Aberdeen South
2010 Results:
Conservative: 8914 (20.71%)
Labour: 15722 (36.53%)
Liberal Democrat: 12216 (28.39%)
SNP: 5102 (11.86%)
BNP: 529 (1.23%)
Green: 413 (0.96%)
Others: 138 (0.32%)
Majority: 3506 (8.14%)
2005 Results:
Labour: 15272 (36.7%)
Liberal Democrat: 13924 (33.5%)
Conservative: 7134 (17.1%)
SNP: 4120 (9.9%)
Other: 1171 (2.8%)
Majority: 1348 (3.2%)
Boundary changes prior to 2005 election.
2001 Result
Conservative: 7098 (19.2%)
Labour: 14696 (39.8%)
Liberal Democrat: 10308 (27.9%)
SNP: 4293 (11.6%)
Other: 495 (1.3%)
Majority: 4388 (11.9%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 11621 (26.4%)
Labour: 15541 (35.3%)
Liberal Democrat: 12176 (27.6%)
SNP: 4299 (9.8%)
Referendum: 425 (1%)
Majority: 3365 (7.6%)
No Boundary Changes:
Profile: Aberdeen South consists of the Southern part of Aberdeen itself and the more rural areas to the West of the city, including the middle class suburbs of Peterculter, Bieldside and Cults. There are also more working class areas included in the seat, such as the post-war estates in Torry, Kincorth and Nigg. The seat was won by Labour in 1997, having had the distinction of being the only seat that Labour lost in the 1992 election. The Conservatives have since fallen into third place and it is now a prime Liberal Democrat target.
Current MP: Anne Begg(Labour) born 1955. Educated at Brechin High School and University of Aberdeen. Worked as a history and English teacher prior to being elected, winning Disabled Scot of the Year award in 1988. First elected as MP for Aberdeen South in 1997. Begg was born with Gaucher Disease and is the first full time wheelchair user to be elected to the Commons. When first elected she was keen not to be seen solely as a disabled MP and tended to avoid disability issues, but has more recently spoken out more on disability issues. Her main interests are social justice and pensions. Voted for a rebel amendment against the war in Iraq (more information at They work for you)
Amanda Harvie (Conservative) Anne Begg(Labour) born 1955. Educated at Brechin High School and University of Aberdeen. Worked as a history and English teacher prior to being elected, winning Disabled Scot of the Year award in 1988. First elected as MP for Aberdeen South in 1997. Begg was born with Gaucher Disease and is the first full time wheelchair user to be elected to the Commons. When first elected she was keen not to be seen solely as a disabled MP and tended to avoid disability issues, but has more recently spoken out more on disability issues. Her main interests are social justice and pensions. Voted for a rebel amendment against the war in Iraq (more information at They work for you)
John Sleigh (Liberal Democrat) Educated at Glasgow University. Assistant to Nicol Stephen MSP 
Mark McDonald (SNP) born Inverurie. Educated at Dyce Academy and Dundee University. Deputy group leader on Aberdeen council.
Rhonda Reekie (Green)
Susan Ross (BNP) Trained counsellor, working in the health sector.Robert Green (Scotland Against Crooked Lawyers)2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 89808
Male: 49.2%
Female: 50.8%
Under 18: 19.7%
Over 60: 20.3%
Born outside UK: 7.6%
White: 97.3%
Black: 0.4%
Asian: 0.9%
Mixed: 0.5%
Other: 1%
Christian: 53.2%
Muslim: 0.7%
Graduates 16-74: 31.1%
No Qualifications 16-74: 21.9%
Owner-Occupied: 68%
Social Housing: 18.9% (Council: 15.8%, Housing Ass.: 3.2%)
Privately Rented: 10.7%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 7.1%
I suppose the upside of having the local elections in 2012 is that parties will target their support better.
I could see Labour putting up more candidates in Argyll and Bute and the borders for example.
“STV did lead to a lot of coalitions of the losers”
Agreed, its about time the experiment was firmly marked as ‘failed’ and returned to the more democratic, FPTP.
“Or alternatively, where the largest parties were unable or unwilling to adjust to coalition politics while second-place parties were more accommodating”
A valiant attempt to defend the indefensible.
