House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1944

The House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1944 (7 & 8 Geo.6. c.41) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that established permanent boundary commissions for each of the constituent countries of the United Kingdom, and provided for the periodic review of the number and boundaries of parliamentary constituencies.

The Act established the membership of each commission, the procedures to be followed by the commissions, and the rules for the redistribution of seats for the commissions to observe. The commissions' initial reviews of constituencies under the Act were implemented by the Representation of the People Act 1948.

The Speaker of the House of Commons was to be the chairman of each of the four commissions. The remaining members were as follows:

(For the purposes of the Act Wales included Monmouthshire)

No member of the Commons, or of either house of the Parliament of Northern Ireland was qualified to be a commissioner, and any serving commissioner would be disqualified on becoming a member of any of these bodies.

The Act contained a number of rules to guide the work of the commissions.

"As far as practicable" in England and Wales:

In Scotland:

In Northern Ireland:

The electorate of any constituency should not differ from the "electoral quota" by more than 25%.

The electoral quota was obtained by dividing the total electorate for either Great Britain or Northern Ireland by the number of allocated seats.

Each commission were allowed to depart from the rules on areas or electorate in special cases "including in particular the size, shape and accessibility of a constituency" in order to form constituencies.

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