UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies & Members – Political Knowledge Atlas (5 Nov 2019)
- November 5, 2019
NOTE – This map shows the ‘state of play’ when the UK Parliament will formally dissolve on Thursday, November 7 in preparation for the forthcoming UK General Election (the 3rd in the past 4 years) on Thursday, December 12th 2019.
There are 59 Scottish members (‘MP’s’) of the United Kingdom Parliament at Westminster out of a total of 650, elected every 5 years or so (very roughly speaking). Though these politicians fundamentally affect our lives on a day-to-day basis through supporting their party’s policies, and their participation in, and oversight of, government and the essential services that keep the nation going, it’s difficult to get the big picture AND the detail, AND how both have changed over time, in the one source. This first ever political knowledge atlas of the members & constituencies of the UK Parliament in Scotland helps solve that problem.
Based on our first ever UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies – General, Geographic & Electoral Knowledge Atlas, the embedded contextual data fields in the seed branches for each constituency are now replaced by an embedded ‘Recent Election Results’ spreadsheet showing turnouts and majorities as well as votes cast for the last 20 years or so, whilst the attached multiple links to general, geographic & electoral knowledge resources are retained.
There are also now knowledge seed branches for all the current Scottish MP’s, with those that have retired or died since they were last elected retained as sub-branches for reference. As well as their official portrait picture, there are attached multiple links and sub-link collections of ‘Official Parliamentary’, ‘Official Party & MP Controlled’ and ‘Externally Controlled’ knowledge resources, with the size of all their majorities won in the constituency also embedded as data fields. Notable changes in circumstance since they were last elected are recorded as a branch note.
All elements are coloured by party when appropriate to make this map a truly ‘visual’ political knowledge base of the constituencies and members of the UK Parliament in Scotland..
NOTE – This map shows the ‘state of play’ when the UK Parliament will formally dissolve on Thursday, November 7 in preparation for the forthcoming UK General Election (the 3rd in the past 4 years) on Thursday, December 12th 2019.
Our UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies & Members – Political Knowledge Atlas is the ideal starting point for ‘thumb & brain friendly’ desktop (or even ‘in the field’) research for anyone with an interest in the political make up of any, or all, of Scotland’s 59 UK Parliamentary Constituencies and their 59 elected members (MP). It is made up of visual framework of…
59 Scottish UK Parliamentary Constituencies political knowledge seed branches – with unique identifying codes, embedded thumbnail location map image and a spreadsheet table coloured by party showing the results (votes cast, winning majorities and turnout) of the most recent elections in the constituency, as well as attached multiple hyperlinks to core general, geographic & electoral knowledge resources, and index markers that also tag them with some of the contextual knowledge.
59 Scottish Elected Member of UK Parlaiment (MP) political knowledge seed branches – coloured by political party with their embedded official profile image, the sizes of their majorities previously won in the constituency as data fields, and notable changes in circumstance since they were last elected recorded as a branch note, as well as attached multiple hyperlinks to ‘Official Parliamentary’ (eg. official profile page(s) & entry in the register of members interests), ‘Official Party & MP Controlled’ and ‘Externally Controlled’ knowledge resources, and index markers that also tag them with some of that contextual knowledge.
Each of these individual elected member (MP) seed branches also has collections of sub-branches, each with a single hyperlink to official / definitive / plain old useful ‘Official Parliamentary’, ‘Official Party & MP Controlled’ and ‘Externally Controlled’ knowledge resources about them found in the public domian.
Official Parliamentary Knowledge Resource Link Collection – This includes their official profile page(s) (on the old and new UK Parliament website), their spoken contributions in Hansard, their register of members interests and official expenses.
Official Party & MP Controlled Knowledge Resource Link Collection – This includes the MP’s official profile on their Party’s website, their own official website and their social media accounts like Facebook and Twitter.
Externally Controlled Knowledge Resource Link Collection – This includes the MP’s entry on pro democratic process transparency websites run by social enterprises and volunteers such as The Public Whip (voting record), TheyWorkForYou (more detailed analysis of their voting), Who Can I Vote For? by Democracy Club (crowd-sourced details of the MP as an election candidate), WriteToThem (a quick way of emailing your local elected representatives), and, if there is one, their Wikipedia article.
Together these elements establish a comprehensive & robust visual knowledge framework upon which we can build many other maps about the ‘national local’ building blocks of Scotland based on the political makeup of UK Parliamentary Constituencies and their elected members (MP’s) in the future.
MindManager Users – As with all our maps, the MindManager (.mmap) version of this map is also both a base map to add your own content to, or a source of content that can be added to your own existing maps.
Explore the other tabs for comprehensive descriptions of the knowledge seed branches and knowledge link collections that make up this knowledge atlas map….
- 59 (out of 650) Scottish Members of the UK Parliament in Scotland
- 59 (out of 650) Scottish Constituencies of the UK Parliament in Scotland
- 2,950 Total hyperlinks to public domain knowledge resources
- 1,763 Total map branches
Part of the 'Governance & Politics' Category
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Knowledge seed branches provide a ‘base level’ of contextual knowledge about the subject embedded within, or attached to, them in the form of…
Image [Embedded] – Such as thumbnail location maps, flags, icons, people profile pictures etc., which provide a unique visual element that users can instantly latch on to as they navigate their way through the map.
Text [Embedded] – Rich (ie. variably formatted) branch text – such as names & unique identifying codes (taken from official sources) – is a unique MindManager feature.
Note [Attached] – Contains supplementary information with all the elements of a word processed page – variably formatted (‘rich’) text, tables and images.
Spreadsheet Table / Chart [Embedded] – Containing contextual facts & figures, which can be toggled between table and chart view as appropriate (once again unique to MindManager).
Multiple Single Data Fields [Embedded] – Another way of adding contextual facts & figures to the map (once again unique to MindManager), these are like single cells in a spreadsheet and the values can be used to format the topic.
Index Marker Tags [Attached] – Arranged in groups and added to individual branches as appropriate, tags add contextual knowledge, enable map filtering and navigation.
Multiple Hyperlinks [Attached] – Another unique feature, multiple links to a range of official definitive / plain old useful knowledge resources about the subject of the seed branch – usually selected from the full range of general & geographic knowledge resource collections – help turn the map into a knowledge portal without adding to the visual clutter.
All the seed branches and their associated embedded / attached contextual knowledge elements used in this map are described in detail below…
UK Parliament Constituency Political Knowledge Seed Branch
UK Parliament Scottish Constituency Knowledge Seed Branch
MindManager provides an unparalleled range of ‘information cartography’ functionality that enables contextual knowledge to be embedded and attached to map branches in multiple ways…
Branch Outline Shape
For geographic area seed branches the outline shape indicates the nature of it’s borders with it’s equivelant neighbours…
CIRCLE = all coastal borders (ie. ‘island(s)’)
HEXAGON = all land borders (ie. ‘land-locked’)
ROUNDED RECTANGLE = mixed coastal & Land borders
Note(s)
i) Assignment of shapes to geographic area seed branches is controlled by MindManager’s unique Smart Rule feature using the ‘SLC – Borders Types’ tag (eqivelant to thematic mapping in GIS).
