The Electoral Registration Officer has submitted a report to brief the City Executive Board on the ward boundary review and ask it to comment on the amended draft ward scheme as published by the Local Government Boundary Commission for England in November 2018.

Recommendations: That the City Executive Board resolves to:

Propose amendments to and comments on the new scheme of wards published by the Local Government Boundary Commission for England as follows:

1.    the Council prefers the scheme as originally proposed and published by the Commission on 5^th June;

2.    the Council does not support the current scheme;

3.    that, if the original scheme is not re-adopted, then it proposes that the two new wards of St. Mary’s and St. Clement’s  in the Commission’s current proposals be accepted with some minor amendments, with the boundaries for Cowley, Temple Cowley, Rose Hill & Iffley and Littlemore from the original scheme, with a small adjustment in the boundary between Cowley and Temple Cowley wards to take account of concerns in the Florence Park area; and

4.    a re-designed Donnington ward, running along the southern boundaries of the new St. Mary’s and St. Clement’s wards, from Weirs Lane in the west to Bartlemas Close in the east.

The Electoral Registration Officer had submitted a report to brief the City Executive Board on the ward boundary review and ask it to comment on the amended draft ward scheme as published by the Local Government Boundary Commission for England in November 2018. He tabled a map of suggested ward boundaries which reflected the preferred option as set out in the report’s recommendations. That map is attached as an appendix to these minutes.

Attention was drawn to minor corrections to paragraph 11 and recommendation 3 of the report. Paragraph 11 of the report should be replaced with the following:

“Councillor Simmons was unable to be at the Working Group meeting, but made clear his support for the new boundaries as currently proposed by the Commission, a view with which Councillor Gotch, on behalf of the Liberal Democrat group, agreed. Councillors Tanner and Hollingsworth disagreed strongly, particularly around the splitting of Iffley from Rose Hill. They had received many representations from both Iffley and Rose Hill residents objecting to the proposal. The two areas had been in the same ward for many decades and many strong links have been developed over that time.

Iffley has been linked with Rose Hill electorally for many decades and, over that time, many links have been developed between the two areas. For example, many parishioners of Iffley Church come from Rose Hill, the Friends of Iffley Village have long supported the Rose Hill and Donnington Advice Centre and the Rose Hill Junior Youth Club, and the area is served by a single Rose Hill and Iffley Low Carbon Group.  The allotments are also shared between the two communities.

It felt that there are no links between Iffley and the rest of its new ward particularly as it stretches as far as the Cowley Road in its north-west.”

The words “with some minor amendments” should be removed from recommendation 3.

In discussion it was noted that the Council’s proposals had not been made in a vacuum but as the result of considerable consultation and feedback. The weight given by the Commission to the number of representations which influenced its revised proposals was arguably disproportionate given the size of the electorate in the affected wards. The well established connections between Iffley and Rose Hill were particularly important and the Council’s response sought to address that.

The Chair noted her regret at the short notice given by the Commission to respond to their further proposals and thanked officers for having made the necessary arrangements to do so.

The City Executive Board resolved to:

Propose amendments to and comments on the new scheme of wards published by the Local Government Boundary Commission for England as follows:

1.    the Council prefers the scheme as originally proposed and published by the Commission on 5th June;

2.    the Council does not support the current scheme;

3.    that, if the original scheme is not re-adopted, then it proposes that the two new wards of St. Mary’s and St. Clement’s  in the Commission’s current proposals be accepted with the boundaries for Cowley, Temple Cowley, Rose Hill & Iffley and Littlemore from the original scheme, with a small adjustment in the boundary between Cowley and Temple Cowley wards to take account of concerns in the Florence Park area; and

4.    a re-designed Donnington ward, running along the southern boundaries of the new St. Mary’s and St. Clement’s wards, from Weirs Lane in the west to Bartlemas Close in the east.