Hugh Robertson Sponsors Bill on Rotten Boroughs

Hugh Robertson has sponsored a Parliamentary Bill that seeks to reform the way that constituencies are drawn up.

The Parliamentary Constituency Equalisation Bill, already nicknamed the rotten boroughs bill, will be presented to Parliament on 7 December and follows the Boundary Commission’s review of Kent seats that proved so controversial last year.

The bill seeks to address a number of issues:

1. A provision to force the Boundary Commission to review constituencies every Parliament to take account of population movement. Constituencies currently vary in size dramatically making the existing arrangements undemocratic. Under current arrangements, the 2009/10 General Election and probably the 2012/15 General Election will be fought under the 2001 census.

2. A provision to take account of projected house building. As an example, the Ashford constituency in Kent is dramatically larger than other Kent constituencies, and will grow further over the next few years. However, no account will be taken of this until 2015.

3. No Parliamentary constituency should vary more or less than 5% from the average. This is not the case at present where the size varies dramatically.

4. Constituencies can cross local authority boundaries. This flexibility does not currently exist.

Hugh Robertson said: “Having participated in the last review of Parliamentary constituencies it was clear to me that the rules under which the boundary commission were operating directly led to ridiculous decisions.

“As an example, Oare has been transferred to the Sittingbourne seat purely because of existing rules whereas anyone with any knowledge of the local area can see that it ought to belong alongside Faversham. Furthermore, the mid Kent part of my constituency is really Maidstone East but current rules prevent this being recognised.

“This bill would correct a number of these anomalies. It is a long overdue reform.”