Image: Thumbnail Location Map
MindManager allows a single image to be embedded within a branch, which may be sufficient for the requirments. However with a bit of forethought (and some software ‘jigery pokery’ 🙂 we can also create one that incorporates more than one visual element so that, like the ‘rich’ branch text, more core knowledge can be ‘packed in’ to a single branch without visually overwhelming the user.
‘Thumbnail’ Consituency Location Map – The thumbnail map (which has been created by us) shows the constituency area within Scotland.
Note(s)
i) All images are optimised to reduce the file size.
ii) Due to the disparate nature of the size of the geographic areas of UK Parliamentary Constituencies, locations are not always immediately obvious for the smallest ones. If you zoom in on-screen, all will become clear though!
Text: Official Name & Unique Identifying Codes
Thanks to MindManager’s unique ability to handle ‘rich’ text – the ability to variably format individual chatracters within a single text ‘string’ – we can pack several different pieces of ‘core knowledge’ into the text of a single branch without it visually overwhelming the user.
Note(s)
i) All names and codes are meticulously sourced from official sources to ensure unambiguous identification of the council body and easy cross-referencing with other data sources, especially GIS databases (though it’s still not without it’s contradictions – see below!).
Costituency Name – We have taken the names of the Constituency from the parliament website.
ONS Code – The UK Government Office for National Statistics and in partnership with the devolved governments maintain a series of codes to uniquely represent a wide range of geographical areas of the UK (such as Council Areas and Electoral wards), for use in tabulating census and other statistical data, known as ‘ONS codes‘ or ‘GSS (Government Statistical Service) codes’.
Although the codes are not formally hierarchical like the previous system it replaced, ONS codes for the same type of geographic area start with the same 3 characters…
- S12 = Unitary Authority
- S13 = Ward or Electoral Division
- S14 = Westminster Parliamentary Constituency
- S15 = European Electoral Region
- S16 = Scottish Parliament Constituency
- S17 = Scottish Parliament Electoral Region
- S21 = National Park
- S22 = Travel to Work Area
- S23 = Police Force Area
- S34 = Workplace Zone
- S92 = Country
Note: By-Election Log
Additional knowledge can be attached to the branch in the form of a note. This is basically as rich an environment as a word processor page, so ‘rich’ text, tables and images.
By election log – The incidence of by-elections in constituenciess will be logged here. Not the results though, or the ‘shananigans’ of individual MP’s, which will recorded in the ‘Political Knowledge Atlas’.
Note(s)
i) By-elections in the Scottish Constituencies of the UK Parliament are infrequent, with the last one taking place in Inverclyde on 30 June 2011. That may be ‘only’ 8 years ago, but 3 (probably soon to be 4) parliaments ago!
ii) As with mapping Local Councillors, it has proved impossible to find ‘official’ sources of information about changes to the political circumstances in Constituencies and / or MPs in the institution’s (ie. the UK Parliament’s) ‘official’ website, especially the ‘old’ version.
iii) As is so often the case in our knowledge mapping work, the only place where such information is gathered in the one, easily accessible place and freely accessible in the public domain, is Wikipedia. However…
- how quickly after the event the information appears on is another matter…
- … if at all (and we have no way of knowing it’s missing).
Spreadsheet Table: Recent Election Results (coloured by party)
As well as the ability to link to, and import, Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, MindManager also (again uniquely) has it’s own in-built spreadsheet tool that allows users to create their own from scratch within a branch. This provides yet another way of packing in a lot more visually structured knowledge into a single map branch eg. election results, colour coded by political party for easier comprehension!
Note(s)
i) If appropriate, and it’s correctly structured, embedded spreadsheets can be toggled between the Table View and a Chart View of the data. However this feature is only available within MindManager. Whatever view is set there at the point of export, is the one that will appear in the HTML version of the map.
ii) Like Embedded Data Fields, Embedded Spreadsheets can be hidden / shown by clicking the green toggle arrow just above the top right corner.
Recent Election Results (coloured by party) – This embedded spreadsheet shows results of General Elections in the consituency going back to 1997 (if applicable), coloured by political party for the winning candidate and their majority. It provides ‘at a glance’ contextual political knowledge. The results are taken from the Wikipedia article for the constituency, which contains the list of candidates and results of all general elections, as well as useful background historical knowledge (which makes it the ‘go to’ single source of general election knowledge that we have found).
Note(s)
i) The Scottish Parliament was re-established on 6th May 1999 after the devolution referendum of 11th September 1997. This is why we show UK Parliament elections results going back to the 1997 if applicable.
ii) There was a major review of consituency boundaries by the Boundary Commission in Scotland in 2005, which was required under the Scotland Act 1998 to reduce the number of Scottish constituencies from 72 to 59. This is why the results only go back to the 2005 election for many constituencies (though the Wikipedia article has results for the historical consitutuency for context).
Index Marker Tags & Goups: Various
A variety of Index Markers arranged into groups are used throughout the map to tag branches as appropriate and enable map filtering and quick navigation. Marker groups can be copied and used to do the same in any other maps.
Note(s)
i) Within MindManager tags…
- provide a useful means of internal navigation between map topics (clicking on the branch that is shown as being tagged with that marker in the ‘Index Task Pane’ will immediately focus the map on that banch).
- can be generated automatically from branches (the title of the parent branch is the group name and those of all the immediate sub-branches become the individual tags within the group) .
- can be copied and pasted in their groups from one map to another.
NAVIGATION (‘NAV’) MARKERS
‘Navigation’ index markers tag the topics that they are named after. They provide another way of navigating the map – clicking on the tag in the index pane takes the user straight to the tagged topic.
NAV – UK Parliament Constituency – Each UK Parliament Scottish Constituency seed branch is tagged with it’s own index marker (it’s name), created from the branch text itself. Thus there are 2 ‘parts’ to the marker tag – Scottish Local Council Name (Council Type and identifying Codes) eg. East Renfrewshire.
POLITICAL MARKERS
Although this map is not of ‘political’ knowledge resources, as it’s about electoral areas a little bit of politics is unavoidable…
UK PARL CONS – Type – Historically there were several diferent types of UK Paliamentary Constituency, with significant differences between the way each worked. However since the advent of universal suffrage, the differences between county and borough constituencies are slight.
From Wikipedia:-
“Borough constituencies are predominantly urban while county constituencies are predominantly rural. There is no definitive statutory criterion for the distinction; the Boundary Commission for England has stated that, “as a general principle, where constituencies contain more than a small rural element they should normally be designated as county constituencies. Otherwise they should be designated as borough constituencies.”[1] In Scotland, all House of Commons constituencies are county constituencies except those in the cities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Dundee and three urban areas of Lanarkshire”.
UK PARL CONS – Current Political Party – Designation of sitting MP’s current party affiliation (tag is coloured as per the usual UK political party colours).
Note(s)
i) The inclusion of the political party of the constitiuency’s current MP is to help with the desktop research function of this map. Much more information is available in our UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies & Members – Political Knowledge Atlas.