I agree.
Benjamin clearly supports the kind of political system where the largest party could be excluded from office, and a rag bag of other parties could come back and present a “democratic choice 50%+ administration” after literally a few weeks or longer.
They do do that in several backwater countries.
Needless to say, it is not a model which attracts me or more importantly, do I think it fits with this country’s way of doing things, needs or traditions.
It is deeply disturbing that the one issue that gets Lib Dem activistis going is playing train sets with the electoral system.
They delude themselves that they are speaking for the country as a whole,
and that it is some great national priority.
I’m becoming less and less enamoured of PR largely because it simply gives too much power to third parties with interest only in being IN power
I shall certainly be voting against AV and I think most Labour voters will too
By all means oppose PR. By all means oppose AV, but don’t get so confused that you end up thinking that one follows neatly from the other. It doesn’t.
Proportional representation produces a council, parliament or assembly that reflects how people have actually voted. It is worth remembering that when we go to the polls we are emphatically not electing a government or an executive, but a representative body. Were I to find myself in a balance-of-power position and having to negotiate the formation of an administration I would certainly have a very strong bias towards talking first and most seriously to the party with the most votes – that’s only fair – but if they cannot or will not put together a workable arrangement then one government representing 50% of the electorate is just as legitimate as any other government representing 50% of the electorate.
Elections are about representing the voters, not just picking a winner.
And we liberals care about a great many issues beyond voting reform. Many of which will never be addressed by governments as long as the people they affect don’t live in marginal seats and have no effective lever of the makeup of either parliament or the government.
There are major advantages and disadvantages to every voting system, but frankly I don’t see how changing from FPTP to AV would really make election results more proportional or ‘fairer’. I’m not a huge fan of FPTP either, and both STV and AMS have major pitfalls, but frankly it doesn’t matter to me whether we stick with FPTP or move to AV in this referendum, and I believe that very few people are genuinely concerned by this issue. If it was a proper referendum between a PR system and FPTP then it would be worth properly engaging in the debate but it really doesn’t matter a fig whether we have AV or FPTP at the next election.
I’m more concerned about the impact of boundary changes to be honest.
Oh indeed, Calum, AV is only a very minor change from FPTP and it is only the anti side who are making any claim that it is anything akin to PR. I would certainly prefer to be holding a referendum on STV or another PR system but when the two major political establishment forces are both so heavily conservative on these matters we are lucky to be getting anything at all.
I am voting Yes because:
A – I am sick of telling people that their vote for Party X is wasted. Maybe Party X “cannot win here” and it is unavoidable campaign tactics to say so, but it is horribly cynical. Elections under AV are about appealing to the voters, not dismissing their choices.
B – Although some seats will remain as safe as they ever were, many currently-safe seats will become much more competitive under AV and the more MPs there are who have to work to justify their continued place in the House, the more democratic our parliament will be.
C – Once we have chosen to change to a better voting system once, it will be much harder for conservative elements to argue that it cannot be done again. Either of the PR systems likely to be used for the Commons, STV or AV+ would be evolutionary developments of AV, so we can regard a Yes vote as step (albeit a small one) towards that in due course.
I think it’s false to say voters choices are dismissed under FPTP if people don’t vote tactically.
Any party that has got into government with an overall majority is worried about losing it,
and therefore it’s important to have a strong second party in place.
That’s the accountability – the representation if you like.
Governments that are cobbled together after a few weeks are not obvious and transparent to the voters,
and would not be capable of taking any long term decisions.
Tough decisions need to be taken, and they are an unpopular.
Government is not about being some weak floppy thing in the chair (to quote the great lady), summing up a committee meeting .
“By all means oppose PR. By all means oppose AV, but don’t get so confused that you end up thinking that one follows neatly from the other. It doesn’t.”
A very ironic statemtn, Benjamin.
I know that it isn’t what you meant, but clearly PR DOES follow on from AV!
We all know that 60%+ of the people supporting AV in the referendum are doing so very cynically NOT because they actually support AV-on the contrary, many of you believe that AV is even worse than FPTP. They are asupporting it plainly and simply because they know that it will break this country’s historic link with FPTP and make it easier to force upon the British people a second referendum perhaps within 10 years that could then move us to full blown PR.
