What changes are planned for Buckinghamshire wards for future elections?

Boundaries have been redrawn around Buckinghamshire to enhance ‘electoral fairness’ – but not without resistance from South Bucks businesses, councillors, parish councils and residents.

When voting in the general election, you vote for an MP of a constituency – such as Beaconsfield, Wycombe, Wokingham, Maidenhead, Slough or Windsor.

The boundaries of these are adjusted every so often to make sure they have roughly the same number of people in them.

In the current system, some MPs have just 50,000 constituents, while others could have double that.

The Boundary Commission is the independent body that draws these boundaries - while the Local Government Boundary Commission for England (LGBCE) deals with redrawing ward boundaries.

They are in the process of being redrawn, with a series of public consultations running from January 2022 to April 2023.

Overall, the South East region is set to increase from 84 to 91 constituencies.

The commission published final recommendations for Bucks on Tuesday (May 30).

The changes become law once Parliament has approved them. They are expected to be in place in time for the Buckinghamshire Council 2025 local elections.

Ward changes

As part of the overall restructuring, local council wards are also redrawn ‘to make sure ward arrangements work effectively’.

This affects which patch your local councillors represent – and could alter who will represent you in the local elections.

For example, the Farnham Common & Burnham Beeches ward will become a Burnham ward and a Farnhams & Stoke Poges ward.

Iver and Farnhams & Stoke Poges

The commission was ‘persuaded’ to make significant changes to its draft recommendations in regard to the Iver and Farnhams & Stoke Poges wards.

This included reducing the total number of councillors for the authority by one. Iver will go down to two councillors, from the current three.

This was a change from the original proposals for a three-councillor Iver ward that also incorporated Wexham parish and the New Denham part of Denham parish.

Iver Parish Council requested that the ward be represented by three councillors, based on ‘the current high workload.’

But the commission said it must reduce the number of councillors per ward across the authority, because of the reduction in the total number of councillors in Bucks.

Otherwise, it could not achieve ‘effective balance’.

“A three-councillor ward would not provide for a good level of electoral equality,” the commission wrote.

Fulmer Parish Council, three councillors, a local business, Fulmer Infant School, St James Church and 46 local residents all opposed the three-councillor Farnhams & Stoke Poges ward.

Burnham, Dorney and Taplow

Currently, Taplow is represented by the Cliveden ward, as is Dorney and parts of Burnham – but not Burnham Beeches, which falls under Farnham Common & Burnham Beeches ward.

The commission seeks to group all of Burnham with Taplow and Dorney under a proposed ‘Burnham’ ward.

Farnham Common would be separated from Burnham Beeches into a new Farnhams & Stoke Poges ward.

Dorney Parish Council, Taplow Parish Council and the Hitcham & Taplow Society opposed this.

They said that Dorney and Taplow parishes are ‘distinct from the more densely populated Burnham parish’ and should be warded separately.

They proposed that Dorney and Taplow parishes form a single-councillor ward, with Burnham parish forming a two-councillor ward.

But this would result in too much difference between the two, creating a minus 45 per cent ‘electoral variance’ by 2028. The commission considered this to be ‘unacceptably high.’

The proposed overall number of councillors in Bucks is set to go down to 97, one fewer than the 98 originally suggested.

As a result, the variance of its proposed Burnham ward has changed from -10 per cent to -11 per cent.

This means ‘it will now fall slightly outside our definition of good electoral equality,’ the commission admitted.

Number of councillors

The commission has included in its review a cutting of the number of Bucks councillors down to 97 – 50 fewer than there are now.

There will be 10 three-councillor wards, 28 two-councillor wards and 11 single-councillor wards (49 wards total).

Originally the plan was for 10 three-councillor wards, 27 two-councillor wards and 14 single-councillor wards, making 51 wards.

In 2021, the commission announced it was minded to recommend a 98-seat size of council.

This move was supported by the administration, the local Conservative group, the local Lib Dems and Labours who echoed thoughts that 147 was ‘too many’ and 98 would be more ‘efficient’.