The Boundary Commission for England is currently conducting a review of Parliamentary constituency boundaries in England on the basis of new rules. These rules involve a significant reduction in the number of constituencies in England (from 533 to 502). This means South Yorkshire will go from 14 down to 13 Parliamentary constituencies.
The public meetings on these proposals are listed on the Boundary Commission for England website. I also expect this to be where the documents outlining these and the rest of the changes to be published.
The parts of the proposals that pertain to Sheffield are as follows:
There are currently 14 constituencies in this sub-region, only four of which (Doncaster Central, Doncaster North, Don Valley, and Rother Valley) have an electorate within 5% of the electoral quota. Of the remaining constituencies, all ten have electorates that are below the 5% limit. We propose to reduce the number of constituencies to 13.
We considered whether we could leave unchanged any of the four existing constituencies that had an electorate within 5% of the electoral quota and we are able to do so in our initial proposals.
In this sub-region, our options were limited by the number of electors in each of the wards in the City of Sheffield, which ranges from 12,134 to 17,646. We noted that, if we were to avoid dividing wards between constituencies, it would be challenging to create constituencies that were either based on the existing constituencies or wholly within the City of Sheffield. Given the electoral sizes of the wards, it was inevitable that some constituencies would have to be proposed that contain part of the City of Sheffield and part of an adjacent borough (either Barnsley or Rotherham). In Doncaster, we propose no change to any of the three existing constituencies.
We propose a Barnsley West and Ecclesfield constituency that crosses the boundary between the Borough of Barnsley and the City of Sheffield. Two wards of the Borough of Barnsley (Darton West and Penistone East) are included in this constituency, together with four wards of the City of Sheffield (East Ecclesfield, Firth Park, Southey, and West Ecclesfield). We note that there are good communication links along the A61 road that connects the urban Sheffield wards with the more rural Barnsley wards in the north of the constituency. We also propose that one ward of the Borough of Barnsley (Penistone West) is included in another cross-boundary constituency called Sheffield West and Penistone, together with five wards of the City of Sheffield (Crookes, Ecclesall, Fulwood, Stannington, and Stocksbridge and Upper Don). Four of these are in the existing Sheffield, Hallam constituency.
We propose that the five remaining wards of the Borough of Rotherham form a Rotherham and Sheffield East constituency, together with two wards of the City of Sheffield (Darnall, and Shiregreen and Brightside).
As a consequence of our changes elsewhere, the remaining 17 wards of the City of Sheffield are divided between three constituencies. The Sheffield Central constituency contains five wards; the Sheffield South East and Sheffield South West constituencies each contain six wards.
Constituency Ward District/borough/city/county Electorate Barnsley West and Ecclesfield CC 73,081 Darton West Barnsley 8,317 Penistone East Barnsley 9,180 East Ecclesfield Sheffield 14,464 Firth Park Sheffield 13,566 Southey Sheffield 13,519 West Ecclesfield Sheffield 14,035 Rotherham and Sheffield East BC 73,631 Boston Castle Rotherham 9,024 Brinsworth and Catcliffe Rotherham 9,033 Keppel Rotherham 9,286 Rotherham East Rotherham 8,786 Rotherham West Rotherham 9,004 Darnall Sheffield 14,711 Shiregreen and Brightside Sheffield 13,787 Sheffield Central BC 73,171 Broomhill Sheffield 12,974 Burngreave Sheffield 14,765 Central Sheffield 17,646 Hillsborough Sheffield 13,569 Walkley Sheffield 14,217 Sheffield South East BC 78,338 Beighton Sheffield 13,239 Birley Sheffield 12,898 Manor Castle Sheffield 12,134 Mosborough Sheffield 13,595 Richmond Sheffield 13,123 Woodhouse Sheffield 13,349 Sheffield South West BC 79,790 Arbourthorne Sheffield 12,551 Beauchief and Greenhill Sheffield 13,530 Dore and Totley Sheffield 13,477 Gleadless Valley Sheffield 13,882 Graves Park Sheffield 13,346 Nether Edge Sheffield 13,004 Sheffield West and Penistone CC 80,123 Penistone West Barnsley 8,992 Crookes Sheffield 13,702 Ecclesall Sheffield 14,647 Fulwood Sheffield 14,047 Stannington Sheffield 14,159 Stocksbridge and Upper Don Sheffield 14,576
