A Polling District is a geographical subdivision of an electoral area such as an electoral Ward within which a polling place is designated.
The Representation of the People Act 1983 places a duty on LA to divide the local authority area into polling districts based on ward boundaries, and to designate a polling place for each district. LAs also have a duty to keep these polling arrangements under review. The Electoral Administration Act 2006 introduced amendments to the 1983 Act (which in turn has been superseded by The Electoral Administration Act 2013). Now local authorities must conduct a full review (with public consultation) of its polling districts and polling places every four years, however adjustments to the boundaries of polling districts and the designation of polling places within LA wards can be proposed at any time in response to changes in ward boundaries or to the availability of premises that can be reasonably designated as polling places.
The Fifth Review of Electoral Arrangements concluded in May 2016 when the LGBCS made recommendations to Scottish Ministers for the number of Councillors and the electoral ward boundaries in each of Scotland's 32 local authorities. The review recommended changes in 30 LA areas of which all but 5 were accepted and came into force on 30th Sept 2016. As a result, ward boundaries (and therefore polling districts and possibly polling places) were changed after this date in time for the May 2017 elections.
The following fields are now MANDATORY fields for this dataset.
"district_code" - The polling district code, as defined by the LA
"UPRN" - The Unique Property Reference Number for the Corporate Address Gazeteer record of the polling place related to the polling district, as defined by the LA
"polling_place" - The name and/or address of the polling place (based on the Corporate Address Gazeteer record) related to the polling district, as defined by the LA