GEOGRAPHIC (‘GEO’) MARKERS
‘Geomarker’ index markers provide ‘spatial intelligence’ in a map by tagging topics as being part of a specific geographic area of various ‘types’ – administrative, electoral, statistical, topographic etc. The areas do not need to be topics in the map for them to be a ‘Geomarker’. They are the equivalent of ‘Lookup Tables’ in ‘GIS’.
GEO Borders
The nature of the area’s borders with it’s equivelant neighbours…
UK PARL CONS – Borders Types – This Marker Group indicates the status of the constituency’s borders with all of it’s equivalent neighbours, in respect to the ocean (as per the topic shape). Thus these tags will enable the filtering of a map to show / hide those areas that do / do not have a coastline.
Possible tags…
- All Coastline (Island)
- Mixed
- No Coastline (Land-locked)
UK PARL CONS – Shared Land Borders – This Marker Group indicates which other UK Parliamentary Scottish Constituency(s) that the selected constituency shares a mutual border with, as shown on the Ordnance Survey Election Map online viewer.
On mainland Scotland UK Parliament constituency borders are contiguous i.e. there are no ‘gaps’ between them, so they have a complex interplay with shoreline, freshwater lochs, rivers, estuaries (firths), sea lochs and the ‘extent of the realm’ (the national boundary offshore). Thus in some cases constituencies share a mutual border on a water feature rather than land.
The ‘islands’ – Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles – are far enough away from the mainland that they do not share a mutual boundary with any others.
GEO Unique Identifying Codes
Within the branch text we incorporate unique identifiers codes for geographic areas for easy cross-reference with other data sources, especially GIS databases.
We also add some of the truly unique codes as ‘geo’ index marker tags to the topic. Only one topic in the map will have that ‘geo tag’. This offers interesting possibilities for adding further content at a later date.
UK PARL CONS – UK EU-NUTS2 Region – The European Union Statistics Agency (Eurostat) maintains a list of ‘Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS)‘ codes for it’s constituent member states (including Scotland as part of the United Kingdom) for statistical reporting & comparison purposes. Each member state has a parent NUTS code, and then there are 3 levels of ‘NUTS code’ for the statistical reporting areas, which in Scotland equate to…
- NUTS for member state = United Kingdom = UK
- NUTS 1 = Scotland = UKM
- NUTS 2 = Regional groupings of Scottish Council Areas…
- NUTS 3 = A ‘rag-tag’ mixture with codes covering sub-groupings of neighbouring council areas within the NUTS 2 region, single council areas for ‘large’ councils, and in the case of the ‘super large’ Highland Council area, internal geographic subdivisions along ‘historic county’ lines.
This means…
- NUTS 2 ‘regions’ don’t correspond exactly to any other way of subdividing Scotland regionally e.g. Scottish Parliament Electoral Regions (even though the nomenclature may by similar).
- NUTS 3 codes are not always unique to individual councils i.e. they cannot be used as unique identifiers.
- NUTS 3 codes don’t always follow Local Council Area boundaries e.g. the Island of Arran is part of North Ayrshire Council Area (NUTS 3 = UKM33), but is included in the ‘Highlands and Islands’ (NUTS 3 = UKM63) area for EU statistical reporting purposes.
There are 2 ‘parts’ to the marker – NUTS 2 area name (NUTS 2 Code) eg. South Western Scotland Region (UKM3).
UK PARL CONS – ONS Code – The Council’s official identifying code given by the UK Government Office for National Statistic (ONS) in partnership with the Scottish Government, as per the Branch Text above.
GEO ‘Look-Up Geographies
In the world of Geographic Information (GI) a ‘look up’ defines the link between one geographic feature and another. Most commonly this is between geographic areas of different ‘types’. For example a Local Council Electoral Ward will also coincide with ‘higher’ electoral geographies of Scottish Parliament Constituencies & Regions, and United Kingdom Parliament Constituencies. Of course the boundaries of the different geographies do not necessarily coincide or ‘nest’ exactly (though they might have done at one time). Thus relationships are often ‘one to many’, or even ‘many to many’, which is ‘database speak’ for ‘it’s complicated’.
Relationships are usually derived using computerised spatial analysis, with the results stored in ‘look-up tables‘ in databases or spreadsheets. ‘Geo’-tagging map branches that represent geographic areas is our hopefully useful alternative.
You can get more of an idea of the complexities of UK Geographihies from the handy UK Office of National Statistics Beginners Guide To UK Geography.
UK PARL CONS – UK Home Nation – As it sounds. The presence of this tag has been inherited from prior Knowledge Mappers’ maps of all the constituencies in the UK Parliament in the one map. The tag consists of just the name ‘Scotland’.
UK PARL CONS – Scottish LCs – All the Scottish local council areas that overlap with the UK Parliament Constuencies. There are usually at least 2.
There are 2 ‘parts’ to this marker – Council Name (ISO3166-2 Code – ONS Code) eg. East Renfrewshire Council (GB-ERW – S12000011).
UK PARL CONS – Scottish Electoral Wards – All the Scottish Local Council Electoral Ward areas that overlap with the UK Parliament Constituencies. There are 2 ‘parts’ to this marker – Electoral Ward Name (LGBCS Ward Number – ISO3166-2 Code – ONS Code) eg. Barrhead, Liboside and Uplawmoor (Ward 1 – GB-ERW – S13002914).
UK PARL CONS – Scot Parl Region – Scottish Parliamentary Consituencies are divided into regions, which also have elected members. The marker is just the Scottish Parliamentary Constituency Region Name eg. West Scotland.
UK PARL CONS – Scot Parl Cons – All the Scottish Parliament Constuencies that overlap with the UK Parliamentary constituency. There are 2 ‘parts’ to this marker – Scottish Parliamentary Constituency Name (ONS Code) eg. Eastwood (S16000103).
Attached Hyperlinks: Multiple
See next section for full details.
UK Parliament Scottish Constituency Knowledge Seed Branch
One of our philosophies at KnowledgeMappers is not to reinvent the wheel whenever possible. Thus we include hyperlinks to original official / definitive / plain old useful knowledge sources whenever possible, as well as links to Wikipedia pages for additional, “bigger picture” context (often not obvious, or even absent from, the original source). By doing this…
- original sources get used more often, by more people.
- errors get spotted quicker, thereby improving the information quality for everybody.
- updates get promulgated sooner to end users.
- rather than us having to interpret original sources to create further information resources around “big picture” context for a subject we are not experts in, users of our map can “get it straight from the horses mouth” as it were, so everybody benefits.
Note(s)
i) MindManager has the unique ability to have multiple hyperlinks attached to a single map branch, and to edit the default title text of the link to make it more meaningful to the user. This…
- greatly reduces the visual clutter of the map.
- means a full basket of links to official / definitive / useful knowledge resources about the subject can stay with the seed branch if it is re-used in other maps.
The chain icon at the end of a branch (rather than the favicon (icon) served by the linked-to website) indicates where a branch has more than one hyperlink.
ii) In the circular knowledge economy way of Wikipedia if there is knowledge that you could add to an existing page that is linked to, or even starting a page that doesn’t yet exist, then go for it! That’s what it’s all about!
iii) Not all of the resources below will exist for all constituencies.
