Northern Ireland Assembly Constituencies

Northern Ireland is divided into 18 parliamentary constituencies: 4 borough constituencies in Belfast and 14 county constituencies elsewhere. Section 33 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998 provides that the constituencies for the Northern Ireland Assembly are the same as the constituencies that are used for the United Kingdom Parliament. Parliamentary constituencies are not used for local government, which is instead carried out by 11 district councils; these often have different boundaries.

Constituencies

Each constituency returns one Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons at Westminster and five Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) to the devolved Northern Ireland Assembly at Stormont. Six MLAs were returned per constituency until the Assembly Members (Reduction of Numbers) Act (Northern Ireland) 2016 reduced the number to five, effective from the 2017 Assembly election.
* Belfast East
* Belfast North
* Belfast South and Mid Down
* Belfast West
* East Antrim
* East Londonderry
* Fermanagh and South Tyrone
* Foyle
* Lagan Valley
* Mid Ulster
* Newry and Armagh
* North Antrim
* North Down
* South Antrim
* South Down
* Strangford
* Upper Bann
* West Tyrone

2024 general election

Historical representation by party

Where a cell is marked → (with a different colour of frame to the preceding cell) it indicates that the previous MP continued to sit under a new party affiliation. Changes are dated in the header row: either a general election (four-figure year, bold, link) or by-election or change in affiliation (two-figure year, italic, link or details appear on hover).

1801 to 1832 (22 MPs)

Antrim

Londonderry

* Sir George Hill, 2nd Baronet, was elected to sit as MP for both Coleraine and Londonderry City in the 1806 general election and chose to continue to sit for Londonderry City, hence the 1807 by-election, in which Walter Jones was restored to his seat.

Tyrone

* At both the 1802 and 1806 elections, George Knox was returned for both Dungannon and Dublin University and chose to sit for the university seat.

Armagh

* Charles Brownlow was initially elected as a Tory but at some point changed his affiliation to sit with the Whigs.

Down

* ''The Parliaments of England'' by Henry Stooks Smith suggests that after the 1806 election there was a petition, which led to Edward Southwell Ruthven (Whig) being unseated and John Wilson Croker (Tory) being declared duly elected. ''Parliamentary Election Results in Ireland, 1801–1922'', edited by BM Walker, does not make any reference to such a petition.

Fermanagh

1832 to 1885 (29 MPs)

Antrim

Londonderry

*unseated on petition

Tyrone

Armagh

Down

Fermanagh

1885 to 1918 (25 MPs)

Antrim

Armagh

Belfast

Down

Fermanagh

Londonderry

Tyrone

1918 to 1922 (30 MPs)

1922 to 1950 (13 MPs)

1950 to 1983 (12 MPs)

Periodic boundary reviews commenced in 1947. The elections at which these were implemented are tagged with diamond suit characters, ♦.

''The 1st Periodic Review boundary map can be viewed on th
ARK elections website
Changes in the 2nd review were relatively minor.''

Notes:
# The constituency was won by Philip Clarke of Sinn Féin, but he was unseated on petition on the basis that his criminal conviction (for Irish Republican Army activity) made him ineligible. Instead, the seat was awarded to the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) candidate.
# The seat was originally won by Tom Mitchell of Sinn Féin, but Mitchell was subsequently unseated upon petition, on the grounds that his terrorist convictions made him ineligible to sit in Parliament. The seat was awarded to Charles Beattie of the UUP. However, Beattie in turn was also found ineligible to sit due to holding an office of profit under the crown, triggering a further by-election.
# Original winner of the 1950 election in that seat, James Godfrey MacManaway (UUP), disqualified due to being a clergyman. Teevan won the subsequent by-election

1983 to present (17, then 18 MPs)

''3rd and 4th Review boundary maps can be viewed on the ARK elections website
1983
''

¹Paisley Jr was suspended from the DUP between July and November 2018.

Seats by political alignment (1983–present)

Boundary changes

2023–present

Following the abandonment of the Sixth Periodic Review (the 2018 review), the Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland formally launched the 2023 Review on 5 January 2021. In accordance with the provisions of the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 2020, the number of constituencies allocated to Northern Ireland was unchanged, at 18. Initial proposals were published on 20 October 2021 and, following two periods of public consultation, revised proposals were published on 17 November 2022. Final recommendations were published on 28 June 2023.

Under the recommendations, the following constituencies for Northern Ireland came into effect at the 2024 general election:

Belfast South and Mid Down is a new constituency, replacing the former Belfast South constituency which had a much smaller area. All of the others have undergone boundary changes, primarily to bring the electorate within the range of 69,724 to 77,062 as required by the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986 (as amended in 2020).

2008–2023

Under the Fifth Periodic Review, the following configuration of constituencies was adopted in 2008. They were used in four general elections: 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019, and also in four Assembly elections: 2011, 2016, 2017 and 2022.

1995–2008

Under the Fourth Periodic Review, the following configuration of constituencies was adopted in 1995. They were used in three general elections: 1997, 2001 and 2005, and also in four Northern Ireland-wide elections: the Forum election in 1996, and the Assembly elections in 1998, 2003 and 2007.

1982–1995

Under the Third Periodic Review, the following configuration of constituencies was adopted in 1982. They were used in three general elections: 1983, 1987, and 1992. Notably, these boundaries were not used for the 1982 Assembly election, with the 1970 boundaries used for these instead.

This review marked an increase in the number of Northern Ireland constituencies, from 12 to 17.

1970–1982

Under the Second Periodic Review, the following configuration of constituencies was adopted in November 1970, after the general election earlier that year. They were used in three general elections: February 1974, October 1974, and 1979, and also in three Northern Ireland-wide elections: the 1973 Assembly election, the 1975 Constitutional Convention election, and the 1982 Assembly election.

1948–1970

Under the Representation of the People Act 1948, the following configuration of constituencies was adopted. They were used in seven general elections: 1950, 1951, 1955, 1959, 1964, 1966 and 1970.

The First Periodic Review, which reported in 1954 and took effect at the 1955 United Kingdom general election, made no changes whatsoever to the number of Northern Ireland constituencies, nor to their boundaries.

The introduction of these constituencies accompanied the abolition of the Queen's University of Belfast constituency. It also abolished the two-member constituencies.

Under the new boundaries, Antrim was split into two single-member constituencies - North Antrim and South Antrim. Down was likewise split into North Down and South Down. Tyrone and Fermanagh was split into Fermanagh and South Tyrone in the south, and Mid Ulster in the north, which also gained further area from the Londonderry constituency.

1920–1948

Under the Government of Ireland Act 1920, Northern Ireland was created on 3 May 1921, and the seats in the area it covered were reduced in number from 30 to 13, across 10 constituencies.

Under these boundaries, Antrim, Down, and Fermanagh and Tyrone each elected two MPs using the bloc voting system, and Northern Ireland had one university constituency, the Queen's University of Belfast constituency. As with other university constituencies in the UK, the QUB constituency was not defined territorially - instead, it had 1 MP elected by the graduates of the university, regardless of where they resided, in addition to any other vote they might have.

See also

*Politics of Northern Ireland

External links

* List of changes to constituency boundaries: section 6 o
Parliamentary constituency boundaries: the Fifth Periodical Review
''House of Commons Library''

References

{{Constituencies in Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland

Parliamentary constituencies