Tag Archives: Charles Pattie

Another nail – but whose coffin? Redrawing Britain’s constituency map (again) and the future of the UK’s voting system

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For the third time in just over a decade, a new map of parliamentary constituencies is being designed. This one will likely be implemented. Charles Pattie and David Rossiter argue that, despite the misconceptions of both Labour and the Conservatives, the review is neither a ‘gerrymander’ against one, nor redressing an imbalance that harmed the other. But these entrenched views could yet threaten the future of First Past the Post as the system for Westminster elections.

Here we go again. For the third time since 2010, a new map of Westminster parliamentary constituencies is being designed. The Boundary Commission for England released its preliminary proposals on 8 June (the Commissions for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will follow suit in the coming months). Final recommendations will appear in the summer of 2023. This time (the previous two attempts at redistricting faltered before being implemented) the new map is very likely to be adopted. And if past reviews are any guide, the process will be carried out amidst claims and counterclaims regarding potential winners and losers, and whether there is deliberate bias in the process.

Of course, redrawing the constituency map inevitably involves winners and losers, even when (as in the UK) done by politically impartial Commissioners. Previous reviews have tended to result in relative losses of seats for Labour and gains for the Conservatives (smaller parties tend to suffer greater disadvantages from the disproportional nature of First Past the Post (FPTP) than from the effects of boundary reviews). Some Labour figures are likely to argue (as they have done in the past) that the review is a gerrymander against their party, and so drives a nail into the coffin of its electoral chances. On the other side some Conservatives will argue the review simply redresses substantial anti-Conservative bias in the old seats – a nail in the coffin in which that bias is to be buried.

Both views are wrong, but for different reasons.

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The Parliamentary Constituencies Bill: no fewer MPs but a very different constituency map

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Pontefract_Parliamentary_Borough_1832A new bill currently before parliament alters the rules governing the periodic redrawing of the UK’s parliamentary constituencies, most notably by replacing a requirement to limit the House of Commons to 600 MPs with a new fixed size, set at the current 650. But, as Ron Johnston, David Rossiter and Charles Pattie show, the new rules are just as likely as those they replace to result in major disruption to the constituency map at all future reviews. 

In 2011, the coalition government passed the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act, which changed the rules guiding how the UK’s parliamentary constituencies are drawn up. Boundary reviews were to take place every five years (more frequently than before). Almost all new seats (with four exceptions) were to have electorates within +/-5% of the national quota (the average electorate). And the House of Commons was to be reduced in size from 650 to 600 MPs. To date, the Boundary Commissions have conducted two redistricting exercises under the 2011 Act. Neither review has been implemented: the first was lost to infighting in the coalition, and the second was tabled in September 2018 but has not yet been approved by parliament. The proposed changes they contained would have produced the largest shake-up in Britain’s constituency map in modern times.

Now the redistricting rules look set to change again. The Parliamentary Constituencies Bill 2019-21, published on 20 May, is now moving through its Committee Stage in parliament. It retains the requirements that all constituencies (with four exceptions) should have an electorate within +/-5% of the national average, but changes the number of constituencies to 650 – the argument being that with Brexit there will be more work for MPs, and thus a need for more of them, than if we had remained a member of the EU. If the Bill is passed, the Boundary Commissions will be required to recommend a new set of 650 constituencies by 1 July 2023 – in time for the next general election, due in May 2024. Subsequent reviews will then take place on a slightly longer timetable than under the 2011 Act – every eight years. Continue reading →

The Constitution Unit blog in 2018: a year in review

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2018 has been an interesting year for the UK constitution, its institutions and those involved in studying or working within them. As the year draws to a close, blog editor Dave Busfield-Birch offers a roundup of the most popular blogs of the year, as well as a look at the reach of the blog through the lens of its readership statistics. 

Obviously, Brexit has made this a very interesting time to work in political science, and the blog has benefited both in terms of increased general interest as a result, but also because there are niche topics being discussed in public now that would have generated little interest in other years. Few, for example, would have predicted in May 2016 that whether or not a motion in the House of Commons was amendable would become a hot political topic.

Below are our most popular blogs from the past year, as well as two personal selections from me, at the end of my first twelve months as blog editor.

Editor’s pick

‘Gendered Vulnerability’ and representation in United States politics by Jeffrey Lazarus and Amy Steigerwalt.

This was obviously a tough decision, but if you were to ask me for my favourite post of the year, this would be my instinctive choice. Jeffrey Lazarus and Amy Steigerwalt discuss their new book, Gendered Vulnerability: How Women Work Harder to Stay in Office, which argues that women’s perception of a more difficult electoral landscape leads them to adopt distinct, and more constituent-oriented, legislative strategies than their male counterparts. It is a fascinating insight into the challenges faced by women in running for, securing and retaining office. A similar blog on the UK experience, entitled Strategies for Success, was written by Leah Culhane in November. Continue reading →

Beating the boundaries? The stalled debate on how to draw up the UK’s parliamentary constituencies

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A major 2011 shake-up of the rules governing how the UK’s parliamentary constituencies are drawn has proved controversial. While the new rules deal with the long-standing issue of substantial inequalities in constituency electorates, they also threaten frequent major disruption of the country’s constituency map. But attempts to square the circle by revising the 2011 legislation seem stalled, and the new rules themselves have yet to result in new constituencies. Charles Pattie, Ron Johnston and David Rossiter offer their view of where we are, and where we should go from here.

Largely unnoticed outside Westminster, an important debate has been going on over how to redraw the UK’s constituency map. The current rules for doing so are enshrined in the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 (the Constituencies Act). But since the start of this year, two major proposals have been made to revise aspects of the Act. In February, the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) published a report setting out its proposals (and in late May, the government responded). And a private member’s bill sponsored by Labour MP Afzal Khan, containing a different set of recommended changes is still making its way through parliament. Continue reading →

The number of ‘safe’ seats should be reduced to strengthen UK democracy and increase participation

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Ron Johnston, Charles Pattie and David Rossiter have argued that an IPPR report’s proposal that constituency boundaries should be gerrymandered to produce more marginal seats would be neither feasible nor sensible. The authors of the report, Sarah Birch and Mathew Lawrence, respond here. They suggest that a boundary delimitation outcome entailing more competitive results would not necessarily be more ‘political’, but it would be more democratic.

The UK has become significantly more unequal politically over the course of the past 30 years. Whereas in the 1970s and 1980s there were only small differences in rates of electoral participation between young and old,  advantaged and disadvantaged groups, by 2015 these differences had turned into gaping chasms. Fewer than half of 18–24 year-olds voted in the recent general election, compared to nearly four-fifths of the over-65s, while three-quarters of ‘AB’ individuals who were registered to vote actually did so, against just over half of ‘DE’ registered voters.

Differential electoral participation matters for democracy. If certain sectors of the electorate are known to vote with lower frequency, politicians are less likely to consider their interests when making policy. The result is policy that fails the inclusivity test, and also increased disaffection among members of those groups who – rightly – feel neglected by politicians. Disaffection in turn strengthens alienation and reinforces electoral abstention, generating a vicious cycle of under-participation and under-representation.

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