The following knowledge resource links are attached to this seed branch (arranged in alphabetical order within the groupings)…
General Knowledge Resource Links
UK Parliament – Constituency Representation – The UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new website with improved information about MPs and consituencies. This constituency page is a recent addition to the site. It shows…
- ‘Representation’ tab – Shows the recent history of ‘representation’ for the constituency back to 2005, cross-referencing to the individual MP’s page, even for previous members.
- ‘Location’ tab – Shows a ‘rough’ boundary of the constituency in an embedded Google Map. Viewers are directed to the Ordnance Survey election maps map viewer website for a more detailed boundary map.
Note(s)
i) The Wikipedia consituency article shows the full history of elections and elected members for the constituency. This is especially useful flagging up material changes to consituency boundaries over the years.
House of Commons Library – Constituency Local Data Dashboard – The House of Commons Library is a research and information service based in UK Parliament. Their interactive Local Data dashboard brings together some of the key statistics for parliamentary constituencies. Select the constituency you are interested in and the dashboard will update. To find out which constituency you live in, type your postcode into Parliament’s find your MP service.
Use the links under each heading to explore the data in more detail, or browse all the detailed dashboards and briefings.
Sources are provided below the dashboard.
Note(s)
i) Due to the architecture of the site, it is not possible to link to individual constituency data profiles. Users must manually select the contituency they ant from the drop down list.
Scottish Government Statistics Portal – Westminster Parliamentary Constituency – This is the link to the constituency’s data profile page in the ‘Westminster Parliamentary Constituencies’ section on the geostatistical atlas section of the statistics.gov.scot website. As well as key facts, the data about the Constituency is grouped as…
- Social Environment
- Crime and Justice
- Economic Activity, Benefits and Tax Credits
- Economy
- Education, Skills and Training
- Environment
- Geography
- Health and Social Care
- Housing
- Labour Force
- Population
- Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation
- Transport
Wikipedia – Article on the UK Parliament constituency – As well as the full history of elections and elected members for the constituency, the Wikipedia consituency article includes the general history. This is especially useful flagging up material changes to consituency boundaries over the years.
Geographic Knowledge Resource Links
Boundary Commission for Scotland – Fifth Review Constituency Map [PDF & online viewer] – The Boundary Commission for Scotland helpfully publish GIS produced, constituency boundary maps in PDF (i.e. static) format as part of their periodic review process. The maps show the boundaries against an Ordnance Survey basemap, and can be easily printed if required.
The last review of UK parliementary boundaries was the 5th Review in 2005. A single report covering the review considerations and recommendations for all Scottish consituencies can be downloaded from the review page (multiple links), as well as an overview map of all consituencies in Scotland.
UK Parliament – Constituency Location Map – As noted in the General Links section above, the UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new website with improved information about MPs and consituencies. On the ‘new improved’ constituency page there is an embedded map showing the ‘rough’ boundary of the constituency over a minimal Google Map in the ‘Location’ tab.
Note(s)
i) Viewers are directed to the Ordnance Survey election maps map viewer website for a more detailed boundary map. Unfortunately it is not possible to link to individual map views, so users will have to manually ‘switch on’ the ‘Westminster Constituencies’ layer from the selection panel on the left side of the window.
Electoral Knowledge Resource Links
BBC News Election Results – Constituency – The BBC News website has the ‘last couple’ of General Election results at individual constituency level (though there’s not any additional consistuency profile information). There are separate ‘sub-sites’ for each General Election at national level (2017 and 2015).
UK Parliament Elections Online 2017 – United Kingdom Parliamentary Constituency – The UK Parliament website is gradually rolling out a new website with improved information about MPs and consituencies. The new Elections Online section has overall & individual constituency results for UK General Elections since 2010 as tables, maps and charts.
National and regional seat summaries for the selected constituency are shown in the table below the pie chart, click/tap the buttons to move between country, region and county.
**TO BE COMPLETED**
Who Can I Vote For? by Democracy Club – Constituency Elections – Crowd-sourced details of all the candidates for all elections to the constituency since 2016 (as well as the 2015 & 2010 general elections) – Blah
Wikipedia – Election results subsection of UK Parliament constituency Article – As noted in the General Links section above, the Wikipedia article on the constituency has the history of elections and elected members for the constituency.
Note(s)
i) As a crowd-sourced resource the quality, breadth and depth of the content of Wikipedia articles is entirely reliant on volunteers, who are able to source (and link to) reliable information found elsewhere in the public domain. In our experience it may be the case that…
- not all election results may be reported for every constituency.
- even if there is a long history of results, there may actually have been intervening boundary changes so the constituency is not exactly the same over time, even though it’s called the same name. These are not always picked up by Wikipedia contributors.
UK Parliamentary Member (MP) Political Knowledge Seed Branch
UK Parliamentary Scottish Member (MP) Political Knowledge Seed Branch
MindManager provides an unparalleled range of ‘information cartography’ functionality that enables contextual knowledge to be embedded and attached to map branches in multiple ways…
Fill Colour: Political Affiliation
The colour of the branch indicates the MP’s political party affiliation, or as an ‘independent’.
Image: Official profile picture
MindManager allows a single image to be embedded within a branch, which may be sufficient for the requirments. However with a bit of forethought (and some software ‘jigery pokery’ we can also create one that incorporates more than one visual element so that, like the ‘rich’ branch text, more core knowledge can be ‘packed in’ to a single branch without visually overwhelming the user.
Note(s)
i) All images are optimised to reduce the file size.
Profile Picture – This is much reduced resolution version of the official picture on the MP’s webpage.
Text: Name, Political Party Affiliation and Constituency Represented
Thanks to MindManager’s unique ability to handle ‘rich’ text – the ability to variably format individual chatracters within a single text ‘string’ – we can pack several different pieces of ‘core knowledge’ into the text of a single branch without it visually overwhelming the user.
Name – This is the name as given on their MP’s official webpage. Names are suffixed with the term ‘MP’ at the end so that the reason why they are listed is unequivocal…
Note(s)
i) If the MP’s name is listed as ‘Sandy’ rather than ‘Alexander’, then that’s what their called in this map.
ii) Some MP’s have a range of civic, business and political profiles, potentially at both local & national levels, so it is helpful to know ‘which hat they are wearing’ :-). For example a recently elected MP may still be a serving Local Councillor.
(Party Affiliation) – Designation of party affiliation is as per the branch fill colour.
[REASON FOR DEPARTURE] – If this is present on the MP branch, it indicates the reason why they are now no longer a serving MP despite being elected at the last election. Possible reasons are…
- [DECEASED] – MP has died
- [RESIGNED] – MP has resigned
- [REFUSED TO TAKE OFFICE] – candidate was successfully elected, but declined to take up their position
Whatever the reason, this will instigate a by-election at which the MP’s replacement is elected.
Note(s)
i) There will usually be a delay before a by-election date is set and announced.
ii) Once the by-election has taken place, the ex-MP’s topic will become a subtopic of the replacement MP (though the hyperlink will probably no longer work as the Parliament usually remove the MP’s profile webpage as soon as their ‘departure’ has been made public).
iii) The reason for departure is expanded upon in the topic note.
iv) The reason for departure is also denoted by a topic index marker (see below).