The AV campaign’s real agenda is to get PR by the back door. Onyl a very tiny minority actually support AV in its own right-and that tells you a lot about its relative merits!
I am not one who says that AV is PR-it clearly isn’t. AV is a system that I could actually live with if it was left at that and if we really really had no prospect of saving FPTP. But AV is a system which will exaggerate swings even more than FPTP, it does not in fact remove safe seats, it does not in fact assist minor parties other than the Lib Dems, it DOES allow even bigger majorities than FPTP and even more government power (1983, 1987, 1997 and 2001 being examples). In fact, according to the stated principles of the electoral reformers, AV fails almost every test. They support it for utterly cynical reasons and the people need to know that.
My advice to the anti-AV campaign: don’t try and pretend that AV is really PR and that we will get permanent coalition government under it. That doesn’t stand up to scutiny. Istead, hit the voters with the REAL killer facts:
Margaret Thatcher would have had even LESS opposition in the 1980s than she actually faced because the Labour Party would have been utterly annihalated in 1983 and the Tory majority would have been even bigger (I speak as a Thatcherite by the way, so I don’t actually think thats a bad thing, but I bet a lot of people do!)
And Tony Blair similarly would have had even less opposition after 1997 and 2001 as the Tory party would have been annihalated under AV and the Labour majority would have been even bigger.
Do you really believe that the thing Tony Blair needed when parliament discussed going to war in Iraq in 2003 was an even BIGGER majority? Even LESS opposition?
Thought not…then you have GOT to vote for FPTP in May next year!
Yes, AV looks as though it would exaggerate large swings, as those tend to occur when one of the two main parties is particularly disliked and is nobody’s second choice.
Although we don’t know for certain because the data of course doesn’t exist.
I think Shaun has a valid point, that once the electoral system has been changed once,
why not change it again.
It is a back-door method,
although surely the Lib Dems are facing oblivion if they fail to get it changed once, and their poll ratings remain slumped.
I’m a strong FPTP supporter,
although the one system I could live with is
a small element of additional member, using
only one vote exactly the same as now.
There would be a small element of regional top
up – perhaps 10% of the seats.
You would then tweak the result by adding a
Green here, UKIP here,
extra Lab in SE, extra Con in NE etc.
That to me is the least worst option,
if I was forced to change it.
But there’s always the risk that once the LDs have got it changed once, they’ll lean on a future hung government to change it again, and play it off at every election,
rather than draw a line in the sand.
It is of course their main policy
‘But there’s always the risk that once the LDs have got it changed once, they’ll lean on a future hung government to change it again, and play it off at every election,
rather than draw a line in the sand.’
If the lib dems were so serious about PR then why didn’t they drive a harder bargain with the tories?
Should have demanded STV for local government in England and Wales instead, then the tories would have had to defend FPTP in multimmember wards added to the fact there are plenty of hung councils anyway.
I reckon if 1997 had been fought under AV the Conservatives would have lost at least another 60 seats roughly 35 to the Lib Dems and 25 to Labour – many more and the LDs could have overtaken the Tories on seats with barely half as many votes. And Laboor’s already bloated majority (on 43%) would have been well over 200.
On this analysis the Conservatives would have won no seats in Norfolk or Suffolk and barely half a dozen seats in the entire South West where they were the most popular party. Basically the worst aspects of FPTP that it’s opponents purport to worry about may be accentuated under an AV system. It would also most likely hurt smaller parties also even more than FPTP. The only party that benefits is the Lib Dems and sometimes one of the larger parties when they are enjoying a landslide already under FPTP
I wonder why no-one seems to support Lord Jenkins’ 1998 AV+ proposal these days.
I agree with Pete’s comments re: 1997 election under AV. And although Joe has said that predictions of past election sfought under AV don’t exist, Andy’s comment on the Jenkins proposals got me remembering that I saw some predictions for past elections fought under AV at around the time Jenkins report was published.
Jenkins of course proposed AV+ and I seem to remember there was a table showing numbers of seats won under AV before the additional members were added. I can’t remember if this appeared in the report or ina newspaper of the day though.
