In the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, the Alternative Vote referendum also known as the UK-wide referendum on the Parliamentary voting system was a referendum that took place on 5 May 2011, on whether to change the system for electing the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

, the lower house of the national

Parliament at Westminster The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the Parliamentary sovereignty in the United Kingdom, supreme Legislature, legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of We ...

. In the result of a Yes vote, future United Kingdom general elections would have used the "Alternative Vote" (AV); in the event of a No vote, the voting system would remain the same, with the UK continuing to use the "First Past the Post" (FPTP) voting system. The votes cast in the referendum were first counted in each of 440 districts or electoral divisions across the country (the "local counting areas"),Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011
Part 1; Section 7(2) — ''note: the legislation refers to them as the "voting areas".'' which were then combined and declared at a regional level (the regions being the constituent countries of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and the regions of England). Under the provisions of the

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 The Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 (c. 1) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that made provision for the holding of a referendum on whether to introduce the Alternative Vote system in all future general ele ...

there was a total of 440 voting areas across twelve regions using the same boundaries as used in European Parliamentary elections since 1999 under the provisions of the

European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002 The European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002 (c. 24) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom governing elections to the European Parliament. The Act divided the United Kingdom into various regions to which were allocated a number of ...

with the exception of

Gibraltar ) , anthem = " God Save the King" , song = " Gibraltar Anthem" , image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg , map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe , map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green , mapsize = , image_map2 = Gib ...

which did not participate in the referendum. In

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

the 326

local government districts The districts of England (also known as local authority districts or local government districts to distinguish from unofficial city districts) are a level of subnational division of England used for the purposes of local government. As the st ...

were used as the voting areas; these consist of all

unitary authorities A unitary authority is a local authority responsible for all local government functions within its area or performing additional functions that elsewhere are usually performed by a higher level of sub-national government or the national governme ...

, all metropolitan boroughs, all shire districts, the

London borough The London boroughs are the 32 local authority districts that together with the City of London make up the administrative area of Greater London; each is governed by a London borough council. The present London boroughs were all created at ...

s, the

City of London The City of London is a city, ceremonial county and local government district that contains the historic centre and constitutes, alongside Canary Wharf, the primary central business district (CBD) of London. It constituted most of London f ...

and the Isles of Scilly. As the date of the plebiscite coincided with elections to the Scottish Parliament,

Welsh Assembly The Senedd (; ), officially known as the Welsh Parliament in English and () in Welsh, is the devolved, unicameral legislature of Wales. A democratically elected body, it makes laws for Wales, agrees certain taxes and scrutinises the Welsh ...

and the Northern Ireland Assembly different arrangements were required for the devolved nations so in

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

the 73

Scottish Parliamentary constituencies The Scottish Parliament (Scottish Parliament Building, Holyrood), created by the Scotland Act 1998, has used a system of constituencies and electoral regions since the 1999 Scottish Parliament election, first general election in 1999. The pa ...

were used as the Scottish counting areas and in

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

the 40 Welsh assembly constituencies were used as the Welsh counting areas and Northern Ireland was a single counting area. Ballots were due to be verified by 13:00 BST on 6 May 2011 and the votes were counted from 16:00 BST onwards. Both the local and regional results were updated live online via ''aboutmyvote.co.uk'', a publicly accessible website run by the

Electoral Commission An election commission is a body charged with overseeing the implementation of electioneering process of any country. The formal names of election commissions vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and may be styled an electoral commission, a c ...

. This article lists, by voting area, all the results of the referendum, each ordered into national and regional sections.

United Kingdom

The national result for the whole

was announced at the Platinum Suite at the Exhibition Centre London (ExCel)Referendum on the voting system for the UK Parliament
Electoral Commission, 3 April 2011 by the Chief counting officer (CCO) and Chair of the

, Jenny Watson, at 01:00 BST on Saturday 7 May 2011 after all 440 voting areas and UK regions had declared their results.electoarlcommission.org.uk
7 May 2011 With a national turnout of 42% the target to secure the majority win for the winning side was 9,639,512 votes. The decision by the people who voted was a decisive "No" vote to adopting the alternative vote system in future

United Kingdom general elections This is a list of United Kingdom general elections (elections for the UK House of Commons) since the first in 1802. The members of the 1801–1802 Parliament had been elected to the former Parliament of Great Britain and Parliament of Ireland, ...

by a majority of 6,860,516 votes over those who had voted "Yes" in favor of the proposal.

Results by United Kingdom regions

Results by United Kingdom constituent countries

Local results

Of the 440 voting areas, ten returned a majority in favour of the change (

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

, Glasgow Kelvin, Edinburgh Central, and the London Boroughs of Hackney, Islington,

Haringey The London Borough of Haringey (pronounced , same as Harringay) is a London borough in North London, classified by some definitions as part of Inner London, and by others as part of Outer London. It was created in 1965 by the amalgamation of ...

, Lambeth, Southwark and Camden). The counting area with the highest proportion of AV supporters was the London Borough of Hackney with 60.68% in favour of the change (34.23% turnout) and the lowest proportion was the borough of

Castle Point Castle Point is a local government district with borough status in south Essex, east of central London. The borough comprises the towns and villages of Canvey Island, Hadleigh, South Benfleet, and Thundersley. The borough council is situated ...

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and Grea ...

with 20.29% in favour (41.38% turnout).

England

The English local districts were used as the voting areas for the referendum in

; these consist of all

, all metropolitan boroughs, all shire districts, the

s, the

and the Isles of Scilly. The

English Regions The regions, formerly known as the government office regions, are the highest tier of sub-national division in England, established in 1994. Between 1994 and 2011, nine regions had officially devolved functions within government. While they no ...

were also then used to count the votes at the regional level meaning there was no single national count of the votes. All nine regions in England returned huge "No" votes.

East Midlands

The East Midlands region was broken down into 40 voting areas.

East of England

The East of England region was broken down into 47 voting areas.

Greater London

The London region was broken down into 33 voting areas.

North East England

The North East England region was broken down into 12 voting areas.

North West England

The North West England region was broken down into 39 voting areas.

South East England

The South East England region was broken down into 67 voting areas.

South West England

The South West England region was broken down into 37 voting areas.

West Midlands

The West Midlands region was broken down into 30 voting areas.

Yorkshire and the Humber

The Yorkshire and the Humber region was broken down into 21 voting areas.

Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland was a single voting area, as well as being a regional count for the referendum. It was the last region of the United Kingdom to declare its result after major delays due to slow pace of counting and declaring results for the 2011 Northern Ireland Assembly Elections meant that the start of the local count for the referendum could not begin until the evening on Friday 6 May 2011, several hours after counting had started in the rest of the country and the result was not finally known until 1am on Saturday 7 May 2011.

Scotland

The

constituencies An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other polity ...

of the Scottish Parliament were used as the local voting areas for the referendum throughout

. Scotland was broken down into 73 voting areas.

Wales

The

of the

National Assembly for Wales The Senedd (; ), officially known as the Welsh Parliament in English and () in Welsh, is the devolved, unicameral legislature of Wales. A democratically elected body, it makes laws for Wales, agrees certain taxes and scrutinises the Welsh Go ...

were used as the local voting areas for the referendum throughout

. Note: In Wales under the

Welsh Language Act 1993 The Welsh Language Act 1993, is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which put the Welsh language on an equal footing with the English language in Wales. The Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542 had made English the only language of publ ...

the Welsh language has equal status with the English language. Wales was broken down into 40 voting areas.

References

External links

The Electoral Commission
Referendum results {{Election results in the United Kingdom 2011 referendums A Electoral reform in the United Kingdom A Election results in the United Kingdom