Final Recommendations on the Future Electoral Arrangements for St Helens
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Final recommendations on the future electoral arrangements for St Helens Report to The Electoral Commission March 2003 © Crown Copyright 2003 Applications for reproduction should be made to: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office Copyright Unit. The mapping in this report is reproduced from OS mapping by The Electoral Commission with the permission of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, © Crown Copyright. Unauthorised reproduction infringes Crown Copyright and may lead to prosecution or civil proceedings. Licence Number: GD 03114G. This report is printed on recycled paper. Report no: 327 2 Contents Page What is The Boundary Committee for England? 5 Summary 7 1 Introduction 11 2 Current electoral arrangements 13 3 Draft recommendations 17 4 Responses to consultation 19 5 Analysis and final recommendations 21 6 What happens next? 47 Appendix A Final recommendations for St Helens: Detailed mapping 48 B Guide to interpreting the first draft of the electoral change Order 50 C First draft of electoral change Order for St Helens 51 3 4 What is The Boundary Committee for England? The Boundary Committee for England is a committee of The Electoral Commission, an independent body set up by Parliament under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. The functions of the Local Government Commission for England were transferred to The Electoral Commission and its Boundary Committee on 1 April 2002 by the Local Government Commission for England (Transfer of Functions) Order 2001 (SI 2001 No. 3692). The Order also transferred to The Electoral Commission the functions of the Secretary of State in relation to taking decisions on recommendations for changes to local authority electoral arrangements and implementing them. Members of the Committee are: Pamela Gordon (Chair) Professor Michael Clarke CBE Robin Gray Joan Jones CBE Ann M Kelly Professor Colin Mellors Archie Gall (Director) We are required by law to review the electoral arrangements of every principal local authority in England. Our aim is to ensure that the number of electors represented by each councillor in an area is as nearly as possible the same, taking into account local circumstances. We can recommend changes to ward boundaries, the number of councillors and ward names. We can also recommend changes to the electoral arrangements of parish councils. This report sets out our final recommendations on the electoral arrangements for the borough of St Helens in Merseyside. 5 6 Summary We began a review of the electoral arrangements of St Helens on 4 December 2001. We published our draft recommendations for electoral arrangements on 3 September 2002, after which we undertook an eight-week period of consultation. We now submit final recommendations to The Electoral Commission. • This report summarises the representations that we received during consultation on our draft recommendations, and contains our final recommendations to The Electoral Commission. We found that the existing arrangements provide unequal representation of electors in St Helens: • in eight of the 18 wards the number of electors represented by each councillor varies by more than 10% from the average for the borough and four wards vary by more than 20%; • by 2006 this situation is expected to worsen, with the number of electors per councillor forecast to vary by more than 10% from the average in nine wards and by more than 20% in four wards. Our main final recommendations for future electoral arrangements (see Tables 1 and 2 and paragraphs 140-141) are that: • St Helens Borough Council should have 48 councillors, six fewer than at present; • there should be 16 wards, instead of 18 as at present; • the boundaries of 17 of the existing wards should be modified, resulting in a net reduction of two, and only one ward, Rainhill, should retain its existing boundaries. The purpose of these proposals is to ensure that, in future, each borough councillor represents approximately the same number of electors, bearing in mind local circumstances. • In 10 of the proposed 16 wards the number of electors per councillor would vary by no more than 10% from the borough average. • This improved level of electoral equality is forecast to continue, with the number of electors per councillor in only three wards - Bold, Rainford and Rainhill - expected to vary by more than 10% from the average for the borough in 2006. Recommendations are also made for changes to parish council electoral arrangements which provide for: • revised warding arrangements and the redistribution of councillors for the parishes of Bold and Windle; • revised warding arrangements and an increase in the number of councillors serving Seneley Green Parish Council; • a decrease in the number of councillors serving Eccleston Parish Council. 