This showed that Labour’s majority in 1997(under AV) would indeed have been over 200 as Pete has said.
Jenkins claimed that under his proposals the Tories would still have won an overall majority in 1983 and 1987,
but not 1979 or 1992,
and Labour a majority in 1997.
Predictions and estimates do exist and may sometimes be valid, yes for AV aswell.
I was saying in the strictly speaking sense, as we never actually used these systems to test 2nd choices etc.
Oh, yes thats of course correct. As we all know, the very fact that the electoral system is different itself affects the way people cast their votes.
If we had had FPTP for the EU elections for example, I would have voted Tory instead of UKIP.
Very depressing electoral system to think it wouldn’t have given an overall majority in 1979,
just a soggy pasta salad.
The Liberals would hardly be in any position to demand anything in 1979 given their vote.
‘If we had had FPTP for the EU elections for example, I would have voted Tory instead of UKIP.’
Are you frightened ditching FPTP might split the tory party?
I’m not voting for AV.
Its largely because I really don’t see it as a better system than FPTP. I have always supported AMS in the belief that it would alter the political party make up and give more choice. Instead it looks like we are going back to 2 parties!
The MP for this seat, Anne Begg, has been made a Dame for the work she has done to highlight disability issues. She is a wheelchair user and it is quite a feat holding a marginal Aberdeen seat under such circumstances. I do recall, though, meeting a couple on holiday who lived in her seat, and were formerly Tory voters, but were very impressed with her. She does appear to have built up some personal support in a seat which would be rock-solid Tory in Surrey
Predictions for May 2011 Scottish Parliament election
Aberdeen Central
SNP – 8000
Lab – 7000
LD – 4000
Con – 3000
Aberdeen South & Kincardine North
LD – 10000
SNP – 9000
Lab – 6000
Con – 5000
@Merseymike
That’s interesting what you say about the seat. Certainly there is probably scope for a 5-10% tory increase at the expense of the lib dems if the LDs fall away.
This is probably Begg’s seat until she retires though, especially if this seat is expanded a bit towards central aberdeen.
‘She does appear to have built up some personal support in a seat which would be rock-solid Tory in Surrey’
It’s inconceivable that the Tories would gain a mere 20% (in what’s meant to be a good year for them – although admitedly not in Scotland) in a seat with similar demographics to this in England
So too East Refrewshire which has swing massively agaimst the Tories – although as in this seat that moght have something to do with having a good MP
Interesting to note that the electorate of the city of Aberdeen is not much more than two seats with the proposed larger electoral quota. Presumably if that change goes ahead the BCS will bring Dyce and Bridge of Don into Aberdeen North and move the most southerly areas of North into this seat. Those would – or might – include Midstocket (traditionally Tory, though now probably quite mixed politically), Castlehill and Pittodrie (historically solidly Labour), so Dame Anne would most likely be a net beneficiary. It would also mean that the seat’s northern boundaries would be very like those of the 1983-97 version of the seat.
These changes might make the present Gordon constituency better for the Lib Dems and Tories though, mightn’t they (I don’t know if it will continue to exist mind you), considering that the Aberdeen part of Gordon will be where most of the Labour and some of the SNP votes come from.
‘It would also mean that the seat’s northern boundaries would be very like those of the 1983-97 version of the seat.’ Well, that might also make Aberdeen South more marginal, though I do not mind being corrected here if I am wrong.
I could see Gordon still existing; the sort of enlarged seat I have in mind is basically the current Gordon, minus Dyce and Bridge of Don, but plus Westhill, Donside and upper Deeside. And yes, the changes would help the Lib Dems and the Tories at the expense of the SNP and, particularly, Labour. The other seats I’d have in mind in this neck of the woods would be:
Banff & Buchan (current seat plus Keith and Buckie);
Moray, Nairn & Badenoch (rest of Moray, plus Nairn, Culloden/Ardesier and Badenoch & Strathspey);
Angus North & Mearns (Kincardineshire, including Banchory, plus Montrose, Brechin, Forfar and Kirriemuir);
Angus South & Dundee East (rest of Angus, plus The Ferry and North East wards of Dundee);
Dundee Central (rest of Dundee).
