Scotland 2007; results thread

[Јas]

Lothian:
SNP 3
LAB 1  
CON 1 
GRN 1
IND 1

Only Highlands & Islands left.

Total
SNP 45
Lab 43

[StateBoiler]

LAB 37   -9   648,374   32.2   -2.5
SNP 21   +12   664,227   32.9   +9.1
LD 11   -2   326,232   16.2   +0.9
CON   4   +1   334,743   16.6   -0.0

This is the first-past-the-post seats only. Labour got 16,000 less votes than the SNP and still get 16 more seats (37 to 21) when there's only 73 total.


Final Results:

SNP 21 26 +20 47
LAB 37 9 -4 46
CON 4 13 -1 17
LD 11 5 -1 16
GRN 0 2 -5 2
Others 0 1 -2 1

[Verily]

Highlands and the Islands in... and the SNP wins!

SNP 47 (+20)
Lab 46 (-4)
Con 17 (-1)
LD 16 (-1)
Grn 2 (-5)
Ind 1 (-9, including SSP, SOL and SSCUP)

Highlands and the Islands
Lab 3
SNP 2 (big swing to them from Lab, Con and Grn to hold two list seats)
Con 2

[afleitch]

Despite everything that has gone wrong in the count; I am proud of the Scottish people for hopefully ending 50 years of Labour dominance. Their grassroots in Scotlands councils are withering. Their bully boy dominance of local politics and city politics will be no more.

[bullmoose88]

So who is going to shack up with who...since the party numbers seem pretty even...SNP/Lab essentially tied, Con/LD essentially tied...Greens potentially holding the two seats needed for coalition...

Stop light?

[Verily]

So who is going to shack up with who...since the party numbers seem pretty even...SNP/Lab essentially tied, Con/LD essentially tied...Greens potentially holding the two seats needed for coalition...

Stop light?

Stop light doesn't have a majority, and I can't imagine the Greens joining it anyway (they're more staunchly nationalist than the SNP). SNP-LD-Green looks like the new government. Margo MacDonald might be offered a spot in the government, too, since SNP-LD-Green is a bare majority of 1.

Required for majority: 65

Theoretically possible coalitions, in order of likelihood, with minimal parties needed:
SNP-LD-Green: 65 seats
SNP-Con-LD: 80 seats
Lab-Con-LD: 79 seats
SNP-Con-Green: 66 seats
SNP-Lab: 93 seats
Lab-Con-Green: 65 seats
Lab-LD-Green-MacDonald: 65 seats

The SNP might try to run a minority government getting support when needed from the LDs, the Cons, the Greens and MacDonald.

[minionofmidas]

Eh, I almost thought Labour had carved out a first place there after all. Funny about the lack of possible coalitions. What 3 indies can do to throw a spanner in the works...

[afleitch]

Eh, I almost thought Labour had carved out a first place there after all. Funny about the lack of possible coalitions. What 3 indies can do to throw a spanner in the works...

Margo will work well with the SNP (her 'beef' was with Swinney, not Salmond) As will the two Greens.

[Verily]

Eh, I almost thought Labour had carved out a first place there after all. Funny about the lack of possible coalitions. What 3 indies can do to throw a spanner in the works...

It'd be even worse if MacDonald and the Greens weren't there. Then the only possible governments would be SNP-Lab (not happening) or any three-way combination, which would have to involve the Tories and either Lab or SNP, both of whom loathe the Tories.

[Harry Hayfield]

Alex Salmond For First Minister (SNP) 55,832 / 2 = 27,916
British National Party- Local People First 3,865
Christian Peoples Alliance- Leader Teresa Smith 2,626
Communist Party Of Britian 260
Independent Green Voice, Ecology, Localism, Democracy 496
Nine Per Cent Growth Party  80
Publican Party-Smoking Room in Pubs 952
Scotland Against Crooked Lawyers 293
Scottish Christian Party "Proclaiming Christ's Lordship" 2,991
Scottish Conservative and Unionist 13,781
Scottish Green Party 10,759
Scottish Labour Party 78,838 / 10 = 7,884
Scottish Liberal Democrats 14,767
Scottish Senior Citizens Unity Party 3,703
Scottish Socialist Party - Rosie Kane 2,579
Scottish Unionist Proudly Scottish Proudly British 1,612
Scottish Voice 389
Socialist Labour Party 2,680
Solidarity- Tommy Sheridan 8,574
UKIP Scotland 405
James Cruickshank Independent 286
Asif Nasir Independent 317
Muhammad Shoaib Independent 582

Run that through a d'Hondt calculator and you get:

SNP win the first seat, Lib Dems win the second seat, SNP win the third seat, Con win the fourth seat, Greens win the fifth seat, SNP win the sixth seat, Solidarity wins the seventh seat.