Constituency – Although this repeats information from ‘higher up’ the map hierarchy, it is helps users keep track of ‘who is who’ when many map branches are expanded and filling the screen.
Note(s)
i) *An asterisk after the name indicates noteworthy MP circumstances…
- they are now no longer a MP. The reasons why will also be shown in [SQUARE BRACKETS]
- they were elected at a by-election. The ‘old’ UK Parliament website did not indicate this on their MP’s pages.
- they have changed their political affiliation since being elected. Usually they will have ‘resigned their party whip’, voluntarily or otherwise, temporarily or permanently, for whatever reason. They may now sit as an ‘independent’, or they may have changed political party completely.
ii) There is also a brief topic note describing the change of circumstances more fully. This is generally taken from the Wikipedia article on the last election.
Note: MP Political Events Log
Additional knowledge can be attached to the branch in the form of a note. This is basically as rich an environment as a word processor page, so ‘rich’ text, tables and images.
MP Political Events Log – If there have been any events that have caused a change in the MP’s political circumstances, then they will be noted here (subject to the caveats in the notes below). So such things as (in increasing potential size of political ‘fall-out’)…
- their suspension of by their party or the council itself, preventing them from participating in normal council democratic processes.
- a change of allegiance – they may resign from their party and sit as an independent, or even “cross the floor” and join another party.
- their resignation / death, triggering a by-election (usually in a few weeks), that may or may not be won by another party!
Note(s)
i) As with mapping Local Councillors, it has proved impossible to find ‘official’ sources of information about changes to the political circumstances in Constituencies and / or MPs in the institution’s (ie. the UK Parliament’s) ‘official’ website, especially the ‘old’ version.
ii) As is so often the case in our knowledge mapping work, the only place where such information is gathered in the one, easily accessible place and freely accessible in the public domain, is Wikipedia. However…
- how quickly after the event the information appears on is another matter…
- … if at all (and we have no way of knowing it’s missing).
Embedded Data Fields: MP’s Majority for each election to represent the constituency
Single data fields embedded in the seed branch are another unique MindManager feature. They provide quick reference of ‘core’ data that provides context and enables meaningful comparison with other MPs, saving the user the time and effort of looking them up in the linked knowledge resources. These are taken from official sources if easily accessible in the public domain, or Wikipedia if not.
Note(s)
i) The Data Fields can be hidden / shown by clicking the green toggle arrow just above the top right corner.
ii) Data Fields are like single cells in spreadsheets..
- The data can be numeric or text.
- The values in cells can be calculated from other cells either in the same branch or in other branches. Formulas that define the values are built using MindManager’s ‘Autocalc’ feature (again unique).
- The values in data fields may be used to control aspects of the visual formatting (eg. colour or shape) of the seed branch using Mindmanager’s ‘Smart Rules’ feature (again unique).
MP’s Majority for each election to represent the constituency – The figures are taken from the Wikipedia article for the constituency (and perhaps others too – see note below) which contains the list of candidates and results of all general elections, as well as useful background historical knowledge (which makes it the ‘go to’ single source of general election knowledge that we have found).
Note(s)
i) The majorities may not be consecutive as MP’s might lose their seat at one election and be re-elected at the next (if they have the tanacity!).
ii) There may be fewer majorities recorded for the MP than recent election victories for their party (as given in the embedded results table in the Constituency Seed Branch) as previously incumbent MPs have not sought re-election. Some MP’s may also have represented other constituencies in the past.
Index Marker Tags & Goups: Various
A variety of Index Markers arranged into groups are used throughout the map to tag branches as appropriate and enable map filtering and quick navigation. Marker groups can be copied and used to do the same in any other maps.
Note(s)
i) Within MindManager tags…
- provide a useful means of internal navigation between map topics (clicking on the branch that is shown as being tagged with that marker in the ‘Index Task Pane’ will immediately focus the map on that banch).
- can be generated automatically from branches (the title of the parent branch is the group name and those of all the immediate sub-branches become the individual tags within the group) .
- can be copied and pasted in their groups from one map to another.
MP – Gender – This is not recorded on MP’s listings (for obvious reasons), so we have assigned this attribute manually ourselves. Thus any errors are ours, for which we apologise in advance ;-).
MP – Political Party – As per the branch fill and text.
MP – Electoral Status – Given that we are going to record MPs over time in subsequent maps, and there may be a time lag between an MP resigning and their replacement being elected at a by-election, there is an obvious need to keep track of the status of individual mebers. Possible tags….
- Elected at YYYY General Election – All General Elections (a tage for each) in which the MP has been elected (note this may not necessarily be for the same constituency)
- Elected at last General Election – MP still serving since elected at last UK General Election
- Elected at subsequent By-Election – MP elected at a subsequent by-election
MP – Active Status – This tag indicates any change in circumstances since the MP was last elected to the constituency.
- Still serving as elected – MP still serving under the same party whip as last elected
- No longer under elected party whip – MP no longer serving under the same party whip as last
- DECEASED – MP has died
- RESIGNED – MP has resigned
- REFUSED TO TAKE OFFICE – Candidate was successfully elected, but declined to take up their position
Note(s)
i) For any status that isn’t ‘Still serving as elected’, it will be expanded upon in the topic note.
Attached Hyperlinks: Multiple
See next section for full details.
Incumbent UK Parliamentary Scottish Member (MP) Political Knowledge Seed Branch
One of our philosophies at KnowledgeMappers is not to reinvent the wheel whenever possible. Thus we include hyperlinks to original official / definitive / plain old useful knowledge sources whenever possible, as well as links to Wikipedia pages for additional, “bigger picture” context (often not obvious, or even absent from, the original source). By doing this…
- original sources get used more often, by more people.
- errors get spotted quicker, thereby improving the information quality for everybody.
- updates get promulgated sooner to end users.
- rather than us having to interpret original sources to create further information resources around “big picture” context for a subject we are not experts in, users of our map can “get it straight from the horses mouth” as it were, so everybody benefits.
Note(s)
i) MindManager has the unique ability to have multiple hyperlinks attached to a single map branch, and to edit the default title text of the link to make it more meaningful to the user. This…
- greatly reduces the visual clutter of the map.
- means a full basket of links to official / definitive / useful knowledge resources about the subject can stay with the seed branch if it is re-used in other maps.
The chain icon at the end of a branch (rather than the favicon (icon) served by the linked-to website) indicates where a branch has more than one hyperlink.
ii) In the circular knowledge economy way of Wikipedia if there is knowledge that you could add to an existing page that is linked to, or even starting a page that doesn’t yet exist, then go for it! That’s what it’s all about!
iii) Not all of the resources below will exist for all Local Councils.
The following knowledge resource links are attached to this seed branch (arranged in alphabetical order within the groupings)…
Official Parliamentary Knowledge Resources
An MP is obliged to submit information to the parliamentary authorities, who then publish it in the public domain on the websites as required, so access to these knowledge resources are not under the control of the MP.
