2018 Representation of the People Act 50p
The 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p is a circulating 50p with 9 million made. Value band: face value. Here is how to recognize it, what makes one worth more and what to check on yours.
- Year
- 2018
- Circulation mintage
- 9,000,000
- Value band
- Face value
- Designer
- Stephen Taylor
Original illustration of the coin's shape and metal. Tap to flip. Not a picture of the actual design.
Face value · Small premium · Collector premium · Significant rarity. We use bands because prices change daily.
What is a 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p worth?
9 million were made, so the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p is easy to find. A circulated one is worth face value; collectors pay a little more only for uncirculated coins and coins still in their original Royal Mint pack.
What would make yours worth more:
- Uncirculated condition with no scratches or contact marks
- Original Royal Mint pack or presentation folder
- A genuine mint error, confirmed by an expert
For market prices, look at recent sold results for the same coin in the same condition, not asking prices.
Quick answers
- Is the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p rare?
- No. 9 million were made, so circulated examples are worth face value.
- How many 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p coins were made?
- 9,000,000 were struck for circulation.
- Who designed the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p?
- The design is credited to Stephen Taylor.
- What is the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p made of?
- Cupronickel (75% copper, 25% nickel). It weighs 8.0 g and measures 27.3 mm, with a seven-sided (equilateral curve heptagon) shape.
- Is the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p still legal tender?
- Yes. Every 27.3 mm 50p, including commemoratives, is legal tender in the UK.
Why the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p was made
The Representation of the People Act became law on 6 February 1918, in the last year of the First World War. It gave the vote to women over 30 who met a property qualification and to almost all men over 21, sweeping away most of the property rules that had kept millions of working men off the register. The size of the electorate roughly tripled. Women had to wait another ten years, until the Equal Franchise Act of 1928, to vote on the same terms as men.
The act is usually remembered as the moment some women first won the parliamentary vote, after decades of campaigning by suffragists and suffragettes. For its centenary in 2018 the Royal Mint chose to mark it on the 50p, putting a political landmark in the pockets of millions of people. The circulation mintage was 9 million. Unlike the Beatrix Potter and Paddington coins of the same year, it is not part of a series, which gives it a slightly more serious place among the 2018 issues. It sits well beside other coins that mark turning points in British democracy.
How to recognize it
Stephen Taylor's design shows a crowd of voters, men and women together, to represent the widening of the vote that the act brought about, with the name of the act and the year 1918. Rather than picking out a single famous campaigner, the coin treats the change as something that belonged to ordinary men and women together. The figures are small and packed closely, so a worn coin can look like a blur of shapes, but the crowd of voters itself is unlike any other 50p. Check for the 2018 date. Its obverse uses Jody Clark's effigy of Queen Elizabeth II. The coin is the standard 27.3 mm seven-sided cupronickel 50p, the same size and weight as the other commemoratives of that year.
The other side carries Jody Clark's portrait of Queen Elizabeth II, introduced in 2015 and the last of her reign.
2018 Representation of the People Act 50p by the numbers
By the numbers, the 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p ranks 60th lowest of 76 circulating 50p coins with a published mintage. The next scarcer is the 2016 Mrs Tiggy-Winkle 50p (8.8 million); the next more common is the 2019 Paddington at the Tower 50p (9 million).
For scale, the most common is the 1973 EEC Hands 50p with 89.8 million, about 10 times as many. The scarcest is the 1992 Single Market 50p with 109,000, 83 times fewer than this one.
It shared 2018 with 6 other circulating 50p designs: the Flopsy Bunny (1.4 million), the Peter Rabbit (1.4 million), the Mrs Tittlemouse (1.7 million), the The Tailor of Gloucester (3.9 million), the Paddington at the Station (5 million) and the Paddington at the Palace (5.9 million). The 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p was the most plentiful of the year.
What to check on your 2018 Representation of the People Act 50p
- Confirm the design. The reverse should match the Representation of the People Act described above and carry the date 2018; similar designs from other years are a common mix-up.
- Weigh it if you can: a genuine 27.3 mm 50p weighs 8.0 g. Copies are often light, slightly soft in detail or the wrong color.
- Ignore painted or colored versions sold online as special editions. Color added after the coin left the Mint does not make it a Royal Mint issue and does not add collector value.
- Look at the surfaces under a bright light. Coins straight from a pack have unbroken luster; change-worn coins show scuffs on the high points of the portrait and design.
Nine million coins is a healthy mintage for a 50p, so this one is common and circulated examples are face value coins. It is a good coin to keep all the same, since it marks a real turning point in British history. Because the crowd is made up of tiny raised figures, wear shows quickly; a coin where you can still separate the heads and shoulders is a better example. The Royal Mint also issued the design in brilliant uncirculated packs. Pack coins have clean, reflective fields, while coins from change look duller and carry contact marks.
Mintage chart
Specifications
| Country | United Kingdom |
|---|---|
| Denomination | 50 pence |
| Issuer | Royal Mint |
| Year | 2018 |
| Circulation mintage | 9,000,000 |
| Composition | Cupronickel (75% copper, 25% nickel) |
| Weight | 8.0 g |
| Diameter | 27.3 mm |
| Shape | Seven-sided (equilateral curve heptagon) |
| Edge | Plain |
| Designer | Stephen Taylor |
| Portrait | Clark |
Other 2018 50p coins
| Coin | Circulation mintage | Value band |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 Paddington at the Palace 50p | 5,901,000 | Face value |
| 2018 Paddington at the Station 50p | 5,001,000 | Face value |
| 2018 Tailor of Gloucester 50p | 3,900,000 | Face value |
| 2018 Mrs Tittlemouse 50p | 1,700,000 | Face value |
| 2018 Flopsy Bunny 50p | 1,400,000 | Face value |
| 2018 Peter Rabbit 50p | 1,400,000 | Face value |
| 2018 Snowman 50p | Collector issue | Small premium |
Frequently asked questions
What does the Representation of the People 50p commemorate?
It marks 100 years since the Representation of the People Act of 1918, which gave the vote to women over 30 who met a property qualification and to almost all men over 21. Equal voting rights followed in 1928.
How many Representation of the People 50p coins were made?
The Royal Mint struck 9 million for circulation in 2018. That is a large mintage, so the coin is common in change and a circulated example is a face value coin, though a sharp one makes a better keepsake.
Mintage figures: Fifty pence (British coin) (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0), compiled from Royal Mint figures. How we build these pages.