Schedule 3 – Payments and Pensions: Minor and consequential amendments Part 9 – Collaboration and Amalgamation Section 167 – Review of electoral arrangements
203.Enables the Welsh Ministers to direct the Welsh Commission to undertake a review of the electoral arrangements for the new local government area.
204.The provisions introduced by section 163 enable the Welsh Ministers to specify the initial electoral arrangements for a new authority in the amalgamation order.
205.In most cases the amalgamation order would be made sufficiently in advance of the scheduled date of the first elections for the electoral arrangements to have been reviewed by the Welsh Commission. A review can take between 12 and 18 months, so if an amalgamation order is close to the scheduled date of elections there may not be time for the Commission to complete the review before the first elections.
206.In these circumstances, section 163 enables the Welsh Ministers to determine the electoral arrangements to be used for the first elections. Ministers would seek out informed opinion in doing so; the arrangements would then be subject to review by the Welsh Commission as soon as possible after the first elections. This is what happened for the first elections to the new authorities created by the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994.