by Mark McGeoghegan, Doctoral Researcher, College of Glasgow
Going into final Thursday’s election, I doubt many would have predicted the big scale of the Labour victory in Scotland. Trying throughout the polling, there was little or no signal that they might sweep the Central Belt in fairly so spectacular a style, nor that the SNP vote would maintain up so poorly.
Only a few predicted that the Liberal Democrats would win Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire. Likewise, it was not broadly anticipated that the one seat the Conservatives would lose could be Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, contested by the Scottish Conservative chief, Douglas Ross.
In the long run, the SNP’s 39 seats misplaced – leaving them on simply 9 – was a far worse efficiency than fashions instructed forward of the vote. Labour’s 37 seats barely outperformed their predicted best-case state of affairs, and the Liberal Democrat’s six seats, overtaking the Conservatives on 5, was additionally past what one might have fairly predicted from the polls:
The outcomes, and the dramatic overhaul of the Scottish electoral map, recommend a polling miss. But voting intention polling in Scotland received the nationwide vote shares just about spot on. A LOESS regression fitted to the Scotland-specific polls, Scottish subsamples in British polls, and implied Scottish vote shares from a number of regression and post-stratification fashions predicted the precise vote of each occasion to inside one proportion level, aside from the Liberal Democrats whose vote it understated by simply 1.2 factors. These errors are nowhere close to giant sufficient to account for the hole between the anticipated seat consequence and the eventual consequence on Thursday.
The reason lies in a mixture of environment friendly swings and electoral geography. Scotland’s post-2014 independence referendum electoral geography arrange Westminster elections which have been, basically, three separate contests. The SNP vote was very flatly distributed throughout the nation. In 20 of the 59 seats Scotland had, the SNP vote in 2019 didn’t range from their nationwide vote by any greater than 4 proportion factors, and an extra 15 didn’t range by any greater than 9 proportion factors.
On common, the SNP’s constituency vote shares various from their nationwide vote share by simply 9.6%. As compared, the Liberal Democrats’ vote shares various from their nationwide vote share by 62%, Labour by 54%, and the Conservatives by 39%, which means that their vote shares have been extra concentrated in a smaller variety of constituencies.
This meant that within the south and northeast of Scotland, the competition was between the SNP and the Conservatives. Within the Central Belt, it was between the SNP and Labour. And in areas with traditionally sturdy connections to the previous Liberal Occasion, the competition was between the SNP and the Liberal Democrats.
Towards a divided opposition and with a big lead in nationwide vote shares – 19.9 factors in 2019 – a geographically well-spread voter coalition was a energy for the SNP, which means they may win seats in all places. With that lead flipped to a 5.3 level deficit, their voter coalition appears to be like much less ‘well-spread’ and extra ‘thinly-spread’, which means they may now lose in all places. In each seat through which the SNP didn’t win final week, they got here second to a celebration with a extra geographically concentrated vote.
Scotland’s Altering Electoral Geography
Electoral geography is a part of the reply, however not the entire reply. The swing towards the SNP was 15 factors Scotland-wide, however this various by constituency. The SNP’s swing was proportional, which signifies that – usually – the SNP misplaced a better share of the vote in constituencies through which that they had gained a better share of votes in 2019.
There have been exceptions to this sample. The SNP’s vote share held up higher within the rural northeast and seats like Perth and Kinross-shire (their lowest swing) and Angus and Perthshire Glens. All of those seats have traditionally sturdy hyperlinks to the SNP, protecting areas the SNP gained in 2005 and 2010, earlier than the independence referendum.
There have been additionally seats the place the SNP’s swing was disproportionately giant. Na h-Eileanan an Iar and Alloa and Grangemouth have been clear outliers, they usually misplaced greater than 20 factors in each Falkirk and Edinburgh South West. Dropping extra votes within the components of the nation the place they have been strongest compounded the weak spot posed by the SNP’s geographically distributed vote share.
