A Look @: South Scotland (Part III)

This post looks at the list seats in the region. To find the constituency seats in the east of the region click here and the west here.

Here is the notional 2007 result for this regional list (AMs in Italics notionally lose their seats as a result of the boundary changes):

Party	Const. Seats	Region Votes	Region Votes %	Add. Members	Total Members
Labour	3	81326	28.8%	2	5
SNP	2	80668	28.5%	3	5
Conservative	4	62972	22.3%	0	4
Lib. Dem.	0	28001	9.9%	2	2
Green	0	9494	3.4%	0	0
Senior Citizens	1.9%	UKIP			0.5%
Solidarity	1.2%	Socialist Party			0.4%
BNP	1.2%	Christian Peoples			0.3%
Christian Party	0.8%	Scottish Voice			0.2%
SLP	0.6%	Independent			0.2%
Additional Members
1. Jim Hume			2. Christine Grahame
3.			4. Michael Russell
5.			6. Adam Ingram
7.			Alasdair Morgan
			Aileen Campbell
			Derek Brownlee

The South Scotland top-up region has been quite affected by the boundary changes. Not only do a couple of constituency seats flip the region has lost the old Cunninghame South seat to West Scotland and gained Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley, whose predecessor seat (Kilmarnock & Loudoun) was contained in the Central Scotland region for the first three Parliamentary elections.

Despite all this the notional total seat allocation is the same as the South of Scotland result in 2007. Back then the SNP did not win any constituency seats but took five of the seven regional seats to compensate for that. They now notionally hold two constituencies; Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley, which has been moved to the region, and the new Midlothian South, Tweeddale & Lauderdale constituency. Labour notionally lose the Dumfriesshire to the Conservatives but they essentially take the sole regional seat the Tories won in 2007 in return. The Liberal Democrats are compensated by the fact they notionally cede the Midlothian South, Tweeddale & Lauderdale seat to the SNP by getting an extra regional seat.

All that is only really relevant if the vote share remains the same in 2007…of course, that not happening is about the only certainty in this Scottish Election! In the constituency previews I only left one seat as Too Close; Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley, which the Scottish Nationalists notionally hold. Labour require a 2% swing to take it so it is very much in the balance between the two largest parties in Scotland. Of the other seats two that are Conservative held are probably the most contentious calls. I have left both Ayr and Galloway & Dumfries West with the Tories because on the pre-April polling they just stay out of reach from Labour and the SNP respectively.

Of course, as I am over 300 miles away from either constituency I could be missing something but it seems that, if anything, the local circumstances will help the Conservatives out perform their national performance here. In addition, I have placed Dumfriesshire back in the Labour column, as a notional gain from the Conservatives here is looking very likely, but left Midlothian South, Tweeddale & Lauderdale with their notional holders; the SNP. The Liberal Democrats don't look likely to overturn a 1000 vote deficit at this election, even with an incumbent MSP as their candidate.

As Chris has mentioned, we are using the average of the last Scottish poll conducted by YouGov, ICM and Ipsos MORI before April 1^st to calculate the swing in these regional posts.

Here is how the regional seats could pan out if the Scottish Nationalists hold Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley:

Party	Const. Seats	U-Swing	Regional Members	Total Members
Labour	4	35.9	2	6
SNP	2	31.2	3	5
Conservatives	3	21.1	1	4
Lib. Dems.	0	6.6	1	1
Greens	0	4.4	0	0

Seat 1: Aileen Campbell (SNP), Seat 2: Adam Ingram (SNP), Seat 3: Claudia Beamish (LAB), Seat 4: Jim Hume (LD), Seat 5: Joan McAlpine (SNP), Seat 6: Graeme Pearson (LAB), Seat 7: Derek Brownlee (CON).

The Scottish Nationalists take the first seat so assuming Christine Grahame 'holds' Midlothian South, Tweeddale & Lauderdale and Aileen Campbell does not gain Clydesdale then the latter will win the first regional seat. The SNP also win the second seat and as I don't think Adam Ingram will win Carrick, Cumnock & Doon Valley he will return to Parliament on the regional list. Both Ingram and Campbell are currently regional MSPs with the former first elected in 1999 and the latter in 2007. As Labour's #1 candidate Elaine Murray is likely to 'gain' Dumfriesshire to remain as a constituency MSP the third seat will fall to Claudia Beamish. Beamish recently enjoyed a stint as the Chair of the Scottish Labour party and she contested the Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale & Tweeddale constituency at the General Election last year.

The next seat would go to the Liberal Democrats, and as a result Jim Hume will be returned for a second term in the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish Nationalists would take the fifth seat which would see their fourth candidate Joan McAlpine elected. She is a columnist for The Scotsman and writes the respected Go Lassie Go blog. Under this scenario the sixth seat heads to Labour which would send former police officer Graeme Pearson to Holyrood.

