ONE of the Bradford parliamentary constituencies could be abolished in proposals by the Boundary Commission.

The finalised proposals of the commission suggest that Bradford South, East and West will be shaken up into new Bradford South and Bradford North constituencies with other parts of the city redistributed to other seats.

In order to reduce the number of constituencies in West Yorkshire, the commission proposed that the City of Bradford wards that comprised the existing Bradford South constituency be redistributed among the neighbouring constituencies.

After a public consultation on its initial proposals, the commission said it would adjust some but that for Bradford South would remain.

The report says: “In light of the considerable opposition to our initial proposals for the City of Bradford, notably in the oral evidence presented at the Leeds public hearing, we felt that we had to go some way to address the issues raised, but this would not be easy as the reduction of two constituencies in West Yorkshire was unavoidable.”

The report says its assistant commissioners visited wards in the east and south of Bradford in order to observe the areas for themselves. Following their visit they recommended a new configuration of constituencies for the area:

l Bradford North would contain the City of Bradford wards of Bingley Rural, Bolton and Undercliffe, Eccleshill, Heaton, Manningham, Thornton and Allerton, and Toller;

l Bradford South would contain the City of Bradford wards of Bowling and Barkerend, City, Clayton and Fairweather Green, Great Horton, Little Horton, Royds, and Wibsey;

l Tong (instead of Wibsey) ward would be in a proposed Spen constituency, which would be renamed Bradford South East and Spen;

l the Queensbury ward would move to the Lower Calder constituency, to be called South Calderdale and Queensbury.

The commission said it was necessary to include a City of Bradford ward in the Pudsey constituency and it considered that the Bradford Moor ward had closer links with Leeds than either the Eccleshill ward, or the Idle and Thackley ward.

They had acknowledged that the inclusion of the City of Leeds ward of Guiseley and Rawdon in the Shipley constituency would lead to the division of some communities, caused largely by the configuration of the Guiseley and Rawdon, Horsforth, and Otley and Yeadon wards. The commission noted that, with an electorate of 17,779, the ward had the largest electorate among all the wards of the Yorkshire and the Humber region, and it had considered it necessary to include the ward in the Shipley constituency to bring its electorate within the permitted electorate range.

The report says there was considerable opposition to the inclusion of the Bingley Rural ward in the revised Bradford North constituency: “A substantial number of all the representations we had received to our revised proposals in the whole of the Yorkshire and the Humber region had concerned the Bingley Rural ward. Those objecting said the ward should continue to be included in the Shipley constituency and that not to do so would divide the community of Bingley.”

The feedback suggested that the Idle and Thackley ward, rather than being included in the Shipley constituency, should instead be included in Bradford North and commissioners could see the merits of keeping the two Bingley wards in the same constituency.

Under the plans, based on rule changes introduced by the coalition government in 2011, the number of seats will be reduced to 600.

Downing Street insisted earlier this year that Prime Minister Theresa May remained committed to delivering “more equal and updated” constituency boundaries that all contain a similar number of voters.

Ministers must secure the backing of Parliament if they want to push the plans through but the Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee has warned the overhaul is unlikely to pass as some Tories, along with Labour, are opposed to the move.