Rochford District Council September 2014 Rochford District Electoral Review Warding Patterns Submission www.rochford.gov.uk Rochford District Council – Rochford District Electoral Review – Warding Patterns Submission Contents Page Introduction ..................................................................................................... 3 Rochford District Proposed Wards – Tabled Summary ................................... 6 Rochford District Proposed Wards – Mapped ................................................. 7 Rochford District Proposed Wards – Overlayed with Parish Boundaries ........ 8 Appendix 1 – Ward 1 Foulness and the Wakerings ........................................ 9 Appendix 2 – Ward 2(a) Roche South .......................................................... 11 Appendix 3 – Ward 2(b) Roche North ........................................................... 14 Appendix 4 – Ward 3 Rochford Central ........................................................ 17 Appendix 5 – Ward 4 Hawkwell East ............................................................ 19 Appendix 6 – Ward 5 Hawkwell West ........................................................... 22 Appendix 7 – Ward 6 Hockley and Ashingdon .............................................. 25 Appendix 8 – Ward 7 Hockley ....................................................................... 28 Appendix 9 – Ward 8 Hullbridge ................................................................... 30 Appendix 10 – Ward 9 Downhall and Rawreth .............................................. 32 Appendix 11 – Ward 10 Sweyne Park and Grange ....................................... 34 Appendix 12 – Ward 11 Wheatley ................................................................. 36 Appendix 13 – Ward 12 Trinity ...................................................................... 38 Appendix 14 – Ward 13 Lodge...................................................................... 40 2 Rochford District Council – Rochford District Electoral Review – Warding Patterns Submission Introduction Rochford District Background Information The District of Rochford is situated within a peninsula between the Rivers Thames and Crouch, and is bounded to the East by the North Sea. The District has land boundaries with Basildon, Castle Point and Southend-on-Sea Borough Councils. It also has marine boundaries with Maldon and Chelmsford Districts. It is located within south Essex, with linkages to the M25 via the A127 and the A13 and direct rail links to London. The majority of London Southend Airport lies within the District. The Rochford District covers an area of 65 square miles and is home to around 83,000 people. The District is one with an ever-increasing percentage of older residents. It is predominantly rural with three larger urban areas and a number of smaller settlements. The District’s towns and villages are diverse in character reflecting their history, location and size. The character, layout and form of groups of buildings, streets and spaces make a significant contribution to providing a sense of place and adding to the quality of life in town and country. Residents have a strong sense of identity with their own settlement. The District is considered to be reasonably affluent and has, relative, to other areas in the County, few issues affecting it. Council Size On 15 April 2014 Full Council agreed the recommendation from the Working Group to propose to the Local Government Boundary Commission for England (“LGBCE”) that the Council size remains at 39 Councillors. On 22 July 2014, the LGBCE formally confirmed they were minded to recommend this number. Electoral Review Working Group and Wider Council Involvement A Member Working Group was set up by Council on 28 January 2014 with the purpose of making recommendations to Full Council in relation to the electoral review of the District. The group comprises representative Members from all political groups and has met on several occasions in order to make recommendations to Full Council on the issues of Council size, proposed Warding patterns and Ward names. Working Group Members have been fully involved in determining the proposed Warding arrangements in a positive, collaborative fashion and were able to reach consensus in recommending their proposal to Full Council. Save for one Member who has put forward their own proposal to the LGBCE, all Members of Full Council approved the recommendation of the Working Group on 4 September and this forms the basis of the Council’s submission within this document. There has been a generally consensual approach to this task from its inception and the Council is proud of the fact the all groups have put aside political differences to propose Wards which make sense for the electorate and local communities. Members, by virtue of their roles and backgrounds have very good knowledge of the District, particularly the areas they represent. The proposal within this document is very much a reflection of that local knowledge and seeks to create new Wards which provide excellent levels of electoral equality, whilst also maintaining existing community ties. 3 Rochford District Council – Rochford District Electoral Review – Warding Patterns Submission Parishes and Community Identity A Parish is the embodiment a local community. It is for that very reason the Council decided to use Parish Council boundary lines as its main building blocks for proposing new Wards. It is clear from the attached proposal plan that divisions of Parishes have been kept to an absolute minimum. Given the criterion of electoral equality, it was evident that some splits would occur due to electoral numbers being too low or too high by for example using one or more entire Parishes as a building block to create a new Ward. This would have been the case for example if the Parish of Hockley were to be used as a building block for new Ward which alone would have a forecast of 8,042 electors; well in excess of the permitted electoral tolerances. The Council (in collaboration with the LGBCE) has endeavoured to keep Parish/Town Councils and other groups fully engaged with the electoral review process. As well as the LGBCE attending public committee meetings at the start of the process, a Parish focussed meeting was arranged on 5th August 2014 which was attended by the majority of Parishes across the District. Given the District Council’s proposals are predominantly based on Parish boundary lines, it is hoped that this will be acceptable to Parish Councils whose local communities are for the most part being kept entirely intact. Electoral Equality Excellent levels of electoral equality have been achieved for the immediate and longer term. It is only in one proposed Ward where electoral equality has not been achieved for the present electorate, namely Ward 3 Rochford Central. This is because of a major housing development of over 500 dwellings being forecasted to be delivered within six years. As such, it is unavoidable for the present electorate to be over-represented by 20% but is forecast to improve to a level of -2.20% by 2020 and hence the Council is of the view that this is considered acceptable and in line with LGBCE guidance. Save for that isolated example, all other Ward proposals are all well within tolerance and allow considerable room for manoeuvre in the event of population changes which are not quite in accordance with the forecasted figures. Three-Member Wards Approach As the Council operates a system of elections by thirds, it has where practicable proposed Warding arrangements of three Member Wards. This is with the exception of Wards 2(a) Roche South consisting of 1 Member and Ward 2(b) Roche North consisting of two Members. The Working Group and then Full Council determined that for the reasons of effective and convenient local government it would be better to arrange the Wards in this fashion. If the Ward were to be proposed as a single three-Member Ward it would have been by far the biggest Ward in the District and very difficult to represent from a practical point of view. Furthermore, as a three Member Ward it would contain a higher number of distinct Parish Councils/Communities which would potentially lead to increased workloads for those Members. In addition, given the relatively large distances between those communities (as one Ward) there would be little connection between some of those communities, particularly those furthest away from each other. 4 Rochford District Council – Rochford District Electoral Review – Warding Patterns Submission New Ward Names In accordance with LGBCE guidance the proposed Ward names are considered to be distinct and easily identifiable. For example, the split Wards discussed above are named “Roche North” and “Roche South” which is a reflection of geographical features in the areas and very easy to distinguish by the electorate. These names were deliberated upon by the Working Group and Full Council, namely by Council Members who have excellent local knowledge and appreciate the subtleties of prosing apt names for their areas. Post Full Council agreeing the names as shown within the summary table on the following page, a further Member suggestion was put forward in respect of Wards 6 and 7 for the names Hockley East & Ashingdon and Hockley West respectively which the Boundary Commission is asked to note as part of their considerations. 5 Rochford District Council – Rochford District Electoral Review – Warding Patterns Submission Rochford District Proposed Wards – Tabled Summary Ward