The trouble is that they’re all a little on the large side, so there would have to be a bit of nipping and tucking to ensure that they conform to the 5%-from-the-quota rule. But I’m sure that there are ways this could be done.
The new Aberdeen South in this arrangement would basically be the 1983-97 Aberdeen South, plus the parts of Aberdeen city that were in Kincardine and Deeside during this period, and which were transferred to Aberdeen South in 1997. Such a seat would have been Tory-held prior to 1997, though would obviously be Labour-held now.
A fairly impressive prediction of what the new seats might be, Aidan.
Banff and Buchan including Keith and Buckie would most likely be an SNP/Con marginal
Moray, Nairn and Badenoch…Ditto, with a significant LD and Lab vote as well though
Angus North and Mearns – Could be Con/SNP or LD
Angus South and Dundee East – Almost certainly fairly safe SNP, with Lab/Con fighting it out for a distant second place.
Dundee Central (and West?) – Safe Labour.
Aberdeen South – Lab/LD/Con marginal, with a little less LD perhaps?
Aberdeen North – Safe Labour with SNP a decent second
The 1997 result here was, IMO, a rather eccentric one. There was in fact a significant swing from Labour to LD. In fact the Labour vote only rose 0.5% upon the 1992 result. I would have expected the Tory decrease of course, a slight LD fall and a large Labour increase in this normally Labour/Tory marginal seat, but instead it seems that many voters tactically voted LD to get the Tories out. This is in spite of the fact that Labour were surely a more obvious choice…
There were big boundary changes in Aberdeen South in 1997, Calum. Only a little over half the old Aberdeen South (Tory Hazlehead and Holburn, Labour Torry and Nigg, and marginal Ferryhill) remained in the new Aberdeen South. The remainder (Tory Rosemount and Rubislaw, and Labour St Nicholas and St Clement’s) was moved to the newly created Aberdeen Central.
The rest of the new Aberdeen South was taken from suburban Aberdeen wards that were previously in Kincardine & Deeside: Tory-Lib Dem marginal Peterculter and Craigton, and Labour-leaning (but, in K&D, Lib Dem-tactically-voting) Auchinyell and Kincorth. Thus the notional result for the new Aberdeen South in 1992 had the Tories a few thousand ahead of the Lib Dems, with Labour just behind in third.
Thus much of the battle was establishing whether Labour or the Lib Dems was best placed to defeat the Tories. There had clearly been a big tactical vote for the Lib Dems in Auchinyell and Kincorth which would now unwind in Labour’s favour; but there had also probably been a tactical vote by some Lib Dems for Labour in the old Aberdeen South, which might unwind in the opposite direction. (And there was also probably some tactical voting by Lib Dems in Aberdeen South for the Tories *against* Labour, which might also unwind.)
Both the Labour and Lib Dem candidates were good ones: Anne Begg, because she had a national profile (she’d won Scotswoman of the Year recently), and Nicol Stephen, because he’d been briefly been MP for Kincardine & Deeside, and had been a popular local councillor (in Craigton) before that. I suspect that all the tactical unwinding and ‘rewinding’ (people working out how to vote tactically in the new seat) cancelled itself out in the end, and that Begg took the seat largely on the national swing; her vote was substantially up on the notional 1992 result for the new seat.
Re my suggested new seats, Calum’s predictions of the political effects are pretty good. After a bit of number-crunching, and considering only the four main parties, this is what I ended up with in terms of percentages (based on 2010 results):
Aberdeen North: Lab 43.1, SNP 23.9, LD 19.7, Con 13.2
Aberdeen South: Lab 37.7, LD 28.7, Con 20.8, SNP 12.7
Angus North & Mearns: Con 30.9, SNP 28.2, LD 25.2, Lab 15.7
Angus South & Dundee East: SNP 38.1, Lab 27.6, Con 22.7, LD 11.6
Banff & Buchan: SNP 43.1, Con 29.5, Lab 14.6, LD 12.7
Dundee Central (which would include the current West): Lab 48.9, SNP 31.5, LD 11.3, Con 8.2
Gordon: LD 41.8, Con 24.9, SNP 20.0, Lab 13.3
Moray, Nairn & Badenoch: SNP 32.7, LD 24.2, Con 23.5, Lab 19.6
Adian your predictions for the Conservatives are to high. The Tories don’t have enough activists to get there vote out, to win anything first past the post, in the north east. One of the reasons I’ll be voting against AV.
