The election results in the UK regions

Parliamentary Affairs

Volumn 58, Issue 4, 2005, Pages 130-145

  Johnston, Ron ^a   Pattie, Charles ^a   Rossiter, David ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 27144460849     PISSN: 00312290     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/pa/gsi061     Document Type: Review

References (20)

1. R.J. Johnston, C.J. Pattie and J.G. Allsopp, A Nation Dividing?, Longman, 1988;
2. J. Curtice and M. Steed, 'Electoral Choice and the Production of Government: The Changing Operation of the Electoral System in the United Kingdom since 1955', 12 British Journal of Political Science 1982, 249-98.
3. See also W.H. Field, Regional Dynamics: the Basis of Electoral Support in Britain, Frank Cass, 1997.
4. I. McAllister and D.T. Studlar, 'Region and Voting in Britain 1979-87: Territorial Polarization or Artifact?', 36 American Journal of Political Science, 1992, 168-99.
5. J. Curtice and A. Park, 'Region: New Labour, New Geography?' in G. Evans and P. Norris (eds), Critical Elections: British Parties and Voters in Long-Term Perspective, Sage, 1988, pp. 124-47.
6. D.J. Rossiter, R.J. Johnston and C.J. Pattie, The Boundary Commissions, Manchester University Press, 1999.
7. The Boundary Commissions for England and Northern Ireland had not completed their work in time for their recommendations to be delivered to the relevant Secretary of State. The Welsh Commission delivered its recommendations to the Deputy Prime Minister on 31 January 2005, but they were not presented to Parliament before it was prorogued and so the 2005 general election was fought in the same constituencies as 2001.
8. C. Railings and M. Thrasher, Media Guide to the New Parliamentary Constituencies, Local Government Chronicle Elections Centre, University of Plymouth, 2005.
9. The percentages for Wales and Scotland are lower than for the other 'northern' regions because of the successes of Plaid Cymru and the SNP, who won 2.2-2.5% of all votes cast at each of the three elections: the SNP won 21.5, 22.1, 20.1 and 17.6% of the votes in Scotland in 1992, 1997, 2001 and 2005 respectively, with Plaid Cymru gaining 8.9, 9.9, 14.3 and 12.6% of the Welsh votes at the four contests respectively.
10. Johnston, Pattie and Allsopp, op. cit.
11. If this study was of the 2005 election alone, then it would have been desirable to produce a new classification using data from the 2001 census. We did not do this for three reasons: (1) at the macro spatial scale of Parliamentary constituencies their relative characteristics change very little over time - the categories will be the same and the membership of each virtually so also; (2) as we are analysing data for four elections stretching back to 1992, the charge of analysing 1992 results using 2001 data could have been levelled just as strongly as that of analysing 2005 results with 1991 data; and (3) because of changes in the available variables an exactly matching data set for the two censuses - allowing two classifications - was not feasible. We believe that the results produced here - in a very short time after the election - are robust.
12. For full details of the classification, see R.J. Johnston, D.J. Rossiter and C.J. Pattie, 'Three Classifications of Great Britain's New Parliamentary Constituencies', Essex Papers in Politics and Government, 1997, p. 117. The original research produced three separate classifications: we have chosen that which had the greatest average differentiation between types in the percentages voting for the main parties at each of the elections studied here.
13. For this we used the data in D.T. Denver, C. Railings and M. Thrasher, Media Guide to the New Scottish Westminster Parliamentary Constituencies, Local Government Chronicle Elections Centre, University of Plymouth, 2004. Where all parts of the new constituency were drawn from previous constituencies of the same type, the allocation was clear. For the remainder, we placed them in the type associated with the constituency forming the largest part of the new one.
14. The number in Scotland of this type was reduced to four after the constituency changes.
15. 2 values modified for degrees of freedom.
16. R.J. Johnston, C.J. Pattie, D.F.L. Dorling and D.J. Rossiter, From Votes to Seats: The Operation of the UK Electoral System since 1945, Manchester University Press, 2001.
17. The estimated results of the 2001 election for the new constituencies were produced by Denver, Rallings and Thrasher (see footnote 11).
18. The dependent variable was binary - whether or not the constituency returned an MP from the defined party - and the ANOVA evaluated how well a constituency's representation (whether it had a Conservative MP or not, for example) could be predicted by knowledge of its type and region.
19. R.J. Johnston, D.J. Rossiter, C.J. Pattie and D.F.L. Dorling, 'Labour Electoral Landslides and the Changing Efficiency of Voting Distributions', Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, NS27, 2002, pp. 336-61.
20. After the delayed contest in Staffordshire South (held on 23 June) the bias fell to 111 seats.