Edinburgh East

No Boundary Changes:

Profile: This seat includes the Old Town of Edinburgh, covering Edinburgh Castle, the Royal Mile, Holyrood palace and now the Scottish Parliament (though the boundary runs along Princes Street, so the retail heart of Edinburgh lies in Edinburgh North). The redevelopment of run down flats and the arrival of the Scottish Palriament means this is now a far more modern, upmarket and desirable area.

Most of the electorate however live on the other side of Arthur`s Seat and Holyrood Park in areas like Meadowbank, Duddingston, Mountcastle, Portobello, Prestonfield, Restalrig, Southside and Tollcross. There are mixed areas here, some dsirable housing, a lot of student accomodation from Napier University, Victorian tenements and a lot of council accommodation from the last century, including notoriously deprived and troubled areas like Craigmillar and Niddrie, both largely demolished and redeveloped since the 1980s.

This is a safe Labour seat, having returned Gavin Strang to Parliament for over 35 years. The Edinburgh East and Musselburgh seat in the Scottish Parliament, fought as the name suggests on significantly different boundaries, fell to the SNP in 2007.

Current MP: Sheila Gilmore (Labour) Former Edinburgh councillor. Contested Edinburgh Pentlands 2007.

2010 election candidates:
Martin Donald (Conservative) Educated at Portobello High School and Aberdeen University. Researcher for David McLetchie.
Sheila Gilmore (Labour) Former Edinburgh councillor. Contested Edinburgh Pentlands 2007.
Beverley Hope (Liberal Democrat)
George Kerevan (SNP) Associate editor of the Scotsman. Former Labour councillor.
Robin Harper (Green) Born 1940, Thurso. Educated at St Marylebone Grammar and Aberdeen University. Former teacher. MSP for the Lothians since 1999, he will stand down from the Scottish Parliament at the next election.
Gary Clark (TUSC)