Iain Sproat passed away on September 29.Obituary in the “Daily Telegraph”.
Quite interesting re-reading the election predictions here. A lot of people did predict LD gain,
probably influenced by the debates,
as the results in 2007 suggested otherwise.
I predicted Con gain, and lost of a lot of money on it, so was very disappointed, but that’s another matter.
Pretty safe for Labour now I think, although there is SNP strength in nearby seats.
I think much will depend on where the Lib Dem vote goes here. If it goes Labour, then it looks like being a safe-ish Labour seat, particularly since the boundary changes proposed here would see the seat take in a lot of inner-city territory that’s currently in North (but was previously in Central, and before 1992 in South). On the other hand, both the current seat and the revised seat would be SNP on Holyrood voting patterns. I wouldn’t like to predict the order of the parties here next time.
Lone Gunman: my figures were extrapolated from the 2010 election results, and, like Anthony’s estimates, are not predictions of how elections, but estimates of what the results would probably have been in the new seats in the 2010 general election had everyone voted the same way as they did back then. I can assure you that I haven’t overestimated the Conservatives’ votes. The reason that they came out ahead in one seat is because it straddles Aberdeenshire and Angus: the Tories came a decent second in both predecessor seats, Aberdeenshire West & Kincardine and Angus, in 2010. The SNP, who won Angus, polled poorly in AbW&K, whilst the Lib Dems, who won AbW&K, polled poorly in Angus; it is therefore possible that the Tories might have come through the middle to win a seat in that area without actually being first-placed in any of the wards in the constituency. Much will depend on how such a seat is drawn. The boundaries I suggested above would have given the Tories a small lead; the seat proposed a fortnight ago by the BCS would have had the SNP ahead in 2010, though not by much. In any case, saying that the Tories would have won a seat in 2010 had it existed then is certainly not the same thing as predicting that they would win it the next time; as a great many Scottish seats have shown over the years, voters have become adept at taking into account local factors and voting tactically.
It is a mark of how strong Labour have become here that this seat remains safe almost however it is drawn. There is no chance of Labour losing Aberdeen South now for a number of years.
Lib Dem Cllr John Reynolds has gone Independent here.
Shouldn’t this be on the Aberdeen North thread?
Anyway my prediction for Aberdeen May 2012:
(changes relative to 2007)
SNP 20 (+8)
Lab 13 (+3)
LD 5 (-10)
Con 4 (-1)
Ind 1
Council 2012 Prediction
SNP 19 (+7)
Lab 16 (+6)
Con 4 (-1)
LD 3 (-12)
Ind 1 (-)
Council 2012 results
First preferences
SNP 31% (+2%)
Lab 30% (+5%)
LD 15% (-12%)
Con 10% (-4%)
Oth 14% (+9%)
Seats
Lab 17 (+7)
SNP 15 (+3)
LD 5 (-10)
Con 3 (-2)
Oth 3 (+2)
Some really bad results for the Lib Dems here, including a ward where they came behind the National Front.
At least the Lib Dems finished ahead of that Penguin here !!!!
Compared with what they must have managed in the past, what a dreadful Tory result in the council elections here…not that that’s unusual in Scotland these days
Lib dems did better/less badly than everyone thought here at the local elections.
Most likely order of the parties at the general election is:
Lab 1st LD 2nd SNP 3rd Con 4th
I think someone predicted this would be an SNP-Con marginal before the 2010 election – although some time before.
I have to say, that is quite funny.
This constituency joined Ealing Acton in 1992 as being one of the ony constituency to have 4 of its MP’s (former and current) sitting during the same parliament.
Donald Dewar 1966 – 1970
Iain Sproat 1970 – 1987
Gerald Malone 1983 to 1987
Raymond Robertson 1992 – 1997
Ealing Actons MP’s (current and former) in the 1983 parliament were -
Philip Holland 1959 – 1964
Kenneth Baker 1967 – 1970
Nigel Spearing 1970 – 1974
George Young 1974 – 1997