The political makeup of Bury could soon change after a review into national constituency boundaries.
The Boundary Commission for England has revised proposals after taking into consideration viewpoints from objectors across the country.
The objectors were mainly sitting MPs wanting to protect their areas identities after some wards were split up in the original proposals launched back last year.
This could change how the constituency areas could look and who people would be voting for by the next general election.
In the borough, there have been several changes proposed for both Bury North and Bury South as the consultation into the review nears to an end.
The town is represented in Westminster by two MPs, the Conservative Party's James Daly for Bury North, and Labour's Christian Wakeford for Bury South, who switched from the Tories in January.
The Boundary Commission says that the number of voters in the Bury North constituency is currently "under the permitted range".
One proposed change is to move the Radcliffe North ward into the Bury North constituency, which Mr Daly has backed after provided evidence that the connections of Ainsworth and Bradley Fold to Bury town centre are good reasons to include the ward.
There were also calls for the Unsworth ward to be included in Bury North but former Radcliffe North and Ainsworth Tory councillor Paul Cropper, who lost his seat after losing a straw drawing contest with party colleague Jo Lancaster at the local elections in May, spoke against this option alongside Cllr Lancaster at a previous public hearing in Manchester.
Similarly, Unsworth Labour Cllr Nathan Boroda highlighted the strong links between his ward and Whitefield and praised the initial proposals for keeping the two areas together.
A decision was therefore made to keep Unsworth in Bury South.
To make up for the loss of Radcliffe North, the Salford area of Kersal and Broughton Park ward will move into the Bury South constituency in which Conservative Cllr Arnold Saunders, who represents the area for Salford City Council, provided evidence that this is an acceptable solution.
He called for the name of the constituency to be change to Bury South and Kersal but this request was rejected. The name will remain as Bury South.
The final consultation on this review ends on Monday, December 5.
After that, a final report would be sent to Parliament and published by July 1, 2023, with the findings and recommendations.
On Tuesday, Secretary to the Boundary Commission for England, Tim Bowden, said: “Today (Tuesday) we are announcing the publication of our revised proposals.
"Last year we published our initial proposals for new constituency boundaries – our first go at what the map should look like.
“We are delighted with the huge number of comments from members of the public on our initial proposals, many which included valuable evidence about local communities.
"Today’s publication is the culmination of months of analysis, and we have revised nearly half of our initial proposals based on what people have told us.
“We now believe we are close to the best map of constituencies that can be achieved under the rules we are working to.
"However, we still want people to tell us what they think of this latest map before we submit our final recommendations to Parliament next year.
“This is our final consultation and I encourage you to participate in the 2023 Boundary Review.”
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