Parliamentary Constituencies bill (Fourth sitting)

Debate between Maria Miller and Jane Hunt

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 4th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Mrs Miller]

Q Would more investment in GIS help?

Peter Stanyon: I am not sure that I am qualified to say that GIS would be the answer to that sort of situation. Better and more complete reporting of where changes have occurred would be beneficial to all those involved in the delineation of boundaries, whether that involves GIS or something else.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

Q Thank you for your contribution so far, Peter. I will also ask you about polling districts, and will declare an interest at this stage: in addition to being a Member of Parliament I am also a borough councillor at Charnwood Borough Council, Quorn and Mountsorrel Castle. I will talk about Quorn. In Quorn, there are two polling districts. The reason there are two—and the reason they are where they are—is that we have a football club at one end of the village and a village hall at the other end, and they are the polling stations. Is that the kind of thing that happens across the country? What is your advice on that? Do the locations of the polling stations denote polling districts as opposed to something else?

Peter Stanyon: That is a fair summation. The legislation is currently worded to say that you start at the top and work down; the reality is that most polling district reviews are based on working upwards, based on the availability of premises. The key point for any review of polling districts is that the locations—the polling places—must be accessible to the majority of electors. In the case you have described, the decision, which was presumably made by the local authority, is that there are two good venues with good accessibility, so it would make sense to use both venues in that situation. In other cases, there will be a surfeit of venues, making it far more difficult. It really depends in many respects on what premises or locations are available. In some locations you see temporary buildings, such as portakabins and caravans, because there is physically nothing else for returning officers to use.

Parliamentary Constituencies bill (First sitting)

Debate between Maria Miller and Jane Hunt

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 18th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Jane Hunt]

Q Ward splitting was referred to previously. How would that work in Wales? There was some reference to some wards being too large, which gives me the idea that single-seat wards would be a good idea for the future. How would that work in Wales? Are there areas where local government wards are too large?

Shereen Williams: Like our colleagues in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, we use electoral wards as our building blocks. However, if there was great difficulty, we would use community wards within the electoral ward. In the past, we have put forward proposals where one or two parliamentary constituencies had a split ward in them. It is a route that we would rather not take because it creates confusion for voters when you have a different local authority and a different parliamentary constituency compared with somebody who is in the same electoral ward as you.

[Mrs Miller]

Q I start by thanking Shereen for her evidence today. In your evidence, you have highlighted the specific challenges in Wales because of the beautiful geography you have. Can you and the Welsh commission learn from the experience in Scotland, when they undertook a very significant review of boundaries in the ’80s—I am sure Scottish members of the Committee can remind me exactly when that was—when there was major reorganisation? It is a challenge, but it is one that has been successfully undertaken in Scotland and perhaps now the challenge falls to Wales. Is there any learning you can get from that?

Shereen Williams: The four Boundary Commissions are in regular contact. We rely on each other and we share good practice on a regular basis. In terms of those changes that have taken place in Scotland, I cannot imagine why we would not be able to invite Scottish colleagues to present to commissioners and to inform our thinking on how we deliver this report for Wales.