Consultation area FAQs

Subsequent reviews must result in reports being submitted every eight years after 1 July 2023. The next review after the 2023 Review will report before 1 October 2031.

The process that we follow is largely defined by the law. The legislation governing our work is the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986.

The process can be summarised as:
• we develop our Initial Proposals;
• we publish those proposals for 8 weeks of public consultation;
• we publish consultation responses online for public comment for a 6 week period. We hold our public hearings during this consultation period;
• we consider all responses and comments received during the first two consultation periods, and produce Revised Proposals as necessary;
• we publish any Revised Proposals for 4 weeks of public consultation;
• we consider any further responses made and amend our recommendations as necessary; and
• we submit our report to the Speaker.

As part of a review we produce a booklet explaining the process and the policies within which we work, which is available to download here or a hard copy can be supplied on request.

The electorate of each constituency, with a few specified exceptions, has to be within 5% of the average electorate of a mainland constituency in the United Kingdom. For this review, a constituency must have between 69,724 and 77,062 electors. The exceptions are constituencies covering Na h-Eileanan an Iar, Orkney Islands and Shetland Islands council areas (which each have a smaller electorate and are not subject to review under the legislation) and any constituency exceeding 12,000 square kilometers which is allowed to have a smaller electorate under certain circumstances.

The legislation stipulates that there are to be 650 constituencies in the UK, including 57 in Scotland. Two constituencies in Scotland are prescribed in the legislation: ‘Orkney and Shetland’ constituency and ‘Na h-Eileanan an Iar’ constituency. We do not review these constituencies and will make recommendations for 55 constituencies in Scotland.
(543 constituencies in England, 32 constituencies in Wales and 18 constituencies in Northern Ireland).

As an independent and politically impartial body, we do not take into account patterns of voting or the results of elections when reviewing constituency boundaries. Nor do the political parties’ views on where boundaries should be have any more weight than those of members of the public.

No. These proposals do not affect: your council boundary, ward boundary or community council boundary; your council tax and the services your council provides; your school catchment area; your postcode or postal address; access to public or private facilities or transport; policing or fire service areas; or, NHS services, i.e. your GP or local hospital.

We publish information about our work on our website and social media channels. At key stages of the review, we issue news releases to newspapers and broadcasters. At the public consultation stages of the review, we make maps and other information about our proposals available for inspection at locations such as public libraries and council offices. Our consultation site allows users to compare our proposals with other electoral boundaries in the area and comment on our proposals and others’ comments. We publish transcripts of our public hearings for public scrutiny and comment.

Once we have met the electorate rule, we also have to ensure that the extent of every constituency is less than 13,000 square kilometres. We can also take account of special geographical considerations, local authority boundaries, existing constituency boundaries and local ties which would be broken by changing constituencies.

The constituencies covering these island areas are defined by legislation to be one covering Orkney and Shetland, and another covering Na h-Eileanan an Iar. Since the extent of these constituencies cannot be changed, we have not included them in the list of areas.

Yes. We’ve published all the discussion papers and minutes from our meetings where we discussed our proposals and final recommendations.

Our meeting papers and minutes are stored in the publications section of our main website. We also have an index showing which of our discussion papers and meetings considered each constituency, see the 2023 Review section of our main website.

We will take account of the ward boundaries at the start of the review.

New wards will be introduced in May 2022 and we will consider using these if consultation responses suggest adopting them will improve local ties.

You can contact us by email (enquiries@scottishboundaries.gov.uk), telephone us (0131 244 2001), or write to us (Boundary Commission for Scotland, Thistle House, 91 Haymarket Terrace, Edinburgh, EH12 5HD).

The consultation site is set up to allow you to view the proposals and final recommendations on an interactive map, and to help you make a comment on the proposals during a consultation stage.

There is further information about the review on our main website.

• Comments which support are as important as those which oppose.
• Comments will be judged on the quality of argument and evidence presented.

Effective comments will:
• Where they are objecting to the Commission’s proposals, suggest an alternative, as well as setting out the objection.
• Take account of the statutory requirements.
• Consider the consequences of the suggested alternative across the widest possible area.

This consultation part of our website allows you to:
• view our proposals and final recommendations on a map which you can zoom and pan
• compare our proposals and final recommendations with other electoral boundaries
• search our proposals and final recommendations by postcode and by council area
• submit comments on the proposals during our consultation stages
• view all comments received during the 2023 Review.

We have concluded the three consultation stages of the 2023 Review. We consulted on our Initial Proposals from October to December 2021 and again from February to March 2022. We consulted on our Revised Proposals from November to December 2022.

We start the review work afresh for each review. In particular, the number of constituencies and permitted electorate range we have to work with are different for each review, making it impossible to simply bring forward proposals from an earlier review. The one area where we do take information from previous reviews is where evidence has previously been given of where local ties exist in an area: even on this issue we may start out with an assumption of where ties exist based on evidence from previous reviews, but evidence in the current review can be submitted to us to show how those ties have changed in the intervening period.

Boundaries Scotland, a separate independent body, is responsible for reviews of Scottish Parliament boundaries. They also conduct reviews of electoral arrangements, the number of councillors and ward boundaries within a council area - www.boundaries.scot.

There are separate Boundary Commissions for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Commissions operate under the same Act of Parliament, and therefore follow a fundamentally identical process, though each Commission has discretion on the timing of their own consultation stages, and certain matters of detailed policy in how the statutory rules are implemented.

The law requires the electorate data we use for the 2023 Review to be the Parliamentary electorate figures as at 2 March 2020.

The law requires us to publish all responses received, but we will not publish your name or detailed address unless you specifically give your consent for us to do so.

The Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 (as amended) requires the four Boundary Commissions for the UK to carry out a review of all constituencies in their area at specified times. The current review runs from December 2020 to July 2023.