Boundary change recommendations for the next UK general election

Between 2003 and 2006, the Boundary Commissions conducted their periodic reviews of constituency boundaries in England, Wales and Northern Ireland for the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The representation changes from that review are now in place, in time for the next United Kingdom general election, which is required to be held by 2010.

Review process

The Boundary Commission is legally required, by the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 (as amended by the Boundary Commissions Act 1992), to conduct a general review of all the constituencies in England every eight to twelve years to ensure the size and composition of constituencies are as fair as possible. The Commission’s recommendations throughout the review must by law be based on the numbers of electors on the electoral registers on that date.

After completion of the latest review, the recommendations were sent to the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs on 31 October 2006. They were approved by Parliament on 27 June 2007.

Constituencies in Wales are also reviewed every 8-12 years by the Boundary Commission for Wales, which has completed its latest review which was laid before Parliament on 14 December 2005. Scotland saw its most recent large-scale review complete in 2004 the boundaries of which were those in use in the 2005 General Election in Scotland.

Changes

In England review areas are usually based on local authority boundaries, usually ceremonial county boundaries, with Unitary Authorities only being regarded as separate review areas in special cases. York for example has been split into two constituencies with no electoral wards from North Yorkshire.

Some areas of England have been awarded extra constituencies in the review, including Lancashire, and the Essex review area. Other review areas have had one constituency removed, such as Tyne and Wear. Greater London as a whole is reviewed on borough-by-borough basis and has lost two constituencies overall.

In Wales, the total number of seats is to remain at 40, although new seats have been recommended by radical redrawing of boundaries in Clwyd and Gwynedd; Arfon and Dwyfor Meirionnydd could replace Caernarfon and Meirionnydd Nant Conwy respectively; Aberconwy could replace Conwy. Currently Welsh constituencies have on average 25,000 fewer people than their counterparts in England

The Northern Ireland Boundary Commission announced in 2006 that minor changes would take place in the east of the province to its existing constituencies.

Scotland is the only part of the United Kingdom with no changes made to parliamentary representation. These changes in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will be the first major changes in the composition of UK Parliamentary constituencies outside of Scotland since 1997.

The current list of recommended constituencies in England, Scotland and Wales is in "Constituencies in the next United Kingdom general election".

One consequence of boundary reviews is the notional changing of representation of some constituencies where calculations of voting intentions suggest a party other than the victor at the last general election would have been successful had the boundaries been in place.

Notional changes in representation as a consequence of the current boundary reviews can be summarised as below:

Currently held by Labour, notionally held by the Conservatives

*Finchley And Golders Green
*Ealing Central and Acton
*Enfield North
*Portsmouth North
*Rochester and Strood
*Sittingbourne and Sheppey
*North East Somerset¹
*Selby and Ainsty²
*South Thanet
*Wirral West

¹ The successor to Wansdyke² The successor to Selby

Currently held by the Liberal Democrats, notionally held by the Conservatives

*Solihull

Currently held by the Conservatives, notionally held by Labour

*Croydon Central¹

¹ Held by Andrew Pelling, who was elected as a Conservative but currently sits as an Independent.

Currently held by Plaid Cymru, notionally held by Labour

*Arfon ¹

¹ The successor to Caernarfon

New and abolished constituencies

It is not always easy to clearly identify newly created constituencies or those abolished during the review process.

The following constituencies are amongst those which are regarded as being replaced during the most recent review process:
*Barnsley West and Penistone
*Barnsley East and Mexborough
*Birmingham Sparkbrook and Small Heath
*Blackpool North and Fleetwood
*Brent East
*Brent South
*Eccles
*Hammersmith and Fulham
*Kensington and Chelsea
*Knowsley North and Sefton East
*Lancaster and Wyre
*Meirionnydd Nant Conwy
*Normanton
*Rugby and Kenilworth
*Sheffield Hillsborough
*Tyne Bridge
*Vale of York

The following constituencies are amongst those which are regarded as brand new creations. It should be noted that South Leicestershire is a renamed Blaby; Rochester and Strood is a renamed Medway; Conwy has had minor alterations and is renamed Aberconwy and the existing Cotswold seat has been given the new name The Cotswolds.

*Barnsley East
*Brent Central
*Broadland
*Central Devon
*Chelsea and Fulham
*Chippenham
*Dwyfor Meirionnydd
*Filton and Bradley Stoke
*Gateshead
*Kenilworth and Southam
*Kensington
*Knowsley
*Meon Valley
*Mid Derbyshire
*Pensistone and Stocksbridge
*South Northamptonshire
*Rugby
*Salford and Eccles
*Sefton Central
*St Austell and Newquay
*Sunderland Central
*Wentworth and Dearne
*Witham
*Wyre and Preston North
*York Outer