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Can the Boundary Commissions Help the Conservative Party? Constituency Size and Electoral Bias in the United Kingdom
Author(s) -
JOHNSTON RON,
MCLEAN IAIN,
PATTIE CHARLES,
ROSSITER DAVID
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
the political quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.373
H-Index - 37
eISSN - 1467-923X
pISSN - 0032-3179
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-923x.2009.02053.x
Subject(s) - house of commons , boundary (topology) , electoral system , political science , public administration , economics , law , politics , mathematics , mathematical analysis , parliament , democracy
As part of a strategy to remove perceived biases operating against it in the system used for elections to the House of Commons, the British Conservative party is promoting a revision of the rules used by the Boundary Commissions to ensure greater equality in constituency electorates. A Bill designed to achieve this—and also to reduce the size of the House—was introduced to the House of Lords in 2007. This paper critiques that Bill and suggests an alternative formulation that would better achieve the goal, whilst identifying a number of operational difficulties that its implementation would involve.