Boost for Conservatives as leak suggests DUP could be about to back constituency boundary overhaul

The Conservatives’ hopes to remove a bias in the electoral system in favour of Labour have received a boost after it emerged that the Democratic Unionist Party might support them after all.

The Tories are committed to cutting the number of MPs from 650 to 600 in an overall of the constituency boundary system ahead of the next election and equalising the size of mainland seats.

The changes would remove a bias in favour of Labour in the distribution of constituency seats and hugely boost the Conservatives' chance of winning the next general election, expected in 2022.

The DUP has so far said it was implacably opposed to the plans originally proposed by the Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland which would see the Province lose an MP and their MP number likely to be cut from 10 to seven.

However, an apparent leak of the Commission's revised plans suggest suggests DUP might lose no MPs afterall. Final plans are published on January 30.

The DUP declined to comment. But Tory sources said the party was now "cautiously optimistic" about winning the DUP's backing for the revised reforms which appear to have been completely rethought.

The Boundary Commission for Northern Ireland confirmed that it had inadvertently published an interactive map during a testing on its website this week.

MPs will vote on the final plans in November when Labour and the SNP are expected to vote against the changes.

Tory whips will have to persuade their own MPs to back the plans even though 20 of them will be voting themselves out of existence and hope that the DUP will support the changes.

Political wrangling has meant that constituency boundaries are now more out of date than at any time since the Second World War.