The Labour swing, in contrast to the SNP’s, was non-linear. It adopted a typically ‘quadratic’ sample, which signifies that they gained fewer votes in constituencies the place that they had the least likelihood of profitable and within the constituencies the place that they had been strongest in 2019. However they gained votes at a disproportionate price in ‘middling’ constituencies the place these votes did probably the most work for them, maximising the worth of every vote gained by way of seat beneficial properties.
Once more, there have been some outliers right here, which overlap with the SNP’s. Labour’s swing was highest in East Renfrewshire, Falkirk, Central Ayrshire, and Alloa and Grangemouth. All 4 are seats the place Labour got here from third place to win and, just like the SNP’s optimistic outliers, partially or solely cowl areas represented by Labour earlier than the independence referendum.
The Conservative swing was additionally quadratic, centered in seats that they had beforehand are available in second, unfold throughout the Central Belt. The important thing exception was Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, the place Scottish Conservative chief Douglas Ross was defeated by the SNP.
The Conservative and Labour swings are associated, with the Conservatives shedding most votes in seats with a historic connection to the Labour Occasion, and the place Labour have been well-placed to defeat each the Conservatives and SNP. In distinction, the Conservatives misplaced fewer votes the place they have been higher positioned to defeat the SNP than Labour – although they nonetheless noticed a heavy swing towards them in these constituencies, too.
The Liberal Democrat swing was proportional, just like the SNP swing by working in a optimistic course. They misplaced small numbers of votes throughout a really giant variety of seats the place different events have been higher positioned to defeat the Conservatives and the SNP. However they gained numerous votes within the constituencies the place they have been strongest in accordance with the notional 2019 outcomes. The important thing optimistic outlier right here was Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire, the place they greater than doubled their vote on the again of a powerful native marketing campaign. Once more, the Liberal Democrats’ greatest performances got here in areas with the best historic hyperlinks to the occasion.
Not solely have been the SNP systemically deprived by their geographically dispersed voter coalition and the extra environment friendly focus of their opponents’ voters, however the swing towards the SNP and in direction of Labour, specifically, couldn’t have been higher designed to transform the 15.7-point SNP-to-Labour swing into Labour beneficial properties.
Within the course of, Scotland’s electoral geography shifted. The SNP and Conservatives retreated into their historic heartlands and a extra conventional electoral geography asserted itself, as Labour reclaimed the Central Belt and the Liberal Democrats rose to the highest in North East Fife, Mid Dunbartonshire, and Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire.
Why did Scotland vote because it did?
The election in Scotland, as elsewhere in Britain, was fought totally on the questions of competence and supply. Pre-election polling discovered that simply 15% of Scots thought the UK Authorities may very well be described as ‘competent’ or deserved to be re-elected, whereas 87% thought that ‘Britain wants a recent workforce of leaders’. On the similar time, 32% thought that the SNP Scottish Authorities deserves to be re-elected, and simply 28% thought that authorities may very well be described as ‘competent’. 70% agreed that ‘Scotland wants a recent workforce of leaders’.[i]
13% not agreeing that Britain wants a recent workforce of leaders, and 30% not agreeing that Scotland does, are values eerily near the Conservative and SNP vote shares. Whereas 40% of Scottish Labour voters stated that they have been voting ‘in a strategy to greatest have an effect on which occasion turns into the UK authorities’, and simply 13% ‘to indicate my help or opposition to the Scottish authorities in Holyrood’[ii], it could be improper to recommend that this election didn’t comprise a level of swing towards the SNP on the grounds of their very own perceived incompetence along with the need to oust the Conservative UK Authorities.
This sample of motivations, each anti-Conservative and anti-SNP, is smart given the swings we see above. On one hand, in seats Labour might win, voters swung disproportionately away from the Conservatives and in direction of Labour, maximising Labour’s probabilities of profitable these seats from the SNP and constructing a bigger Labour majority at Westminster. In Conservative-held seats the place Labour stood no likelihood of profitable, voters have been much less prone to swing from the Conservatives to Labour. And the SNP swing means that, outwith their historic heartlands, 2019 SNP voters have been completely blissful switching to Labour to each win a Labour majority at Westminster and to punish the SNP at Holyrood.
