Chairman

Rt Hon Michael Martin MP, Speaker of the House of Commons

Ex-officio appointment.

The Speaker of the House of Commons is ex-officio Chairman of the Boundary Commission for Scotland and of the equivalent Commissions for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. However, he takes no part in the discussions and decisions of the Commissions.

Deputy Chairman

The Hon Lord McEwan (Robin Gilmour McEwan)

Appointed from 1 January 2007 for a period of 4 years.

Having served as a Temporary Judge of the Court of Session and of the High Court of Justiciary since 1991, the Hon. Lord McEwan was appointed a Judge in March 2000.

He studied at the University of Glasgow, obtaining the degrees of LL.B and Ph.D., and held the Faulds Fellowship in Law at Glasgow University. Admitted to the Faculty of Advocates in 1967, he served as Standing Junior Counsel to the Department of Energy from 1974 to 1976, and as an Advocate Depute from 1976 to 1979. He was appointed Queen's Counsel in 1981, the year in which he also took up office as a Chairman of Industrial Tribunals. From 1982 he was a Sheriff of South Strathclyde, Dumfries and Galloway (initially at Lanark and then at Ayr). He also served as a member of the Scottish Legal Aid Board from 1989 to 1996.

Lord McEwan is the author of Pleading in Court and, with the Hon. Lady Paton, of A Casebook of Damages in Scotland (first edition), and is also a contributor to the Stair Memorial Encyclopaedia.

Commissioners

Kenneth McDonald

Appointed on 7 June 2007 for a period of 4 years.

As a Member of the Royal Town Planning Institute, Kenneth McDonald served for almost 30 years in Local Government prior to retirement in 1999. He has experience with a variety of Councils and areas including Ross and Cromarty, Northumberland, Falkirk, Central Region and most recently Stirling Council where he was Service Manager and had a lead role in preparing for the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park. In addition to his staffing and budget management roles, he has wide experience in the planning functions with an emphasis on environment, countryside and rural development issues working in partnership with public agencies and community groups. Since retiring from local authority work he has undertaken various short term consultancy contracts. He also serves as a Commissioner on the Local Government Boundary Commission for Scotland.

Dr Elspeth Graham

Reappointed on 1 January 2007 for a period of 4 years.

Dr Elspeth F. Graham is Reader in Geography in the School of Geography and Geosciences at the University of St Andrews. She studied at the Universities of St Andrews and Durham where she obtained the degrees of MA (Hons) in Geography and Economics (St Andrews) and PhD (Dunelm). She has also held academic appointments at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA and at The National University of Singapore. Her research focuses on population change and health variations, both in Europe and in South-East Asia. She has published extensively on population issues, including Scotland’s demography, and has recently completed a project investigating low fertility in Scotland and England.

Dr Graham was a Commissioner on the Local Government Boundary Commission for Scotland from 1994 to 2004. She has considerable experience of the work of the Boundary Commission for Scotland, having served as a Commissioner since 1999 and having completed the Fifth Periodical Review of constituencies for the Westminster Parliament in 2004.

Appointments

Appointments to the Boundary Commission for Scotland are made under Schedule 1 of the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986. The Act specifies that the ex-officio Chair of the Commission is the Speaker of the House of Commons, as is the case for the parliamentary boundary commissions in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

The Deputy Chairman of the Commission is a judicial appointment made by the Lord President of the Court of Session. This post is unpaid.

There are two further Commissioners who are appointed by the Secretary of State for Scotland, following Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments (OCPA) guidance, for a period of 4 years, with the possibility of renewal. These posts receive a per diem remuneration, plus expenses. It is usual for vacant posts to be advertised in the national press and be subject to a process of selection and interview by a panel including the Deputy Chairman, a representative of the Scotland Office and a representative of OCPA. The final appointment is made by the Secretary of State for Scotland.

Secretary

The work of the Commission is supported by a small Secretariat which is headed by the Secretary, Hugh Buchanan.

Hugh Buchanan has spent his career in mapping and geographic information, including policy and technical roles. Hugh joined the Commission after being External Relations Manager in Scotland for Ordnance Survey from 2001 until 2007. His previous posts included user support for web services at EDINA, part of the Computing Service of the University of Edinburgh, and as a lecturer in what is now the School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences at the University of Newcastle, undertaking a variety a professional, research and teaching activities. Hugh is a Chartered Surveyor, has a PhD in geographic data handling and a mathematics degree.

 

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