There are a range of ‘official’ knowledge resources about members that are published by the United Kingdom Parliament on it’s websites. We use the plural as…
- there are a number of sub-sites that have different branding, even though they are sub-domains of parliament.uk.
- the UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new, improved website with better, more inter-connected knowledge resources about MPs and consituencies. At time of writing this is running in parallel with the exisiting website so we include links to both where appropriate.
- even though this is an improvement, everything is still not inter-connected (that we can see), so users still have to hunt for particular knowledge resources about MPs in different sections of the website (e.g. expenses, or register of financial interests).
UK Parliament MP Profile – The UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new, improved website with better, more inter-connected knowledge resources about MPs and constituencies. At time of writing this is running in parallel with the exisiting website so we include links to both where appropriate.
The page on the existing website has no ‘self-penned’ biography information about the MP as a person, just a factual list of electoral history and committee memberships, with no interlinking to other knowledge resources.
Note(s)
i) Once a General Election is declared, the UK Parliment disables the links to the incumbent MP’s profile pages on the website so this resource will not be availables during the campaign.
UK Parliament MP Profile [NEW WEBSITE] -The UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new, improved website with better, more inter-connected knowledge resources about MPs and constituencies. At time of writing this is running in parallel with the exisiting website so we include links to both where appropriate.
The page on the ‘new’ website still has no ‘self-penned’ biography information about the MP as a person, but has more factual information about the MPs parliamentary activities, with interlinking to the relevant knowledge resources about those activities.
Tabbed’ subsections are…
- Parliamentary career
- Voting record
- Early Day Motions
- Last election result
Email MP @parliament.uk – This is the official e-mail address of the MP at the UK Parliament. Other contact details, are given on the MPs official parliamentary profile page.
UK Parliament Hansard – Hansard is a “substantially verbatim” report of what is said in Parliament that, previously was made available in print and is now available online. Members’ words are recorded, and then edited to remove repetitions and obvious mistakes, albeit without taking away from the meaning of what is said. Hansard also reports decisions taken during a sitting and records how Members voted to reach those decisions in Divisions.
House of Commons – The Register of Members’ Financial Interests – This is one of several registers in the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards section of the current parliament website. A new register of members’ financial interests is published each year as both PDF and HTML, with the ‘current’ register updated at regular intervals through the year.
Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) Expenses Tracker – This site allows users to interactively view individual MPs expenses since 2010, filtering by year and expense type.
Official Party / MP Controlled Knowledge Resources
This collection of knowledge resources is directly controlled by the MP, or their political party, and consists of websites and social media accounts. As is the case with the ‘real world’, some MPs have a bigger / more active ‘online presence’ than others…
Official Party MP Profile – Most political parties provide a profile page of their MP’s on their main website. They are usually fairly minimal in content. They may have some personal biography information, but at the very least will have contact details for the MP and their local party association. Sometimes this is the only ‘official’ website an MP has.
MP’s Official Website – This is the MP’s own wesbite and so is presumably under their control. That said some are better than others (or even absent completely), and are more personalised than ‘corporate template’. They usually provide details of how to get in touch with the MP and local surgeries for constituents.
Facebook – MP’s Facebook page if they have one. Many, but by no means all, do.
Twitter – MP’s Twitter feed if they have one. Many, but by no means all, do, or still have (it’s not as if politicians could get vilified for something that they had ‘tweeted’ in the past or anything like that…).
Externally Controlled Knowledge Resources
This collection of knowledge resources is published by external, and therefore ‘unofficial’, parties. With the sophisticated level of web technology available now, some combine and repackage knowledge from official parliamentary sources on the one ‘page’ as a service to consitiuents so they can get the full picture of what their MP is actually doing in parlaiment. And then there’s good old Wikipedia, which is amazingly ‘current’ on UK politics.
The Public Whip Voting Record – A not for profit, open source project that ‘scrapes’ the flat text of the parliament Hansard (daily transcription of what is said) and turns it into a useful online database of meaningful knowledge about how individual MPs have voted on specific ‘divisions’.
TheyWorkForYou – Another not for profit project run by mySociety, that ‘scrapes’ a variety of online sources of MPs activities in parliament and turns them into a useful online knowlegde base of not just how individual MPs have voted on specific issues, but also some analysis and sharing tools.
**TO BE UPDATED**
Who Can I Vote For? by Democracy Club – Crowd-sourced details of the MP as an election candidate in all UK elections going back to 2016 (plus the 2015 & 2010 general elections).
Wikipedia – Article on MP (if available) – There is a Wikipedia article on just about all MP’s, though the amount and quality of the content does vary. Usually it contains a bit more personal biographical information than is available from ‘official’ sources.
Note(s)
i) As with all Wikipedia links…
- If you know something that’s not there, get involved and add your contribution to the article so everybody can benefit from your knowledge.
- The external Links’ section at the bottom of the articles provides a great ‘jumping off point’ to discover new knowledge resources.
WriteToThem – Another not for profit project run by mySociety, this time providing a quick way of emailing your local elected representatives, including MPs.
Hyperlinks to official / definitive / ‘plain old useful’ knowledge resources found in the public domain is one of the main focus of our knowledge maps. Links are added to our maps in 2 ways…
Multiple Hyperlinks Attached To Seed Branches – MindManager has the unique ability to attach multiple hyperlinks to a single map branch. This means that…
- maps need fewer branches so are less visually cluttered.
- a single branch can become a mini knowledge portal in it’s own right (one of the reasons why we call them ‘knowledge seed branches’).
- links to core knowledge resources (usually the most important links taken from the Link Collections) can remain with the branch when it’s re-used in other maps, whether or not it’s the kep focus of that map.
The multiple hyperlinks attached to the different types of knowledge seed branches in this map are already detailed in the ‘Seed Branches’ tab.
Knowledge Link Sub-Branch Collections – Sub-branches – each with a single attached hyperlink to an external knowledge resource – are grouped into related collections, such as ‘General Knowledge Resources’ or ‘Geographic Knowledge Resources’. This makes for easier, more ‘thumb friendly’ browsing & discovery of knowledge resources, which helps in more intensive activities like prolonged desktop research.
The knowledge link sub-branch collections in this map are detailed below…
Official Parliamentary Knowledge Resources Links Collection
UK Parliamentary Scottish Member (MP)
An MP is obliged to submit information to the parliamentary authorities, who then publish it in the public domain on the websites as required, so access to these knowledge resources are not under the control of the MP.
There are a range of ‘official’ knowledge resources about members that are published by the United Kingdom Parliament on it’s websites. We use the plural as…
- there are a number of sub-sites that have different branding, even though they are sub-domains of parliament.uk.
- the UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new, improved website with better, more inter-connected knowledge resources about MPs and consituencies. At time of writing this is running in parallel with the exisiting website so we include links to both where appropriate.
- even though this is an improvement, everything is still not inter-connected (that we can see), so users still have to hunt for particular knowledge resources about MPs in different sections of the website (e.g. expenses, or register of financial interests).