So why does Glasgow say:

Bashir Ahmad SNP, Sandra White SNP, Robert Brown Lib Dem, Bob Doris SNP, Bill Aitken Con, Bill Kidd SNP, Patrick Harvie Green.

[afleitch]

Have you divided the tally by the number of seats won+1?

[Harry Hayfield]

Have you divided the tally by the number of seats won+1?

Yes, that's why the SNP vote is divided by 2 (Glasgow, Govan +1) and the Lab vote is divided by 10 (9 Lab wins +1)

[afleitch]

I calculated it and got the same result as on the BBC. I'll do it by hand.

[minionofmidas]

Run that through a d'Hondt calculator:

That's what undid you. As a result of that, you only got additional SNP seats at total/4, total/6, total/8 etc when it should have been total/3, total/4, total/5 etc.
Same thing and worse with Labour of course (total/20, total/30, total/40 rather than total/11, total/12, total/13), tho' it didn't matter there anyways.

[minionofmidas]

I've just checked for overhang.
Under the system in Scotland and Wales, if a party wins too many seats for its proportional share, not only does it get to keep the booty, but other parties lose seats they're proportionally entitled to.

In Scotland, Labour won an overhang seat each in Glasgow and the West of Scotland, and the SNP (in Glasgow) and the Tories lost a seat each as a result - the proportional result was SNP 48, Labour 44, Tories 18, all other unchanged. (The result under rules as in the German Bundestag, except with D'Hondt rather than Hare-Niemeyer, was SNP 48, Labour 46, Tories 18, etc, as logically follows.) A system of adding extra seats to render the result proportional again, as used in German state elections, renders SNP 49, Labour 46, Tories 18, etc, with the extra SNP seat in the West of Scotland (ie, SNP would get a sixth seat there before Labour proportionally got that eightth seat they won in the direct vote. In Glasgow the Labour overhang seat was the next in line anyways, with Sheridan in the position after that.)

[Harry Hayfield]

Let's do Glasgow through a computer then (using the standard method and using Glasgow's numbers) as this is getting confusing:

9 Lab constituency wins (divides the Lab total by 10)
1 SNP constituency win (divides the SNP total by 2)
All other parties divide by 1

As each regional seat is calculated, it gets added to the totals of seats won and is recalculated

SNP 1st seat (new SNP divisor 3)
SNP 2nd seat (new SNP divisor 4)
Lib Dem 3rd seat (new Lib Dem divisor 2)
SNP 4th seat (new SNP divisor 5)
Con 5th seat (new Con divisor 2)
SNP 6th seat (new SNP divisor 6)
Greens 7th seat (new Green divisor 2)
SNP 4, Con 1, Lib Dem 1, Green 1

In that case, why am I getting: SNP 3, Con 1, Lib Dem 1, Solidarity 1 using a d'Hondt calculator that I was using for all the other calculations then?

[True Democrat]

Any chance of a map being made?  Or is that too hard with the electoral system in Scotland?

[Verily]

The BBC has a good constituency map here, though it doesn't show margins.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

A map should be up soon

[Silent Hunter]

I heard on News 24 there might be legal challenges to some results.

[afleitch]

I heard on News 24 there might be legal challenges to some results.

Yes - Labour wish to challenge the result in Cunnighame North. McConnell is also trying to undermine Salmond by trying to start coalition talks. Labour is desperately trying to hold onto power by any means possible (including dubious means on Thursday night/Friday morning)

Labour care not for the 150,000 spoiled papers and disenfranchised Scots, but for the handful where it counts for them. If they challenge, then the SNP can challenge the Airdrie and Shotts result. Then it just gets tit for tat.

Labour have no respect for the democratic system anyway from postal votes to dodgy machines. I expect them to stoop as low as they possibly can. My dislike for Labour has, over this election and from my experiences as a candidate, become a passionate hatred.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Labour have no respect for the democratic system anyway from postal votes to dodgy machines.

I could quite happily dig up plent of evidence to "prove" that your party also has no respect for the democratic system either.

I could also, for example, claim that as Gwynedd County Council is run in very authoritarian way, discriminates against non-Welsh speakers and is probably very corrupt, all members of Plaid Cymru are corrupt, hate people who can't speak Welsh and have an authoritarian strike about a mile wide.

But what's the point exactly?

Besides it would also be quite hypocritical; for one thing, one of Labour's new AM's used to be a member (more than that; he was once their chairman!) of Plaid. And I also know several Plaid members, more Plaid members and find them to be, on the whole and with a few exceptions, decent people.

