Subdivisions of Scotland Na h-Eileanan Siar Created 1918 Member of parliament Angus MacNeil | Electorate 20,887 European Parliament constituency Scotland | |
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Created from Ross & Cromarty
Inverness-shire Replaced by Ross and Cromarty, Inverness-shire | ||
Na h-Eileanan an Iar (/nə ˈhɪlənən ənˈjɪər/; [nəˈhelanən əˈɲiəɾ]; formerly Western Isles) is a constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, created in 1918. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.
Contents
History
The constituency was formed by merging areas which were formerly within the Ross and Cromarty constituency and the Inverness-shire constituency.
Na h-Eileanan an Iar is the Scottish Gaelic for the Western Isles, which was the constituency's name prior to the 2005 general election. An identical constituency with the same name is used by the Scottish Parliament.
Boundaries
The constituency area is that of the Outer Hebrides, known also as Na h-Eileanan Siar, and the constituency has the smallest electorate in the United Kingdom, one-fifth of the size of the largest, the Isle of Wight, with the latter also being an island constituency. However, the Isle of Wight is a substantially smaller parliamentary constituency in geographical terms. It has been suggested that Na h-Eileanan an Iar could be combined with the Orkney and Shetland constituency: the resulting combined electorate would still be well below the average constituency quota. Meanwhile, the Scottish Boundary commission in 1980 originally proposed that the seat should be extended to include the Skye and Lochalsh areas, however this was overturned at a public enquiry. Generally, overriding considerations of sheer geographical size, a disparate population and of convenience for the MPs concerned as well as tradition and identity have tended to override the arguments about numerical imbalance. Furthermore, a change in the Boundary Commission's rules in 2000 added rule 3a which forbids Orkney or Shetland being combined with another council area. In 2011, the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 was introduced, which protected both Na h-Eileanan an Iar and Orkney and Shetland from being added to any other constituency.
Local government areas
When created, the area of the constituency was divided between two local government areas; the counties of Ross and Cromarty and Inverness-shire. The division line was the Lewis-Harris boundary, with Lewis in Ross and Cromarty and Harris in Inverness-shire.
In 1975 the constituency area became also an island council area, known as the Western Isles council area. That same area became one of the 32 unitary council areas of Scotland in 1996. The council area is known also as Na h-Eileanan Siar.
Politics
The seat has been a two-way marginal between the Labour Party and the Scottish National Party for many years. In recent years, however, it has become increasingly safe for the Scottish National Party. Despite that, during the Scottish independence referendum, 2014 the constituency voted against independence by a margin of 53.42% (10,544) to 46.58% (9,195) in favour on a turnout of 86.2%