Neath () was a constituency of the Senedd. It elected one Member of the Senedd by the first past the post method of election. Also, however, it was one of seven constituencies in the South Wales West electoral region, which elected four additional members, in addition to seven constituency members, to produce a degree of proportional representation for the region as a whole.

History

From the creation of the assembly the constituency had returned a Labour AM, with varying majorities, from 7.7% to 26.8%. The last holder Jeremy Miles, was one of the first openly gay elected Members of the Senedd. Plaid Cymru were Labour's main opposition in the seat.

In the election in 2016 the constituency got the highest vote share from an Independent in Steve Hunt with 8.1% of the vote. Hunt was the only independent to save his deposit.

Boundaries

The constituency was created for the first election to the Assembly, in 1999, with the name and boundaries of the Neath Westminster constituency. It was entirely within the preserved county of West Glamorgan.

The other six constituencies of the region were Aberavon, Bridgend, Gower, Ogmore, Swansea East and Swansea West.

Voting In general elections for the Senedd, each voter had two votes. The first vote was used to vote for a candidate to become the Member of the Senedd for the voter's constituency, elected by the first past the post system. The second vote was used to vote for a regional closed party list of candidates. Additional member seats were allocated from the lists by the d'Hondt method, with constituency results being taken into account in the allocation.

Assembly Members and Members of the Senedd ElectionMemberPartyPortrait 1999 Gwenda ThomasLabour 2016 Jeremy Miles

Elections Elections in the 2020s

Regional Ballot void votes: 174. Want of an Official Mark (23), Voting for more than ONE party or individual candidate (44), Writing or mark by which the Voter could be identified (0), Unmarked or Void for uncertainty (107)

Elections in the 2010s

Regional ballots rejected: 126

Elections in the 2000s

2003 Electorate: 56,759 Regional ballots rejected: 381

Elections in the 1990s

Notes

References