[Harry Hayfield]

Constituency Vote:
Con 334,743 (16.59% -0.27% on 2003) winning 4 seats (+1 on 2003)
Lab 649,150 (32.17% -2.98% on 2003) winning 37 seats (-9 on 2003)
LDm 326,232 (16.17% +0.58% on 2003) winning 11 seats (-2 on 2003)
SNP 664,227 (32.92% +8.78% on 2003) winning 21 seats (+12 on 2003)
Ind 25,047 (1.24% -0.12% on 2003) winning 0 seats (-1 on 2003)
Others 18,355 (0.91% -5.99% on 2003) winning 0 seats (n/c on 2003)

Regional Vote:
Con 284,005 (13.77% -1.73% on 2003) winning 13 seats (-1 on 2003)
Lab 595,415 (28.86% -0.44% on 2003) winning 9 seats (+5 on 2003)
LDm 230,671 (11.18% -0.60% on 2003) winning 5 seats (n/c on 2003)
SNP 633,401 (30.70% +9.84% on 2003) winning 26 seats (+10 on 2003)
Grn 82,584 (4.00% -2.89% on 2003) winning 2 seats (-5 on 2003)
SSP 12,731 (0.62% -6.11% on 2003) winning 0 seats (-8 on 2003)
Solidarity 31,066 (1.51%) winning 0 seats (n/c on 2003)
Ind 21,320 (1.03% -0.38% on 2003) winning 1 seat (n/c on 2003)
SSCUP 38,743 (1.88% +0.37% on 2003) winning 0 seats (-1 on 2003)
Socialist Labour 14,244 (0.69% -0.44% on 2003)
UKIP 8,197 (0.40% -0.23% on 2003)
Others 110,793 (5.37% +2.59% on 2003)

Composition of the Holyrood Parliament
SNP: 21 constituencies + 26 regionals = 47 MSP's (+22 on 2003)
Lab: 37 constituencies + 9 regionals = 46 MSP's (-4 on 2003)
Con: 4 constituencies + 13 regionals = 17 MSP's (n/c on 2003)
LDm: 11 constituencies + 5 regionals = 16 MSP's (-2 on 2003)
Grn: 0 constituencies + 2 regionals = 2 MSP's (-5 on 2003)
Ind: 0 constituencies + 1 regional = 1 MSP (-2 on 2003)
SNP short of an overall majority by 18

Coalitions: SNP + Lib Dem + Green = 66, Lab + Lib Dem + Green = 65, Lab + Con + Lib Dem + Green = 81

[minionofmidas]

Labour have no respect for the democratic system anyway from postal votes to dodgy machines.

I could quite happily dig up plent of evidence to "prove" that your party also has no respect for the democratic system either.

I could also, for example, claim that as Gwynedd County Council is run in very authoritarian way, discriminates against non-Welsh speakers and is probably very corrupt, all members of Plaid Cymru are corrupt, hate people who can't speak Welsh and have an authoritarian strike about a mile wide.

But what's the point exactly?

Besides it would also be quite hypocritical; for one thing, one of Labour's new AM's used to be a member (more than that; he was once their chairman!) of Plaid. And I also know several Plaid members, more Plaid members and find them to be, on the whole and with a few exceptions, decent people.

This just proves that you, too, have an authoritarian strike a mile wide, are very corrupt, and hate people who can't speak Welsh, the Scottish electorate for example.
And given that you're a Labourite, you just proved Andrew's point.

[minionofmidas]

Let's do Glasgow through a computer then (using the standard method and using Glasgow's numbers) as this is getting confusing:

9 Lab constituency wins (divides the Lab total by 10)
1 SNP constituency win (divides the SNP total by 2)
All other parties divide by 1

As each regional seat is calculated, it gets added to the totals of seats won and is recalculated

SNP 1st seat (new SNP divisor 3)
SNP 2nd seat (new SNP divisor 4)
Lib Dem 3rd seat (new Lib Dem divisor 2)
SNP 4th seat (new SNP divisor 5)
Con 5th seat (new Con divisor 2)
SNP 6th seat (new SNP divisor 6)
Greens 7th seat (new Green divisor 2)
SNP 4, Con 1, Lib Dem 1, Green 1

In that case, why am I getting: SNP 3, Con 1, Lib Dem 1, Solidarity 1 using a d'Hondt calculator that I was using for all the other calculations then?

Run that through a d'Hondt calculator:

That's what undid you. As a result of that, you only got additional SNP seats at total/4, total/6, total/8 etc when it should have been total/3, total/4, total/5 etc.
Same thing and worse with Labour of course (total/20, total/30, total/40 rather than total/11, total/12, total/13), tho' it didn't matter there anyways.

Maybe I've not been clear enough... I assume you just added your new totals (ie with SNP/2 and Labour/10) into that calculator and told it to distribute seven seats. How is some machine supposed to know that the SNP's next divisors come at SNP/3, SNP/4 etc - ie at (new total)/1.5, (new total)/2 etc rather than the normal (party x)/2, (party x)/3 etc. ?