The final seat would go to the Conservatives so their top candidate Derek Brownlee would win re-election. He was 5^th on the Tories regional list in 2003 but because candidates above him on the list also stood and won constituency seats he was first in line to enter Parliament if a Tory vacancy in the region arose. Sure enough, David Mundell resigned in 2005 following his election to Westminster in that year's General Election and so Brownlee became an MSP. In 2007 he won his seat outright and he would just sneak in again under this scenario.

As is often the case in Scotland's regions the race for the last seat is very tight and Brownlee would just win it ahead of Labour and the SNP. A small swing to either on the above figures would see Marie Rooney elected as Labour's third regional MSP in South Scotland or Aileen McLeod become the Scottish Nationalist's fourth.

So, what happens if Labour manage to gain Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley?

Party	Const. Seats	U-Swing	Regional Members	Total Members
Labour	5	35.9	1	6
SNP	1	31.2	4	5
Conservatives	3	21.1	1	4
Lib. Dems.	0	6.6	1	1
Greens	0	4.4	0	0

Seat 1: Aileen Campbell (SNP), Seat 2: Adam Ingram (SNP), Seat 3: Joan McAlpine (SNP), Seat 4: Jim Hume (LD), Seat 5: Aileen McLeod (SNP), Seat 6: Claudia Beamish (LAB), Seat 7: Derek Brownlee (CON).

Basically, the end result is exactly the same; Labour's constituency win loses them a regional seat and the Scottish Nationalists are compensated for their loss with an extra list MSP. Although this change wouldn't affect the eventual shape of the Parliament vis-à-vis the previous scenario it would matter to the candidates involved. Graeme Pearson is the unlucky regional candidate who loses out if his party gains the extra seat. Aileen McLeod would have just lost out in the last scenario but she is reasonably comfortable in winning a seat if her party only manage to win one constituency in the region.

As above, the Tories are far from safe in the final seat with Labour's Graeme Pearson very much in with a chance if his party slightly out-perform the swing used in these scenarios. The SNP's SIXTH list candidate Paul Wheelhouse is also in contention for this last seat.

The key thing to remember with the seat allocations in Scotland is that because there are top up seats any constituency losses are generally cancelled out in the regional list, therefore the regional vote share is very important. Essentially, the eventual accuracy of these regional posts is reliant on the accuracy of the Scottish Parliament Election polling, which has been historically been quite unreliable! In previous elections the SNP have been over stated and the Conservatives understated so it remains to be seen if this has been rectified. This is also the first Scottish election taking place with Labour out of power in London so that is another potential spanner in the works.

This is a roundabout way of saying we can only work with the data we have. If you think, for example, that the Tories will yet again be under-estimated by the polls then you would have reason to think that Derek Brownlee is a bit safer than he looks in this analysis. You can even use the general rule of thumb that a party gets a seat for every 6% they poll in a region. It's by no means a 100% accurate way of looking at things, but it does indicate how vulnerable the fourth Tory seat is if they poll just 21% of the regional vote.

A Look @: South Scotland (Part II)

This post concentrates on the four seats in the east of this region, which cover the Scottish Borders Council area along with most of East Lothian and South Lanarkshire with a bit of Midlothian too. To find the seats in the west of this region click here
and to find the regional discussion click here.

Constituency	MSP	Majority	Swing Required	First Elected	B-V.co.uk
Clydesdale	Karen Gillon	1079	1.9%	1999	LAB Lean
East Lothian	Iain Gray	2109	3.4%	2007	LAB Safe
Ettrick, Roxburgh & Berwickshire	John Lamont	1514	2.7%	2007	CON Lean
Midlothian South, Tweeddale & Lauderdale	Jeremy Purvis	-1201	1.9%	2003	SNP Lean

Karen Gillon has been an MSP for Clydesdale (South Lanarkshire) since 1999 but this year the boundary changes have made her constituency a lot more marginal. The Larkhall ward has been moved into the Hamilton, Larkhall & Stonehouse constituency along with the Stonehouse part of the Avondale & Stonehouse ward. As a result Gillon is defending a majority barely a third of that which she won four years ago. The Scottish Nationalists are Labour's closest rivals on the South Lanarkshire Council, which they run as a minority, and the same is true in this Scottish Parliament seat. Notionally the SNP require a swing of just 1.9% to gain Clydesdale and they have selected their regional MSP Alieen Campbell to fight this seat. Campbell came second in this constituency at the last election and was the youngest MSP to be elected in 2007.

