As the Assembly elections draw near, we have profiled local constituency areas, assessing the achievements and failures,and asking people's views. Our final profile is the South Wales East electoral region.

IN ADDITION to voting for a candidate to represent your constituency, you will get a second vote for a party. These second votes will be added up to see how many top-up candidates each party gets to represent the whole South Wales East electoral region.

This constituency is a vast area, with many challenging issues.

Stretching from Merthyr Tydfil down to Newport and the far reaches of Monmouthshire, this diverse constituency has some of the most impoverished communities in Wales - and some of the most affluent. It includes the bustling new city of Newport, and the wilds of the World Heritage Site.

South Wales East covers eight constituencies:

* Blaenau Gwent;

* Caerphilly;

* Islwyn;

* Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney;

* Monmouth;

* Newport East;

* Newport West;

* Torfaen.

A total of four candidates can be elected to cover the region and for the past four years these have been:

* Michael German, Liberal Democrat;

* Jocelyn Davies, Plaid Cymru;

* William Graham, Conservative;

* Phil Williams, Plaid Cymru.

The candidates are chosen from lists supplied by each party, but if the top candidate has already been elected to represent a constituency then the number two candidate will become an AM for South Wales East.

If the number two candidate has also been elected to represent a constituency then the job will fall to the number three candidate, and so on.