Leith set to become biggest constituency in the country

Published on Tuesday 25 March 2008 09:13

BOUNDARY changes and housing developments are set to make Leith the biggest constituency in Scotland by the time of the next Scottish Parliament elections.

The dramatic population growth forecast for the Capital's waterfront will give the redrawn North Edinburgh and Leith constituency more voters than any other seat in the country.

A consultation on the Boundary Commission's proposed changes to seats throughout the country, published last month, has recently finished. Public inquiries are expected to be held later this year.

In its submission to the commission, Edinburgh City Council has highlighted how the proposed seats in the Capital will grow between now and the next Holyrood elections in 2011, when the new boundaries will take effect.

All six of the proposed Edinburgh seats are already above the commission's target figure of 54,728 voters. But North Edinburgh and Leith is by far the biggest with an electorate of 57,240 – almost five per cent over the target.

And the city council claims by 2011 the number of voters in the constituency will have soared to 64,577 – nearly 10,000 more than the target size. Ten other proposed seats across the country are over the 57,240 figure, but none is likely to see as dramatic a population rise as Leith.

The city council has projected an extra 15,500 voters in Edinburgh as a whole.

Its submission said: "Recent population projections and anticipated new house building projections for the city suggest there will be considerably more voters in each proposed constituency than the commission has planned for.

"Notable increases can be anticipated within the proposed North Edinburgh and Leith constituency with more than 7000 additional voters by 2011 and continuing increases as further phases the Waterfront and Leith Docks projects are developed."

The council said taking the extra voters into account would mean significantly different boundaries from those being proposed. But it conceded it was unlikely the commission would adjust its proposals because the law requires it to produce recommendations using electorate data as at July 3, the date the review was announced.

However one source suggested the commission could still have paid some heed to the population explosion expected in the area. "We keep being told the waterfront will be a development the size of Falkirk. If you can't officially take account of the population boom, you could at least make sure North and Leith was the smallest constituency, not the biggest," the source said.

The proposed changes to North Edinburgh and Leith, held by Labour's Malcolm Chisholm, are seen as broadly neutral from a political point of view. They include removing the New Town and Stockbridge, but adding Leith Links, part of West Pilton and an area around Fettes.

Other seats in the city would see more drastic changes, putting Labour's Sarah Boyack at risk in the new Central Edinburgh and placing a question mark over Tory David McLetchie in the new South West Edinburgh.