The wildcard in this contest is that due to an 'administrative error' the Liberal Democrats do not have a candidate for this constituency. Apparently Scottish Borders Councillor John Paton-Day was all set to stand here for the Lib Dems' but as he is also their #7 candidate on the regional list he thought only one nomination paper was required. By the time the mistake was noticed the deadline had passed; a lesson for forward planning if ever there was one! Notionally there are 2664 Liberal Democrat votes up for grabs in this constituency so how they break could have a huge impact on the battle to win this seat. I think they'll favour Gillon so this is down as a Labour Lean.

Party Leaders very rarely lose their seats, especially when they are polling 7-8 points higher than they were at the last election. Therefore Labour's Scottish Parliamentary leader Iain Gray is very unlikely to lose his East Lothian constituency. Gray has led his party since 2008 when he won the AV ballot with 58% of the final round vote. The boundary changes have made things marginally more favourable for the Scottish Nationalists here and they have selected local Councillor David Berry. He is unlikely to reproduce his party's excellent performance at the last election when they managed a 10% swing from Labour. Gray is looking pretty safe.

In 2007 John Lamont gained the Roxburgh & Berwickshire constituency from the Liberal Democrats on an impressive 9.4% swing. Since then Lamont has got in a spot of bother with his office expenses and was unsuccessful in his bid to become an MP for the Berwickshire, Roxburgh & Selkirk constituency. The boundary review has brought in the ward of Selkirkshire into this constituency, which has resulted in a renaming of the seat to Ettrick,
Roxburgh & Berwickshire and has shaved 500 votes off Lamont's majority. The Liberal Democrats have kept faith with their losing candidate from 2007 Euan Robson and he needs a 2.7% swing to once again represent this area. Robson was the MSP here between 1999 and 2007 before his defeat at the last election. Both parties are suffering in the polls at the moment but Lamont should have enough to hold on here.

The most interesting seat on this side of the region has to be Midlothian South, Tweeddale & Lauderdale. As the current Liberal Democrat MSP Jeremy Purvis narrowly held off the Scottish Nationalist challenge in the Tweeddale, Ettrick & Lauderdale constituency that preceded this one it was bound to be a tight race. However, the boundary review was not kind to Purvis as they removed the Lib Dem leaning Selkirkshire ward and added the SNP leaning Midlothian South. It has meant Purvis now requires a 1.9% swing towards him to remain an MSP, which doesn't look likely given his party's current polling. The SNP have re-selected their candidate from the last election Christine Grahame who has been a South of Scotland regional MSP since the Parliament's creation and has been the runner up in this constituency in all three elections. It looks quite likely Grahame will finally make the switch from regional to constituency MSP this May.

It is worth briefly considering Labour's chances in this constituency given that they only narrowly lost out on second place to the SNP in the first two elections to the previous seat. The 8% drop in their vote in 2007 would have left them seemingly out of contention for the previous constituency but the boundary review has been kind to them here. Their candidate Ian Miller requires a notional swing of 7.3% to win from third and as they are eating into the Liberal Democrat vote quite significantly then there is an outside chance of a surprise gain. They could certainly push Purvis down to third but I fancy Grahame will do enough to gain the seat for the SNP. This new constituency has all the ingredients to become a three-way marginal in future elections though.

A Look @: South Scotland (Part I)

This post concentrates on the five seats in the west of this region, contained within the Dumfries & Galloway, East Ayrshire and South Ayrshire Council boundaries. To find the seats in the east of this region click here and to find the regional discussion click here.

Constituency	MSP	Notional Majority	Swing Required	First Elected	B-V.co.uk
Dumfriesshire	Elaine Murray	-649	1.1%	1999	LAB Lean
Galloway & Dumfries West	Alex Fergusson	2504	3.9%	2003	CON Lean
Ayr	John Scott	4375	6.4%	2000	CON Lean
Carrick, Cumnock & Doon Valley	Cathy Jamieson	4403	7.3%	1999	LAB Safe
Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley	Willie Coffey	1342	2.1%	2007	Too Close

Unlike Wales the Scottish Parliamentary constituencies no longer match their Westminster counterparts. To complicate matters further this election will be the first election held since the First Periodic Review of the Scottish Parliament's boundaries, so we have the fun and games of notional majorities!

Dumfriesshire covers the western part of the Dumfries & Galloway Council area and the southern part of the Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale & Tweeddale Westminster seat. In the former the Conservatives are the largest party, and lead a minority coalition with the Liberal Democrats and the latter is the Tories' sole Westminster seat in Scotland. The main difference between this seat and the old Dumfries seat is the loss of the western part of Dumfries. The North West Dumfries ward has been moved to the new Galloway & Dumfries West seat with the Mid & Upper Nithsdale ward heading the other way. The NW Dumfries ward is more urban, and therefore Labour leaning, than M&U Nithsdale which has notionally flipped this seat from Labour to Conservative.