Noticeable by their absence on this election have been the problems of Brexit and independence. In 2019, 55% of Scots stated Brexit was a ‘crucial’ situation in deciding who to vote for, and 34% stated independence.[iii] On this election, simply 4% talked about Brexit and 17% talked about independence.[iv] In 2019, these two points have been key to the SNP voters coalition. 42% of voters fell into the pro-independence plus pro-Stay ‘tribe’, and voter identification with constitutional positions was far stronger than their identification with political events.[v]
As the one main pro-independence and pro-Stay occasion, constitutional loyalties gained the SNP the 2019 UK Common Election in Scotland. The neutralising of these points within the 5 years since disadvantaged the SNP of the first glue holding their coalition collectively, permitting points round competence and supply to re-assert themselves.
What subsequent?
The outcomes of the 2024 Common Election in Scotland have redrawn the Scottish political map. With independence and Brexit off the agenda, and competence and supply points pushed to the highest, Scottish voters swung strongly towards the nation’s two incumbent governments in a way that maximised the SNP’s losses and Labour’s beneficial properties.
The redrawn map can also be largely to Labour’s profit. Of the 25 seats now labeled as ‘secure’, gained by a margin of 15 factors or extra, twenty are held by Labour (the opposite 5 are Liberal Democrat). Of the 13 labeled as ‘leans’, gained by between ten factors and 15 factors, ten are held by Labour (two by the SNP, one Conservative). And of the 19 marginals, seven are held by Labour and 7 by the SNP.
In different phrases, to regain a plurality of Scottish Westminster seats, the SNP would wish a uniform nationwide Labour to SNP swing of round seven factors – with the caveat that, as we’ve seen on this election, such giant nationwide swings have a tendency to not be uniform throughout constituencies. Historic expertise would recommend that such a swing is unlikely inside a single Parliament, and that almost all Scottish Westminster constituencies are prone to be represented by Labour for not less than the following decade.
The one caveat I might apply right here could be to notice that, because the independence referendum, the common Scottish constituency has flipped between events 2.19 occasions and the nation has now been represented at Westminster by 183 totally different MPs.[vi] Taken alongside persistently weak occasion identification and the neutralising of constitutional points that did entice voter loyalty, this all suggests a considerably extra unstable voters than we’re used to – and due to this fact, better potential for extra ‘massive swing’ elections than up to now.
However the subsequent Scottish election is to not Westminster, however to Holyrood in Might 2026. These elections will are available in 22 months, and barring a considerable shift within the political setting might be fought on the identical grounds because the election final week – competence and supply.
The identical polls that appropriately predicted the Scottish consequence at the moment have Labour and the SNP neck-and-neck, however that might shift in both course. A number of authors, together with myself, have speculated that we could return to a sample of extra nationalist Scottish voters voting Labour at Westminster and SNP at Holyrood, a sample we noticed from 1999-2011. However that was throughout a interval of Labour authorities and SNP opposition, and a competence election with the SNP 19 years into authorities and battling excessive ranges of dissatisfaction doesn’t seem to be the best floor for the resumption of such a voting sample.
This election was a cataclysmic defeat for the SNP at Westminster and is a shot throughout the bow of their Holyrood group. The voting system at Holyrood signifies that a replication of this nationwide vote at that election wouldn’t imply as heavy a defeat, however it could virtually actually eject the SNP from energy.
What occurs subsequent will depend on how the SNP and Labour react to this consequence. Within the SNP, inside recriminations have already begun. Labour, then again, have the benefit and the political momentum to press that benefit residence. A Labour victory and return to energy in Edinburgh in 2026 at the moment looks like the almost definitely end result.
[v] The Referendum That Modified a Nation, p. 157
[vi] Because of Jonny Kiehlmann for the calculations right here.