7 All further correspondence on these final recommendations and the matters discussed in this report should be addressed to The Electoral Commission, which will not make an Order implementing them before six weeks after publication of the Final Report. The information in the representations will be available for public access once the Order has been made. The Secretary The Electoral Commission Trevelyan House Great Peter Street London SW1P 2HW Fax: 020 7271 0667 Email: [email protected] (This address should only be used for this purpose) 8 Table 1: Final recommendations: Summary Ward name Number of Constituent areas Large Map councillors reference 1 Billinge & Seneley Billinge Chapel End parish; the proposed Seneley 3 2 Green Green North parish ward of Seneley Green parish 2 Blackbrook the proposed Seneley Green South parish ward of 3 Seneley Green parish; part of Blackbrook ward; part 2 of Broad Oak ward; part of Haydock ward 3 Bold Bold parish; part of Sutton & Bold ward; part of West 3 4 Sutton ward 4 Earlestown 3 part of Newton East ward; part of Newton West ward 2,3 and 4 5 Eccleston Eccleston parish; part of Grange Park ward; part of 3 1,2 and 4 Queen’s Park ward; part of Thatto Heath ward 6 Haydock the proposed Seneley Green East parish ward of 3 2,3 and 4 Seneley Green parish; part of Haydock ward 7 Moss Bank 3 Moss Bank ward; part of Blackbrook ward 2 8 Newton 3 part of Newton East ward; part of Newton West ward 3 9 Parr 3 part of Broad Oak ward; part of Sutton & Bold ward 2 and 4 10 Rainford Rainford ward; the proposed Windle North parish 3 1 and 2 ward of Windle parish; part of Windle ward 11 Rainhill 3 Unchanged: Rainhill parish 4 12 Sutton part of Marshalls Cross ward; part of Sutton and Bold 3 4 ward 13 Thatto Heath part of Grange Park ward; part of Thatto Heath ward; 3 4 part of West Sutton ward 14 Town Centre part of Marshalls Cross ward; part of Grange Park 3 ward; part of Parr & Hardshaw ward; part of Queen’s 2 and 4 Park ward; part of West Sutton ward 15 West Park part of Grange Park ward; part of Queen’s Park ward; 3 2 and 4 part of Thatto Heath ward 16 Windle the proposed Windle South parish ward of Windle 3 1 and 2 parish; part of Windle ward; part of Queen’s Park ward Notes: 1) There are seven parishes in the borough and they comprise parts of eight wards, as indicated above. 2) The wards on the above table are illustrated on Map 2, Map A1 and the large maps. 3) We have made a number of minor boundary amendments to ensure that existing ward boundaries adhere to ground detail. These changes do not affect any electors. 9 Table 2: Final recommendations for St Helens Number of Variance Number of Variance Number of Electorate electors from Electorate electors from Ward name councillors (2001) per average (2006) per average councillor % councillor % Billinge & Seneley 1 3 9,457 3,152 11 9,547 3,182 9 Green 2 Blackbrook 3 8,818 2,939 3 8,617 2,872 -1 3 Bold 3 7,018 2,339 -18 7,563 2,521 -13 4 Earlestown 3 7,617 2,539 -11 8,007 2,669 -8 5 Eccleston 3 9,326 3,109 9 9,239 3,080 6 6 Haydock 3 8,956 2,985 5 9,243 3,081 6 7 Moss Bank 3 9,038 3,013 6 8,977 2,992 3 8 Newton 3 8,272 2,757 -3 8,256 2,752 -5 9 Parr 3 8,472 2,824 -1 9,224 3,075 6 10 Rainford 3 7,083 2,361 -17 7,133 2,378 -18 11 Rainhill 3 9,646 3,215 13 9,697 3,232 11 12 Sutton 3 9,464 3,155 11 9,337 3,112 7 13 Thatto Heath 3 7,956 2,652 -7 8,728 2,909 0 14 Town Centre 3 8,284 2,761 -3 9,031 3,010 3 15 West Park 3 8,953 2,984 5 8,855 2,952 1 16 Windle 3 8,147 2,716 -5 8,172 2,724 -6 Totals 48 136,507 - - 139,626 - - Average - - 2,844 - - 2,909 - Note: The ‘variance from average’ column shows by how far, in percentage terms, the number of electors per councillor varies from the average for the borough. The minus symbol (-) denotes a lower than average number of electors. Figures have been rounded to the nearest whole number. 10 1 Introduction 1 This report contains our final recommendations for the electoral arrangements for the borough of St Helens. We are reviewing the five metropolitan boroughs in Merseyside as part of our programme of periodic electoral reviews (PERs) of all 386 principal local authority areas in England. The programme started in 1996 and is currently expected to finish in 2004.