Senedd constituency review details published
The Democracy and Boundary Commission Cymru has today (19 July 2024) published its Guide to the 2026 Review of Senedd constituencies.
The Guide sets out the key dates for the review, explains the way in which the Commission will develop the new constituencies, and gives instructions on how members of the public can shape the proposals.
Initial Proposals for Wales’ 16 new Senedd constituencies will be published on 3 September 2024, with a 4-week consultation period opening immediately and closing on 30 September.
Revised Proposals will follow in December, with a second 4-week consultation running into mid-January.
Considerations
The Commission’s Final Decisions are likely to be published in March 2025, and will take effect automatically at the next scheduled Senedd election in 2026.
The 16 constituencies proposed by the Commission must be formed by pairing Wales’ 32 parliamentary constituencies. Each paired constituency must be contiguous.
DBCC will take account of geography such as mountains, rivers, and estuaries in its proposals, with the Commission interpreting that only constituencies with direct road links are in fact contiguous.
Constituencies which border each other on a map but between which it is impossible to travel without passing through a third constituency are not considered to be contiguous and therefore won’t be paired by the Commission.
DBCC will also consider local government boundaries where possible and attempt to maintain local ties as it pairs the 32 constituencies.
The Commission will not, however, consider the impact on future election results as it develops its proposals.
Naming
DBCC will also propose names for each constituency, with a single monolingual name being the default, and separate Welsh and English names being used where a need is identified.
Area names which are already in common use will be selected where appropriate, and existing constituency names used elsewhere.
Where the names of current parliamentary constituencies are used, the Commission will list the names alphabetically according to the Welsh language.
Commenting on the publication of the Guide to the 2026 Review, Chief Executive of the Democracy and Boundary Commission Cymru, Shereen Williams MBE OStJ said: “Wales’ developing democracy is at an exciting point in its history and the Commission is pleased to officially launch the 2026 Review of Senedd constituencies.
“Public feedback is central to our work so we look forward to seeing responses from all parts of Wales on not only the pairing exercise for the new constituencies, but for their proposed names also.
“We would encourage everyone to find out more about the Review before we publish our Initial Proposals by heading to dbcc.gov.wales and reading our Guide to the Review.”
The guide is available here.
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Can some geographically knowledgeable person inform us which constituenc(y)(ies) are connected by road to Ynys Môn? The choice of partner constituency to Ynys Môn will likely have a domino effect on the choices for all of North and Mid- Wales.
Th southern ends of both road bridges across Afon Menai / Menai Strait lie within the Bangor Aberconwy constituency so Ynys Mon will have to be paired with Bangor Aberconwy.
Well in that case let’s add the votes for each party in those two constituencies at the general election to give a baseline estimate of the seats that might be won in the next Senedd election in Ynys Môn/Bangor/Aberconwy. By my pen and paper method it would be
Labour 2
Plaid 2
Con 2
with Reform a very close runner-up.