Newport council chamber would seat fewer members under the proposals More plans to reduce the number of councillors in Wales have been put forward to create what supporters say would be greater fairness for voters.
Boundary commissioners’ final proposals for Anglesey, Denbighshire, Neath Port Talbot, Newport and draft plans for Bridgend would cut the total by 21.
The aim is that councillors represent roughly the same number of electors.
The final decision on arrangements across the 22 Welsh counties will rest with the assembly government.
If the proposals go through as suggested, the number of councillors would fall from 40 to 36 in Anglesey, and from 47 to 42 in Denbighshire.
In Neath Port Talbot the total would be reduced from 64 to 59, and in Newport from 50 to 46.
Meanwhile, Bridgend would see a reduction from 54 to 51.
The Local Government Boundary Commission for Wales was asked to examine councils’ arrangements in January 2009 by the then Local Government Minister Brian Gibbons.
Dr Gibbons said at the time: “Since the last reviews were conducted new communities have been created in some areas and there have been shifts in population in others.
“This means that in some areas there is now an imbalance in the number of electors that councillors represent.
“The commission will review the total number of councillors making up each council; the number of councillors representing each electoral division and the name and boundary of each division.
“As far as possible, I want to restore fairness so that councillors generally represent the same number of people.”
Paul Wood, the chair of the commission, said in his introduction to the proposals that the issue of fairness was a “key principle for our work”.
“The situation which currently exists, where a councillor from one part of the county represents a small number of voters whereas another councillor may represent many, many more is simply not fair on electors”
Paul Wood Local Government Boundary Commission for Wales
“The situation which currently exists, where a councillor from one part of the county represents a small number of voters whereas another councillor may represent many, many more is simply not fair on electors.
“In practical terms, it means that some areas have an unfair advantage over others in decisions made in the council chamber.”
Mr Wood said correcting this was “far from simple” and commissioners had to adhere to existing “building blocks” which sometimes did not reflect current “patterns of community life”.
He added that “even where this is the case, we have not been able to accept suggestions which cut across these boundaries. This is frustrating for both respondents and the commission”.
Mr Wood said: “The publication of our first few draft proposals reports drew some concern that we were moving away from the principle of having one councillor for an electoral division to suggesting far greater use of multi-member divisions.
“The rules within which we operate envisage that each electoral division shall be represented by one councillor; this could be called the ‘default position’.
“However, we can move away from this for a variety of reasons, including where we have found this is the best way of ensuring that electors are more equally represented.”
He said the commission had aimed for “democratic fairness for all electors” and that, along with other proposals “will lead to local government which is effective and convenient”.
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