The following knowledge resource links form this collection…
UK Parliament MP Profile – The UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new, improved website with better, more inter-connected knowledge resources about MPs and constituencies. At time of writing this is running in parallel with the exisiting website so we include links to both where appropriate.
The page on the existing website has no ‘self-penned’ biography information about the MP as a person, just a factual list of electoral history and committee memberships, with no interlinking to other knowledge resources.
UK Parliament MP Profile [NEW WEBSITE] -The UK Parliament is gradually rolling out a new, improved website with better, more inter-connected knowledge resources about MPs and constituencies. At time of writing this is running in parallel with the exisiting website so we include links to both where appropriate.
The page on the ‘new’ website still has no ‘self-penned’ biography information about the MP as a person, but has more factual information about the MPs parliamentary activities, with interlinking to the relevant knowledge resources about those activities.
Tabbed’ subsections are…
- Parliamentary career
- Voting record
- Early Day Motions
- Last election result
Email MP @parliament.uk – This is the official e-mail address of the MP at the UK Parliament. Other contact details, are given on the MPs official parliamentary profile page.
UK Parliament Hansard – Hansard is a “substantially verbatim” report of what is said in Parliament that, previously was made available in print and is now available online. Members’ words are recorded, and then edited to remove repetitions and obvious mistakes, albeit without taking away from the meaning of what is said. Hansard also reports decisions taken during a sitting and records how Members voted to reach those decisions in Divisions.
House of Commons – The Register of Members’ Financial Interests – This is one of several registers in the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards section of the current parliament website. A new register of members’ financial interests is published each year as both PDF and HTML, with the ‘current’ register updated at regular intervals through the year.
Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) Expenses Tracker – This site allows users to interactively view individual MPs expenses since 2010, filtering by year and expense type.
Official Party/MP Controlled Knowledge Resources Links Collection
UK Parliamentary Scottish Member (MP)
This collection of knowledge resources is directly controlled by the MP, or their political party, and consists of websites and social media accounts. As is the case with the ‘real world’, some MPs have a bigger / more active ‘online presence’ than others…
The following knowledge resource links form this collection…
Official Party MP Profile – Most political parties provide a profile page of their MP’s on their main website. They are usually fairly minimal in content. They may have some personal biography information, but at the very least will have contact details for the MP and their local party association. Sometimes this is the only ‘official’ website an MP has.
MP’s Official Website – This is the MP’s own wesbite and so is presumably under their control. That said some are better than others (or even absent completely), and are more personalised than ‘corporate template’. They usually provide details of how to get in touch with the MP and local surgeries for constituents.
Facebook – MP’s Facebook page if they have one. Many, but by no means all, do.
Twitter – MP’s Twitter feed if they have one. Many, but by no means all, do, or still have (it’s not as if politicians could get vilified for something that they had ‘tweeted’ in the past or anything like that…).
Externally Controlled Knowledge Resource Links Collection
UK Parliamentary Scottish Member (MP)
This collection of knowledge resources is published by external, and therefore ‘unofficial’, parties. With the sophisticated level of web technology available now, some combine and repackage knowledge from official parliamentary sources on the one ‘page’ as a service to consitiuents so they can get the full picture of what their MP is actually doing in parlaiment. And then there’s good old Wikipedia, which is amazingly ‘current’ on UK politics.
The following knowledge resource links form this collection…
The Public Whip Voting Record – A not for profit, open source project that ‘scrapes’ the flat text of the parliament Hansard (daily transcription of what is said) and turns it into a useful online database of meaningful knowledge about how individual MPs have voted on specific ‘divisions’.
TheyWorkForYou – Another not for profit project run by mySociety, that ‘scrapes’ a variety of online sources of MPs activities in parliament and turns them into a useful online knowlegde base of not just how individual MPs have voted on specific issues, but also some analysis and sharing tools.
**TO BE UPDATED**
Who Can I Vote For? by Democracy Club – Crowd-sourced details of the MP as an election candidate in all UK elections going back to 2016 (plus the 2015 & 2010 general elections).
Wikipedia – Article on MP (if available) – There is a Wikipedia article on just about all MP’s, though the amount and quality of the content does vary. Usually it contains a bit more personal biographical information than is available from ‘official’ sources.
Note(s)
i) As with all Wikipedia links…
- If you know something that’s not there, get involved and add your contribution to the article so everybody can benefit from your knowledge.
- The external Links’ section at the bottom of the articles provides a great ‘jumping off point’ to discover new knowledge resources.
WriteToThem – Another not for profit project run by mySociety, this time providing a quick way of emailing your local elected representatives, including MPs.
We are continually striving to find further, freely accessible in the public domain definitive / official / plain old useful 🙂 knowledge resources to link to in our maps, as well as keeping the existing links up to date. The changelogs below summarise the actions undertaken to initially create – and subsequently update – this knowledge map.
UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies & Members Polticial Knowledge Atlas (5 Nov 2019)
Version – 1.0
Links to knowledge resources – 2,950
Map Branches – 1,763
File Sizes – HTML5 – 22.2 MB; MindManager (.mmap) – 15.1 MB
Basemap Framework(s) – UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies – General, Geographic & Electoral Knowledge Atlas (14 Oct 2019) (v1.0)
Actions – The main work done in making this version of the map was…
- Initial creation of knowledge seed branch framework of Members of Parliament (MPs’) as additions to the UK Parliament Constituencies in Scotland mainbranch framework.
- Seeking out and attaching multiple links to MP’s seed branch of knowledge resources from Official Parliamentary, Party/MP Controlled and Externally Controlled sources.
- Attaching selected hyperlinks to the seed branch so they always stay with it if the map is re-used and re-purposed in MindManager.
- Adaptation of Constituency seed branches from general to political embedded knowledge – replaced facts and figures single geostatistical data fields with election results tables (spreadsheets) coloured by party, going back to the 1997 UK General Election. Data taken from the constituency’s Wikipedia article (the only source of historical election results data we could find in the public domain).
Note(s)
i) There was a major review of constituency boundaries by the Boundary Commission in Scotland that were implemented for the 2005 General Election and so some constituencies only date from then.
Map Facts
Here are some of the ‘fun facts’ 😉 about Scotland’s 59 (out of a total of 650) United Kindom Parliament Constituencies & Members that we have discovered (and embedded!) during the process of creating this map…
Geographic Area
Smallest & Largest
Glasgow North Consituency
Ross, Skye and Lochaber Constituency
Majority
Smallest & Largest
North East Fife Consituency [SNP]
Edinburgh South Constituency [Lab]
Gender Balance
15 out of 59 Female MP's
MPs - ALL: 59 Female: 15 Male: 44
Political Balance
By Total MPs, Consituency Areas & Constituency Populations
Constituency MP's As A Proportion of Total
(59 MP's)
MPs - SNP: 35 LDP: 4 Lab: 7 Con: 13
Constituency Areas As A Proportion of Total
(78,977.6 sq km)
Constituency Areas - SNP: 37,574.2 sq km LDP: 11,293.4 sq km Lab: 1,374.2 sq km Con: 28,735.7 sq km
Constituency Populations As A Proportion of Total
(5,533,270 people)
Constituency Populations - SNP: 3,241,864 LDP: 290,524 Lab: 674,500 Con: 1,326,652
Map Features
We take full advantage of MindManager’s many unique ‘information cartography’ features when creating our unique maps so we can pack in 1000’s of ‘bits’ of knowledge into a single, visually structured, intuitive to navigate document that can be easily shared. Here are the main features of this UK Parliament Scottish Constituencies & Members Polticial Knowledge Atlas (5 Nov 2019) …
Big Map With 100's Of Branches & Links And Capacity For Plenty More
With 2,950 knowledge resource links over 1,763 branches, this map is a useful, contextual knowledge resource in it’s own right, as well as being a visually structured ndex of the best definitive / official / plain old useful knowledge resources available in the public domain about the subject. Thanks to MindManager’s unique capabilities it has plenty of spare capacity for further content to be added in the future.
