Khunanup
Lib Dem
Portsmouth Liberal Democrats
Posts: 11,488
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Post by Khunanup on Oct 4, 2016 18:07:38 GMT
Yes, I'm booked into the Portsmouth hearing. Interestingly, having just checked the dates, I am probably in Portsmouth on the 27th. (It's half term and I'm doing the Gt Sth Run on the Sunday). Won't look to speak but might well pop in briefly just to see how they work - do you have a time for when you are speaking or is it pretty random? You have to book yourself in for a time. My spot is 15:00 on the 27th.
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Adrian
Co-operative Party
Posts: 1,726
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Post by Adrian on Oct 4, 2016 18:50:56 GMT
I'm sorry, but that's BS. I can't imagine "out of order" is right, but I suspect the point that the Commission won't take a Dyfed/Powys counterproposal very seriously if it doesn't address the knock-on effects in the rest of Wales is right. I'm certainly assuming that if I'm going to submit a counter-proposal for the Sheffield area I need to include something about the rest of Yorkshire, though I'd rather concentrate on the areas I know best. No, it's not right. There is nothing to stop Joe Bloggs proposing that Stryd Buddug should be in seat X instead of seat Y because Z. The Commission might respectfully ask whether this will have any knock-on effects, but they certainly have no right to disallow the contribution. Whoever said it really ought to be more careful in how they're phrasing things, because it would certainly be illegal for them to dissuade people from speaking or writing because of such considerations.
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Post by greatkingrat on Oct 4, 2016 19:12:41 GMT
Let's not forget that the readers of this forum are not the average contributor. Probably 95% of the responses the Commission receives will not be proper counter-proposals, just people saying that their local ward should be in seat X rather than seat Y.
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Post by An Sionnach Flannbhuí on Oct 4, 2016 19:37:37 GMT
Do I imagine Harry Hayfield's ideas in 2011 were not "ruled out of order" but merely assessed a later date to be the sort of proposal he sometimes proffers here and not accepted? That's a very different thing.
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Post by lennon on Oct 4, 2016 19:46:29 GMT
Let's not forget that the readers of this forum are not the average contributor. Probably 95% of the responses the Commission receives will not be proper counter-proposals, just people saying that their local ward should be in seat X rather than seat Y. If you are including online comments, then I'd be astonished if it were as low as 95%. I would expect people booking to speak at a specific hearing to be more in line with this forum however.
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Adrian
Co-operative Party
Posts: 1,726
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Post by Adrian on Nov 2, 2016 19:20:34 GMT
How many people have been to a hearing so far? Who will I see at the Birmingham hearing tomorrow?
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Adrian
Co-operative Party
Posts: 1,726
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Post by Adrian on Nov 3, 2016 16:04:37 GMT
Damn Apple - I decided not to have a powerpoint but just a series of pictures, but the Commission's Macbook couldn't cope - so that threw me a bit.
Most of the day spent listening to Tories claiming that Stockland Green is not in Erdington.
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Post by greenchristian on Nov 3, 2016 18:52:54 GMT
Damn Apple - I decided not to have a powerpoint but just a series of pictures, but the Commission's Macbook couldn't cope - so that threw me a bit. Most of the day spent listening to Tories claiming that Stockland Green is not in Erdington. What did you think of the various proposals? I did quite a bit of work on putting the Green Party's proposal together (though I wasn't there to see it presented), I'd be interested to see what people there thought about it (if, indeed, it stuck in your memory).
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Adrian
Co-operative Party
Posts: 1,726
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Post by Adrian on Nov 3, 2016 19:17:03 GMT
Damn Apple - I decided not to have a powerpoint but just a series of pictures, but the Commission's Macbook couldn't cope - so that threw me a bit. Most of the day spent listening to Tories claiming that Stockland Green is not in Erdington. What did you think of the various proposals? I did quite a bit of work on putting the Green Party's proposal together (though I wasn't there to see it presented), I'd be interested to see what people there thought about it (if, indeed, it stuck in your memory). Just off to orienteering club AGM, will feed back later in WM thread. But: maps, why no maps?
