Posted on Wednesday 9th November 2022
Alan White
Staffordshire residents can have their say on revised parliamentary constituency boundaries published this week.
The Boundary Commission for England is running its consultation on the proposals until December 5.
So far, the commission has taken into consideration over 45,000 comments sent in by the public during the previous two stages of public consultation and has changed nearly half of its initial proposals based on this feedback.
This is the third and final consultation on the new map of revised constituency proposals. People can view and comment on the new map at bcereviews.org.uk
In Staffordshire, the new constituency boundaries take in:
• Stone and Great Wyrley (includes Penkridge)
• Stafford (including rural areas to the west)
• Cannock Chase
• Burton (and Uttoxeter)
• Newcastle
• Lichfield
• Kingswinford and South Staffs
• Tamworth
• Staffs Moorlands
• Stoke-on-Trent South (including villages north of Stone and Staffordshire Moorlands)
• Stoke-on-Trent North (including Kidsgrove)
Staffordshire County Council leader Alan White said:
The Boundary Commission for England’s review of parliamentary constituencies does include some significant changes for Staffordshire.
It’s important that people across the county feed back into the consultation and we’d encourage people to have their say ahead of its close on December 5.”
The commission is undertaking an independent review of all constituencies in England. The number of electors within each constituency currently varies widely due to population changes since the last boundary review.
The 2023 Boundary Review will rebalance the number of electors each MP represents, resulting in significant change to the existing constituency map. As part of the review, the number of constituencies in England will increase from 533 to 543.
After this final consultation has closed on December 5, the commission will analyse the responses and form its final recommendations. These will be submitted to Parliament by July 1 2023.
Tim Bowden, Secretary to the Boundary Commission for England, said:
Last year we published our initial proposals for new constituency boundaries – our first go at what the map should look like. We are delighted with the huge number of comments from members of the public on our initial proposals, many which included valuable evidence about local communities.
We now believe we are close to the best map of constituencies that can be achieved under the rules we are working to.
However, we still want people to tell us what they think of this latest map before we submit our final recommendations to Parliament next year. This is our final consultation and I encourage you to participate in the 2023 Boundary Review.”