Main Branches Create Robust Visual Framework For 'Seed Branches'
The 1st level branches form the main (‘org-tree’) visual framework within which the map content of interest sits. It is a simple ‘A – Z’ layout, with the 2nd level Scottish United Kingdom Parliament Constituency branches arranged alphabetically in 7 groups of approximately equal sizes to pack as much in to a ‘single screen view’ as possible.
Visually Rich 'General Knowledge Seed' Branch For Each Of Scotland's 59 UK Parliament Constituencies
The 2nd level branches are political ‘knowledge seed points’ for individual United Kingdom Parliament constituencies. They contain the name & official constituency identifier codes in variably formatted (‘rich’) text, and a thumbnail location map image to aid user navigation and provide spatial context. This is supplemented by the variation in topic shape, which indicates the status of the borders with neighbouring electoral wards – all coastlal (ie. island), mixed or all land (ie. landlocked). There is also a table of the results by party for the most recent (half dozen or so) General Elections & by-elections, coloured by party, as well as multiple hyperlinks to public domain general, geographic & electoral knowledge resources about the constituency. The full list of knowledge embedded within, and attached to, this seed topic is given in the map summary above.
Embedded Spreadsheet Contains 'Recent' General Election Results For The Constituency
Data features embedded within seed branches – like spreadsheets, charts & data fields (another unique MindManager feature) – provide another ‘channel’ of knowlegde that adds context to the more detailed knowledge contained in the public domain resources linked to in the map. The embedded spreadsheet is a table of the results by party for the most recent General Elections & by-elections, coloured by party. Results go back to 1997 at most ie. 20 years or so (though a few consituencies were only formed in 2005 at the last boundary review). As well as the results for each party candidate, the turnout, and the majority of the winning candidate are also recorded. The colouring by party gives a simple ‘at a glance’ recent electoral history of the constituency, whilst the attached multiple hyperlinks to electoral knowledge resources will provide more detail as required. The full list of data embedded within this seed topic is given in the map summary above.
Visually Rich 'General Knowledge Seed' Branch For Each Of Scotland's 59 Members of the UK Parliament (MPs)
The 3rd level branches are ‘knowledge seed points’ for individual members of the UK Parliament (MPs), coloured by their political party allegiance. They contain the members name suffixed by ‘MP’ and their party allegiance in brackets, as well as a thumbnail of their official portrait picture. Their constituency names are also included to make it easier to keep track of ‘who’s who and where’s where’ when many MP branches are open on screen at one time. Embedded data fields show the MP’s majorities when elected for the constituency. There are also multiple hyperlinks to public domain knowledge resources about the MP, including their official register of interests. The full list of knowledge embedded within, and attached to, this seed topic is given in the map summary above.
Embedded Data Fields Show All MP's Majorities In Constituency
Data features embedded within seed branches – like spreadsheets, charts & data fields (another unique MindManager feature) – provide another ‘channel’ of knowlegde that adds context to the more detailed knowledge contained in the public domain resources linked to in the map. The data fields embedded in the MP seed topic show their majorities every time they were successfully elected to represent the constituency. Note these may be not be consecutive as MP’s might lose their seat at one election and be re-elected at the next. Also there may be fewer majorities recorded for the MP than recent election victories for their party as previously incumbent MPs have not sought re-election. Some MP’s may also have represented other constituencies in the past. The full list of data embedded within this seed topic is given in the map summary above.
Attached Multiple Hyperlinks To Public Domain Knowledge Resources
Seed Branches have multiple hyperlinks attached to them (yet another unique feature of MindManager maps), which link to the best definitive / official / plain old useful knowledge resources available in the public domain about the subject. The ‘definable link text’ gives clarty as to the resource being linked to (which can be very variable if left to the default). As well as increasing the amount of knowledge that can be ‘squeezed’ into a map without increasing the ‘visual clutter’ of additional branches, it means these links can be retained if the seed branches are used in other maps, or this map is re-purposed. The full list of multiple knowledge resource hyperlinks attached to the seed topics in this map is given in the map summary above.
Index Marker Tag Groups Enable 'Geo Intelligent' & Other Map Filtering
Branches in the map may be tagged with one or more ‘index markers’ from one or more ‘marker groups’. These enable intelligent map filtering and quick navigation. Many of the tags are ‘geographic’ in nature such that branches are tagged with ‘where’ they are – eg. administrative or electoral areas. This gives the map in-built ‘spatial intelligence’ and the ability to be ‘geo-filtered’. (MindManager software users can copy and paste any of the marker groups in any other maps). The full list of index marker tags attached to the seed topics in this map is given in the map summary above.
Sub-Branch Collections Of Single Links To Public Domain Knowledge Resources
The Scottish United Kingdom Parliament Members sub-branch link collections – each with a single hyperlink to official / definitive / at least practical & useful online knowledge resources – are grouped into related collections for ‘Official Parliamentary’, ‘Official Party/MP Controlled’ and ‘Externally Controlled’ knowledge resources. These are starting points for knowledge discovery and subsequent more detailed (‘desktop’) research. (MindManager software users have the advantage of being able to add to these branches as they go). The full list of links in the sub-branch collections attached to this seed branch is given in the map summary above.
Map Legend Branch Describes Each Topic 'Type' With Links To Further Information
Every map needs to have a legend that explains the cartographic structure, colours and symbology used. The ‘Map Legend’ branch describes the sub-components of each ‘type’ of map branch, with links to further knowledge resources where necessary.
'Contributing Online Knowledge-bases Branch' With Links To Further Information
We hunt down and assess many official / definitive / at least practical & useful online knowledge resources in the process of creating our maps. The ‘Contributing Online Knowledge-bases’ branch has links to all the ones that are actually linked to in the main map content, as well as some others that are a good source of general knowledge about the subject. It is a frustrating fact of life that some resources are organised better than others, and not all are ‘linkable to’ at the individual ‘building block’ level and so can’t be included in seed branches.
'Voter Help For Scottish Elections Branch' With Links To Useful Resources
The ‘Voter Help For Scottish Elections’ branch has links to useful links to help you registering to vote, find out which Local Council Electoral Ward, Scottish Parliament Constituency & Region or UK Parliament Constituency you live in, notice of any upcoming elections in your area and where to vote in them, and what the voting record for your incumbent MP’s or MSP’s.






