British Local Election Database, 1889-2003

UKDA study number:5319

Principal Investigators

Rallings, C.S.
Thrasher, M.A.M.
University of Plymouth. School of Sociology, Politics and Law
Ware, L.
University of Plymouth. Social Research and Regeneration Unit

Sponsors

Arts and Humanities Research Board
Economic and Social Research Council

Distributed by

UK Data Archive, University of Essex, Colchester.

June 2006

Bibliographic Citation

All works which use or refer to these materials should acknowledge these sources by means of bibliographic citation. To ensure that such source attributions are captured for bibliographic indexes, citations must appear in footnotes or in the reference section of publications. The bibliographic citation for this data collection is:

Rallings, C.S., Thrasher, M.A.M. and Ware, L., British Local Election Database, 1889-2003 [computer file]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Archive [distributor], June 2006. SN: 5319, http://dx.doi.org/10.5255/UKDA-SN-5319-1

Acknowledgement

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Any publication, whether printed, electronic or broadcast, based wholly or in part on these materials should carry a statement that the original data creators, depositors or copyright holders, the funders of the Data Collections (if different) and the UK Data Archive bear no responsibility for their further analysis or interpretation.

Copyright:
Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, University of Plymouth

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5319 . British Local Election Database, 1889-2003

Depositor:

Rallings, C.S. , University of Plymouth. School of Sociology, Politics and Law

Principal Investigators:

Rallings, C.S. , University of Plymouth. School of Sociology, Politics and Law

Thrasher, M.A.M. , University of Plymouth. School of Sociology, Politics and Law

Ware, L. , University of Plymouth. Social Research and Regeneration Unit

Sponsors:

Arts and Humanities Research Board
Economic and Social Research Council
Grant Number: RES-023-25-0001; AHRB - RF/AN2626/APN13667

Other Acknowledgements:

Material on Scottish Local Election Results was provided by Professor David Denver from the Department of Politics and International Relations at Lancaster University.

Abstract:

This project has established a unique database of local elections results in Great Britain. The database contains data for the period of the twentieth century before wholesale local government reorganisation in 1973. It also links the existing English, Welsh and Scottish local election databases. Until now, these results had never been collated together, let alone transformed into machine-readable form.

Main Topics:

The part of the database comprising the twentieth century before wholesale local government reorganisation in 1973 was funded by the AHRB and contains ca.50,000 election results. These cover mainly urban areas, including English, Welsh and Scottish county boroughs between 1911 and 1972 and all London area contests in the period 1889-1971. In detail these are:
County Borough Council, first year: 1911, last year: 1972, number of cases: 35678
County Council, first year: 1958, last year: 1970, number of cases: 5270
Greater London Council: first year: 1964, last year: 1970, number of cases: 96
London Borough Council: first year: 1900, last year: 1971, number of cases: 7361
London County Council: first year: 1889, last year: 1961, number of cases: 1214

The second part of the database which updates and links the existing English, Welsh and Scottish local election databases was funded by the ESRC and contains in excess of 150,000 individual local election results. In detail these are:
County Council: first year: 1973, last year: 2001, number of cases: 27663
District Council: first year: 1973, last year: 2003, number of cases: 87066
Greater London Council: first year: 1973, last year: 1981, number of cases: 276
London Borough Council: first year: 1974, last year: 2002, number of cases: 5827
Metropolitan Borough Council: first year: 1973, last year: 2003, number of cases: 18995
Metropolitan County Council: first year: 1973, last year: 1981, number of cases: 1641
Unitary Authority: first year: 1974, last year: 2003, number of cases: 9879

Coverage:

Time Period Covered: 1889 - 2003
Country: England; Scotland; Wales
Spatial Units: Unitary Authorities (England);Greater London;London Boroughs (Including City of London);Electoral Wards/Divisions (England);Metropolitan Counties;Electoral Divisions (Wales);Electoral Wards (Scotland)
Observation Units: Administrative units (geographical/political)
Kind of Data: Textual data; Numeric data; Alpha/numeric data

Universe Sampled:

Location of Units of Observation: National
Population: Election Results for England, Wales and Scotland between 1889 and 2003

Methodology:

Time Dimensions: Cross-sectional (one-time) study
Sampling Procedures: No sampling (total universe)
Number of Units: ca.200,000
Method of Data Collection: Compilation or synthesis of existing material
Data Sources:
Published or unpublished census material, official election returns, newspaper reports, local authority election returns, ward level data from censuses, OPCS electorate figures, and the series of publications Scottish Local Election Results by J. Bochel and D. Denver and additional materials for the Scottish data.
Weighting: no weighting conducted

Language(s) of Written Materials:

Study Description: English
Study Documentation: English

Access:

Access Conditions: The depositor has specified that registration is required and standard conditions of use apply. The depositor may be informed about usage. See terms and conditions for further information.
Availability: History Data Service, UK Data Archive
External note: Some of these data previously appeared in the UKDA catalogue under study numbers SN 2362, 2576, 3180 and 3301.
Contact: Help desk: hds@essex.ac.uk

Date of First Release:

28 June 2006

Copyright:

Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, University of Plymouth

File last updated:

4 January 2012