Shereen Williams, chief executive of the Democracy and Boundary Commission Cymru, introduces the Commission’s work and explains how people across Wales can be involved.
The dust has barely settled on a historic general election in Wales, but attention has already turned immediately to the next big contest: the 2026 Senedd election.
As politicians tweak their tactics and commentators assess how the general election will affect the makeup of the next Senedd, we at the Democracy and Boundary Commission Cymru have a more urgent challenge: to create the constituencies that will take Wales’ young democracy through the next stage in its development.
There have long been arguments that the Senedd is underpowered due to its number of members; that the cabinet needs more ministers, committees are overstretched, and backbenchers are unable to dedicate enough time to their scrutiny and constituency roles.
Our role is to honestly, fairly, and transparently use the provisions of the Act to develop the best set of constituencies we can in time for the 2026 election.
The answer, according to the Senedd Cymru (Members and Elections) Act 2024, is to increase the number of members from the current 60 to 96, and to move to an (almost) entirely new electoral system.
Of course, arguments remain about the increase in numbers and the means of electing them, but as an independent and impartial commission, we’ll leave those ongoing debates to the public and their elected representatives. Our role is to honestly, fairly, and transparently use the provisions of the Act to develop the best set of constituencies we can in time for the 2026 election.
This first review must be completed in time for the 2026 Senedd election, so the Act tasks us with creating 16 constituencies by pairing the 32 parliamentary constituencies used in the recent general election. As soon as we complete this review, we’ll begin a second review of Senedd constituencies which will take a deeper look at electorate numbers, geography, existing electoral boundaries, and local ties.
How will the Democracy and Boundary Commission work?
Here’s what the Act tells us about the new constituencies:
- By April 2025, the Democracy and Boundary Commission Cymru must submit its final decisions on the creation of 16 new Senedd constituencies;
- These constituencies must be created by pairing the 32 parliamentary constituencies in Wales, those we’ve just used for the first time at the general election;
- Each constituency recommended by the Commission must be contiguous. (More on how we interpret that below).
So, how will we go about the work?
We’re calling the process of creating these constituencies the 2026 Review, and it started this month with the publication of our Guide to the Review.
The guide sets out in detail how we interpret the provisions of the Act and how the public and stakeholders can play their part in shaping the new constituency map.
The real fireworks start in September as we publish our initial proposals. While we’re confident that these proposals will set us up for success, that doesn’t mean there’s no room for improvement.
We’ll open a 4-week consultation period and take all views into account. The recent experience of the Boundary Commission for Wales’ 2023 Review of parliamentary constituencies shows that public feedback does not only demonstrate the strength of feeling across Wales, it also significantly strengthens the proposals as the Review progresses.
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By December, having examined the representations received during the initial consultation period, the Commission will be ready to publish its revised proposals and a second 4-week consultation will open.
The pressure will be on at this point as it’ll be the last opportunity for people across Wales to affect the final decisions.
It’ll also be the Commission’s last chance to gather the feedback we need to perfect those final decisions.
By the first months of 2025, we’ll be busy putting the finishing touches on our final decisions, examining every representation received across the two consultation periods. We expect to publish them and to have completed the Review in March.
The Commission’s decisions will take effect automatically at the 2026 Senedd election, without the need for a vote in the Senedd.
That’s the bird’s eye view of the process itself, but how will we actually develop the proposals? Schedule 2 of the Act gives us some instructions on this. The Commission will consider a variety of factors, including geography, Local Government boundaries, and local ties.
Geography
As mentioned, the constituencies must be contiguous, but we’ll also consider features like mountains, rivers, and estuaries.
Road links are also particularly important. While a quick look at a map may indicate that two constituencies are contiguous, we only consider a pair of constituencies to be contiguous if one can travel across them without having to go through a third constituency.
This is a crucial point, especially as people present their alternative proposals during the consultations.
This interpretation means – spoiler alert – that we won’t be proposing the pairing of Ynys Môn and Dwyfor Meirionnydd for example, as the only way of travelling between the two by road is to go through Bangor Aberconwy.
Local Government boundaries
Where possible, we will give consideration to local government boundaries. In this case, that means the external boundaries of Wales’ 22 local authorities. People do identify with their county so we want to create constituencies that feel as coherent as possible.
Another important factor we’ll consider is our colleagues in local government who do such a fantastic job of managing elections.
To ensure that Welsh democracy is carried out in the most effective and convenient way, we want to ensure that local authorities cover as few constituencies as possible, and that constituencies cover as few local authorities as possible. That means democratic services in our councils having to manage fewer elections and Members of the Senedd having to deal with casework relating to fewer council departments.
While the exercise of pairing 32 constituencies limits our options, these principles will inform our work to remap Wales’ constituencies.
Local ties
What really matters to people as we develop constituencies? Comments we’ve received during previous reviews of both parliamentary constituencies and local government wards have shown that social or human geography is perhaps the most important factor of all to the people of Wales.
Socio-economic links, the Welsh language, and shared history are crucial considerations as we develop constituencies. Wherever we can, we will do our best to ensure that local ties are respected and maintained.
What won’t we consider?
The Commission cannot and will not consider any potential impact on future election results. The winner of the next Senedd election in each constituency, and nationally, will be for the people of Wales to decide, and we cannot take any predictions or projections into account.
In developing our proposals, we have considered multiple options, though the differences between each one are far more minor than they were for the 2023 Review of parliamentary constituencies.
We’re open to suggestions for improvements on all aspects of our proposals, and names offer infinite opportunities for variation. We’re excited to see what people across Wales come up with, and expect their feedback will enrich our proposals.
We look forward to seeing the alternative options proposed by stakeholders and the public during our consultations. It’s important to remember that nothing we propose is set in stone until the Final Decisions.
What’s in a name?
The Commission has another important task to complete during this Review where the options are far less limited however: coming up with 16 names.
The Act states that each constituency should have one monolingual name, unless that name would not be acceptable in both languages. In which case, we should give the constituency a Welsh and English name.
The conventions we’re following for our Initial Proposals are that where a name (for example, the name of a county or counties) is already in widespread use and is appropriate for the area covered by a constituency, this name should be prioritised.
Where there isn’t an appropriate option, we’ll combine the names of the parliamentary constituencies to look and sound as natural as possible.
When it comes to deciding on Welsh language names, the Welsh Language Commissioner is given an early opportunity to comment on the orthography.
During our two consultations, we expect that we’ll receive a significant number of comments on the names we’ve proposed. We’re confident that the names we’ll propose are appropriate for each constituency, but the greatest source of knowledge when it comes to naming an area will be the people that live there.
We’re open to suggestions for improvements on all aspects of our proposals, and names offer infinite opportunities for variation. We’re excited to see what people across Wales come up with, and expect their feedback will enrich our proposals.
The buildup to the next Senedd election is set to be an exciting one, for even more reasons than usual.
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