Great Western Coffee Shop

Sideshoots - associated subjects => The West - but NOT trains in the West => Topic started by: grahame on August 08, 2018, 09:14:53



Title: Voter ratio
Post by: grahame on August 08, 2018, 09:14:53
Looking at doing some planning / stats ... if a constituency has an electoral roll of 68,846 ... what is the residential population likely to be, bearing in mind those under age and those not eligible to vote on the basis of their nationality.  Would 100,000 be a sensible guess?   How might the guess vary between a shires constituency, an inner suburbs and an outer suburbs?   Does the age profile (lack of youngsters) in places like Retirement-supe-mare make any difference?



Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: stuving on August 08, 2018, 09:36:55
Looking at doing some planning / stats ... if a constituency has an electoral roll of 68,846 ... what is the residential population likely to be, bearing in mind those under age and those not eligible to vote on the basis of their nationality.  Would 100,000 be a sensible guess?   How might the guess vary between a shires constituency, an inner suburbs and an outer suburbs?   Does the age profile (lack of youngsters) in places like Retirement-supe-mare make any difference?

The rule of thumb (as someone who was an election agent in the days when organising the mailshot, including hand adressing and filling the envelopes, was the main job) was two voters per address. It was pretty accurate in Falkirk East at the time, though no doubt it does vary with the kind of area. For your purposes you may want some non-voters to be added in, of course.

The simple answer ought to be to find some local authroity population figures and compare with electoral roll numbers. Of course constituencies are carefully set up to not align with LA boundaries, so as to stop you doing that. Or mostly they don't, it might be worth looking for cases where a county's constituencies do fit it exactly.


Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: grahame on August 09, 2018, 01:55:00
Looking at doing some planning / stats ... if a constituency has an electoral roll of 68,846 ... what is the residential population likely to be, bearing in mind those under age and those not eligible to vote on the basis of their nationality.  Would 100,000 be a sensible guess?   How might the guess vary between a shires constituency, an inner suburbs and an outer suburbs?   Does the age profile (lack of youngsters) in places like Retirement-supe-mare make any difference?

The rule of thumb (as someone who was an election agent in the days when organising the mailshot, including hand adressing and filling the envelopes, was the main job) was two voters per address. It was pretty accurate in Falkirk East at the time, though no doubt it does vary with the kind of area. For your purposes you may want some non-voters to be added in, of course.

The simple answer ought to be to find some local authroity population figures and compare with electoral roll numbers. Of course constituencies are carefully set up to not align with LA boundaries, so as to stop you doing that. Or mostly they don't, it might be worth looking for cases where a county's constituencies do fit it exactly.

Taking that rule of thumb ... and the rule of thumb that each house is occupied by 2.5 people ... gives me a population of around 86,000 in a 68,000 constituency.  Best guess - rough, but it will do for what I need.  25% uplift for children and none-UK

I'm unconvinced by local authority figures ... suspect they underestimate too, based on our local official numbers and numbers registered with doctors.


Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: CyclingSid on August 09, 2018, 15:28:53
Try looking at a recent looking at a recent boundary review by the Local Government Commission: http://www.lgbce.org.uk/ (http://www.lgbce.org.uk/). West Berkshire and Windsor & Maidenhead have been finalised in the last 12 months. LGBCE didn't agree with the LA figures and adjusted accordingly.
In both cases they reduced the number of elected members by a third. Seeing how LAs apply for a review I would imagine that has made the concept less popular. Turkeys and Christmas?


Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: Andy on September 12, 2018, 22:59:24
On the subject of boundary reviews, the latest proposals for redrawing the House of Commons constituencies would mean that each seat is supposed to represent about 1/600th of the UK population. For the island of Great Britain (i.e. excluding Northern Ireland, the island constituencies in Scotland, Wight and Ynys Mon), it comes out to just under 1/580th of the population.

The proposals once again include a "Devonwall" seat, which is (quite rightly, in my opinion) meeting with vociferous opposition.

Unless I'm mistaken, this new "Devonwall" seat, containing 1/580 of the GB population, would not have one single railway station on the national network in it, and not even one single mile of standard gauge track. I wonder if there are any other parliamentary constituencies in GWR territory in the same position. 



Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: Red Squirrel on September 13, 2018, 13:18:25

quite rightly, in my opinion...


Elsewhere on this forum plans to unite Greater Thornbury with (presumably) mwy o Magwyr to form a Severnside Cities axis have been discussed. I can't help wondering what makes the Cornish Brummies think they are in some way ethnically or culturally different from the Essex Devonians. Convincing people that they are in some way superior to the people in the next village or town, or over the river, is the oldest trick in the book for those who seek to divide us and rule us. Resist it! Put the cream beside the jam, and rid yourself of tyrants!


Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: Andy on September 13, 2018, 18:31:12

"Convincing people that they are in some way superior to the people in the next village or town, or over the river,is the oldest trick in the book for those who seek to divide us and rule us."
Totally agree.

"I can't help wondering what makes the Cornish Brummies think they are in some way ethnically or culturally different from the Essex Devonians."

The whole logic of a constituency-based system is geo-cultural: a self-identifying community chooses a representative to promote and defend its interests. Whether or not this is a good (or even particularly democratic) thing is debatable, I agree.

If ensuring equal weight for every vote were taken as the basic principle for organising elections, then logic would dictate no constituencies, with either a straight party/ideological vote and seats attributed by PR, or a vote for individuals, with the top 600 winning a seat.

Whether we like it or not, though, it is at the core of British 'democracy' and there is a sense of (sub)-cultural identity in Cornwall & Devon just as there is in many other parts of the UK, and it goes back a long way. My own view is that rather than worrying about reducing the number of elected representatives in the UK Parliament from 650 to 600, the time would be better spent tackling the question of the 800 or so unelected ones... 
 

 
 


Title: Re: Voter ratio
Post by: TaplowGreen on September 16, 2018, 10:14:04
As someone who has lived in both Devon and Cornwall, given that the latter voted to leave the EU which underwrites or at least underpins their entire economy, I'm surprised they're trusted with crayons and paper, never mind a voice in Parliament.

How can you possibly defend the interests of turkeys who vote for Christmas?



This page is printed from the "Coffee Shop" forum at http://gwr.passenger.chat which is provided by a customer of Great Western Railway. Views expressed are those of the individual posters concerned. Visit www.gwr.com for the official Great Western Railway website. Please contact the administrators of this site if you feel that content provided contravenes our posting rules ( see http://railcustomer.info/1761 ). The forum is hosted by Well House Consultants - http://www.wellho.net