In 2007 the Labour MSP Elaine Murray won her third term in Holyrood quite comfortably with a 3000 vote majority over her Conservative opponent. I can't imagine she will be too pleased with the boundary changes now she is notionally facing a 650 vote deficit but given Labour's current polling this should be easy to overcome. Murray is up against Gillian Dykes, who is a Councillor in the Mid & Upper Nithsdale ward that has been moved into this constituency. Although Dykes herself is so confident she is passing herself off as an MSP it's hard to see her defeating an incumbent against the national swing. Murray is clear favourite to hold/gain her seat.

Alex Fergusson in Galloway & Dumfries West is another incumbent who was not helped by the boundary review. The loss of the Mid & Upper Nithsdale ward has cut 800 votes off the Conservative MSP's majority from the last election. As a result the Scottish Nationalists require a 3.9% swing to gain the seat, which they held during the first Parliament, and that is very much in their range given the current polling figures. Aileen McLeod has been given the task to win seat #16 on her party's target list but it won't be easy. Fergusson, who was a regional MSP for the South of Scotland before he won his Galloway & Upper Nithsdale seat in 2003 election, has been the Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament during the last term. He has done well in this prominent position but he has stated he will not seek another term in that role should he win re-election this May.

In addition to facing a popular incumbent the SNP should also be wary of Labour coming from third place to challenge here, especially as they hold the roughly equivalent Westminster seat. A rough Uniform swing calculation on the current polls would put all three parties within the 30-35% range so local factors and the relatives strength of the candidates could play a key role. Labour have selected local Councillor Willie Scobie as their candidate and he has the boundary changes to thank for bringing him into contention. The constituency already contained an area of strength for Labour in the form of Stranraer, which Scobie represents on the Council, and the addition of West Dunfries is likely to produce a significant boost for them. Whether it will be enough to topple Fergusson remains to be seem.

The key problem for Labour is that there isn't much of a Liberal Democrat vote to pick up. The bookmakers are placing Fergusson as the favourite and I'd agree with that. As a popular incumbent he should limit any swing against his party and hold off both challengers.

Moving to Ayrshire now and the Conservatives are defending the Ayr seat
against Labour. This is notionally the safest constituency seat for the Tories but with Labour riding high in the polls at the moment there is a possibility of a gain for them here. In addition, Labour hold the Westminster seat that covers this constituency. The seat takes in five of the eight wards in the South Ayrshire Council which the Conservatives control as a minority administration. John Scott won this seat from Labour in a by-election eleven years ago and as this is at the edge of the current CON>LAB swing so he can not be complacent. Labour has selected Gordon McKenzie to fight this seat and it will be an impressive feat if he manages a gain. As in Galloway & Dumfries West, the absence of a Liberal Democrat vote to pick up will make Labour's task a lot harder. As a result Scott should be able to hang on, albeit with a reduced majority.

The MSP for the Carrick, Cumnock & Doon Valley constituency Cathy Jamieson won the Kilmarnock & Loudoun seat at last year's General Election and so she is not standing for re-election to the Scottish Parliament. Jamieson was a prominent Labour MSP and stood for the group's leadership in 2008, coming second behind Iain Gray. She leaves a pretty safe seat for her party to defend this May. Labour have selected Richard Leonard as their candidate and he should hold this open seat with ease.

In 2007 the Scottish Nationalists leapfrogged the Conservatives to claim second place and with the Tories set to fall back at this election they look likely to cement that position this year. The SNP have kept faith with their perennial candidate for this constituency Adam Ingram, who has been a regional MSP for the South of Scotland since the formation of the Parliament. Despite holding a cabinet position during the last term he is unlikely to win this constituency seat. Leonard is a shoo-in for Labour.

The Kilmarnock & Irvine Valley seat is a key battleground between the two largest parties in Scotland. All the wards within this constituency are from the East Ayrshire Council where both Labour and the Scottish Nationalists won 14 seats each in 2007. On the same day Willie Coffey gained this seat for the SNP from Labour on a 4% swing but he faces tough challenge to hold on this year. Although the SNP are higher in the polls compared to 2007 Labour are also very much on the up in Scotland. With the Conservative and Liberal Democrat vote in this constituency already very low it will be interesting to see if Labour can take votes directly off the SNP to gain this. They have selected Matt McLaughlin as their candidate and he requires a 2.1% swing to win here for his party. The bookies have Coffey as the marginal favourite but I'm leaving this as Too Close for now.