The New Scottish Parliament Constituencies

Abstract

The fourth round of Scottish Parliament elections in May 2011 will be contested on the basis of revised constituency boundaries (as well as revised regions for list voting). In me first three sets of elections (1999, 2003 and 2007) the constituencies used were originally created for Westminster elections and first used in the 1997 UK general election. Since then, of course, much has changed with respect to electoral boundaries in Scotland. For Westminster elections, the number of Scottish constituencies was reduced from 72 to 59 in time for the 2005 general election. Since Scottish Parliament and Westminster constituencies now had different boundaries (and, in many cases, names) this created, potentially at least, a confusing situation for electors. In response, the Scottish Affairs Committee of the House of Commons voted firmly against having non-coterminous constituency boundaries for the two sorts of elections (First report, session 2003-4) but a special independent commission to consider the matter concluded that, while it would be desirable to have the same constituencies for both Westminster and Holyrood, it was not essential (Commission on Boundary Differences and Voting Systems 2006). In the event, nothing happened and the boundaries remained different. Indeed, they are set to become even more different as the current government's intention to achieve more equal constituency electorates will probably entail a further reduction in the number of Scottish Westminster seats.