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Post by greenchristian on Nov 3, 2016 19:46:58 GMT
What did you think of the various proposals? I did quite a bit of work on putting the Green Party's proposal together (though I wasn't there to see it presented), I'd be interested to see what people there thought about it (if, indeed, it stuck in your memory). Just off to orienteering club AGM, will feed back later in WM thread. But: maps, why no maps? Same reason we didn't actually present anything for the Black Country - local parties didn't give us maps in their submissions, and didn't have enough time to prettify it up before submitting. Maybe we should have just included screenshots from boundary assistant. Apologies.
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Post by greenhert on Nov 11, 2016 22:36:51 GMT
Today I attended a BCE hearing in Cambridge re: East of England constituencies.
I made the longest speech that day (to a sparse audience since most people were at work/university during the hearing) about the importance of considering transport connections particularly in Hertfordshire, Essex, and Cambridgeshire. I stated that my ideas (and associated constituency maps) were available on my blog and I shared it with members of the public present.
A Mr William McCarthy of Chelmsford suggested that there should be two Chelmsford constituencies (as there were from 1997 to 2010 i.e. West Chelmsford and Maldon & East Chelmsford) because he wanted no Chelmsford wards in a Saffron Walden constituency (he has a good point there) and did not northern villages in the Chelmsford district to be paired with Brentwood either due to the poor road links (I did point out to him that it was still better connected than the current Brentwood & Ongar constituency, which Mr McCarthy stated was a leftovers constituency). He supported my idea of Loughton (i.e. all of the Epping Forest district not in an expanded Harlow constituency).
At said hearing, I was reminded by a kindly gentleman from Cambridgeshire that there was no point in reviving old constituency names like Ramsey and Wisbech and that adding Fletton was a wise idea because it formed part of the old Soke of Peterborough.
It was an excellent learning curve for us all.
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Foggy
Non-Aligned
Long may it rain
Posts: 5,501
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Post by Foggy on Nov 18, 2016 0:55:22 GMT
I spoke at the afternoon session of the Bristol hearings today, presenting an alternative plan for the South West. I sat in Harriet Bradley's seat in the chamber when not at the lectern. I read a chapter of Engel's England and played Puzzle Bobble on the 3DS during the downtime. I handed in my notes and the data in spreadsheet form afterwards in case any of the interested parties wanted them. I was cross-examined by a local Lib Dem activist who didn't like what I'd done to Wiltshire (and to be fair, he had a point) but also claimed Somerton & Frome should not be left unchanged because it was an "artificial creation" from... 1983. A Tory councillor then piped up to object to one South Gloucestershire seat of mine. Neither of the people who challenged me seemed to appreciate my unquestionable improvements to Dorset. The chair's expression gave nothing away about what the Assistant Commissioners will make of them. I got the feeling I'd missed out on all the fun in the pre-lunch session when the main parties probably gave their counter-proposals. I do hope the Greens were among them as I saw nobody who obviously identified as such although I passed the window of an office of theirs on the way in after navigating through the wind and rain. I presume at least one of the silent note-takers was from Labour. A Gloucestershire County Councillor then presented findings from a self-selecting survey of local residents in the Quedgeley area on behalf of himself and some colleagues from neighbouring divisions, and urged the Commission to take it on board. He did not offer any alternative to moving those wards into Stroud, and most of the reasons given suggested he thought they were switching districts rather than parliamentary constituencies. A member of the public turned up just on time. He became defensive when asked to give his address, eventually submitting a postcode for an area just to the west of the railway line between Lawrence Hill and Stapleton Road railway stations. He said the the former ward should be put in Bristol East along with Easton, because he had friends in Easton and didn't want to be in a different constituency from them. He also rambled about the lack of a fairer electoral system in this country. Unlike with the councillor, the activists actually took him to task on this first complaint (the second not being relevant to the discussion on this occasion). When pressed, he did at least concede that the knock-on effect was that a ward would have to be taken from Bristol North West into Bristol West – but stopped short of recognising that the former would then be under quota – which shows that he'd at least done some research and given it some thought. I left shortly after 4pm as the session had been adjourned until 6pm and I had other plans in Bridgwater for the evening. There was some on-topic chatter between the presentations, from which a choice quote would be "the whole system is completely f... lawed." There were only two further speakers scheduled yesterday and not many today either. I shan't be able to be the forum's mole in the camp for that, I'm afraid. It must be tedious for those who have to be there the whole time. I find via the guestbook that the MP for Plymouth Sutton & Devonport had already testified (despite the fact that there have already been hearings in Truro and Exeter) and via the local news that Jacob Rees-Mogg had also attended earlier.
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