - takes all of Caddington, plus Barnfield



The rural wards being added to Luton aren't ideal, but the only alternative would be to split Dunstable.

[East Anglian Lefty]

I'm not sure that's correct. The electorate of Luton is 123,871. The electorate of the 5 Dunstable wards is 26,568. Add that together and you've got two seats with an electorate of around 75,000. The remaining four seats may be tight enough that you might end up with some odd arrangements and splitting Houghton Regis off from Dunstable isn't briliant, but mathematically there's no issue.

[greatkingrat]

Yes, it can just about work although I am not sure it is any better overall

Bedford (72777)
North West Bedfordshire (71205)
North East Bedfordshire (71126)
Luton Without (74027)
Luton North and Dunstable (77324)
Luton South (73115)

[East Anglian Lefty]

Here are three separate attempts at Essex, each with slightly different aims.



The first is intended as a least change option. Three seats are assigned to Colchester and Tendring with fairly similar boundaries to those used in 1997-2010. Three more are assigned to Uttlesford, Braintree and Maldon and again they resemble older arrangements, although the vagaries of ward sizes meant that the Maldon seat also has to include one ward from Chelmsford district (note also that Braintree has been rewarded, and under those lines the Maldon seat looks a little less jagged). Two seats are assigned to Harlow and Epping Forest. Five seats (in addition to the aforementioned orphan ward) are assigned to Brentwood, Chelmsford, Rochford and Southend. Chelmsford, Southend West and Rochford and Southend East see minimal change, whilst Rayleigh is essentially the 1997-2010 seat recreated. Brentwood sees more change, but Chelmsford's rural hinterland for Ongar is not a big difference. In the south, four seats are assigned to Thurrock, Basildon and Castle Point. Thurrock is unchanged, Castle Point gains Pitsea South-East and the centre of Basildon is shifted into South Basildon & East Thurrock.

Thurrock 75,935
South Basildon & East Thurrock 76,576
Billericay 72,457
Castle Point 76,010
Southend West 71,636
Rochford & Southend East 73,146
Rayleigh 74,684
Chelmsford 73,716
Brentwood 73,716
Epping Forest 77,500
Harlow 77,929
Saffron Walden 72,848
Braintree 75,064
Witham 74,659
North Essex 77,481
Colchester 74,140
Harwich & Clacton 77,200



Then there's this, which I think of as the Basildon option. The north and west of the county are the same, but by swapping the groupings of Brentwood and Castle Point a very different set of constituencies are produced in the south. Thurrock remains unchanged and this time Chelmsford can also keep its current boundaries. Castle Point heads west to grab West Leigh instead of parts of Pitsea, Southend West now takes in the entire town centre, Rochford & Southend West grabs both Hawkwell and Hockley (which lines up nicely with the incoming ward boundaries, unlike the least change options) and Rayleigh gains a rather appalling tail into the Mid-Essex countryside.

But the big changes are in Basildon and Brentwood. The much-divided New Town is finally given its own seat, which leaves East Thurrock with nowhere to go but Brentwood. However, the tight numerical fit means that Hutton and Shenfield (both of which are essentially Brentwood) have to be excised out and given to Billericay, which also takes in Wickford.

Electorates of changed seats:

Brentwood & East Thurrock 71,297
Billericay 71,209
Basildon 71,441
Castle Point 74,488
Southend West 78,267
Rochford & Southend East 71,423
Rayleigh 75,609
Chelmsford 78,107



Finally, this is the third option, which I came up with once it struck me that it probably wasn't strictly necessary to have two seats with long tails disconnected from their main urban centre. In this Rayleigh and Wickford remain together, Brentwood & East Thurrock is demonstrably rather than just plausibly less offensive than the current Basildon South & East Thurrock and it's Billericay which ends up being paired with wide swathes of Essex countryside (like a somewhat less silly version of the zombie review's Billericay & Great Dunmow.) The only downside is that I had to take Galleywood back out of Chelmsford to make the numbers work, but otherwise I'm really pleased with this.

Numbers:

Brentwood & East Thurrock 74,863
Rayleigh & Wickford 76,183
Billericay 71,460
Chelmsford 73,716

Thoughts, suggestions?

[East Anglian Lefty]

Feb 27, 2016 21:53:56 GMT greatkingrat said:

Yes, it can just about work although I am not sure it is any better overall

Bedford (72777)
North West Bedfordshire (71205)
North East Bedfordshire (71126)
Luton Without (74027)
Luton North and Dunstable (77324)
Luton South (73115)

Looks pretty decent to me.

[mattb]

Here are two schemes for Herts that produce 11 constituencies within quota with no ward-splitting.
There are compromises with both options that can only be avoided by crossing the county boundary or splitting wards.

In both schemes: NE Herts, Stevenage, Wel-Hat, Hert/Stort, Broxbourne, Hertsmere all as proposed by Pete W earlier (or could swap Hertford Rural South & Stanstead Abbots wards between constituencies).

Option 1
Hemel - lose Ashridge; gain Redbourn
SW Herts - lose remainder of Watford Rural parish; gain Ashridge
Watford - lose remainder of Abbots Langley parish; gain rest of Oxhey Hall/Hayling and South Oxhey ward
St Albans - lose Marshalswick N and Colney Heath; gain remainder of Abbots Langley parish
Hitch & Harp - lose Redbourn, Cadwell & Chesfield; gain Marshalswick N and Colney Heath (?re-name Central Herts?)

Option 2
Hemel - lose Kings Langley, Nash Mills; gain Tring wards and Aldbury/Wig - re-name as West Herts
SW Herts - lose Tring wards and Aldbury/Wig and rest of Ox Hall/H and CP wards; gain Kings Langley, Nash Mills
Watford - lose rest of Gade Val and Abbots Langley/Bed wards; gain rest of Oxhey Hall/Hayling
St Albans - lose Marshalswick N; gain rest of Gade Val and Abbots Langley/Bed wards
Hitch & Harp - lose Cadwell & Chesfield; gain Marshalswick N