Gordon
2010 Results:
Conservative: 9111 (18.68%)
Labour: 9811 (20.11%)
Liberal Democrat: 17575 (36.03%)
SNP: 10827 (22.2%)
BNP: 699 (1.43%)
Green: 752 (1.54%)
Majority: 6748 (13.83%)
2005 Results:
Liberal Democrat: 20008 (45%)
Labour: 8982 (20.2%)
Conservative: 7842 (17.6%)
SNP: 7098 (16%)
Other: 508 (1.1%)
Majority: 11026 (24.8%)
Boundary changes prior to 2005 election.
2001 Result
Conservative: 8049 (23%)
Labour: 4730 (13.5%)
Liberal Democrat: 15928 (45.5%)
SNP: 5760 (16.5%)
Other: 534 (1.5%)
Majority: 7879 (22.5%)
1997 Result
Conservative: 11002 (26%)
Labour: 4350 (10.3%)
Liberal Democrat: 17999 (42.6%)
SNP: 8435 (20%)
Referendum: 459 (1.1%)
Majority: 6997 (16.6%)
No Boundary Changes:
Profile:
Current MP: Malcolm Bruce(Liberal Democrat) (more information at They work for you)
Ross Thomson (Conservative) Barney Crockett (Labour)Malcolm Bruce(Liberal Democrat) (more information at They work for you)Richard Thomson (SNP) Sue Edwards (Green) Elise Jones (BNP)2001 Census Demographics
Total 2001 Population: 89320
Male: 49.6%
Female: 50.4%
Under 18: 23.9%
Over 60: 17.8%
Born outside UK: 3.2%
White: 98.8%
Asian: 0.3%
Mixed: 0.2%
Other: 0.6%
Christian: 60.1%
Graduates 16-74: 20.9%
No Qualifications 16-74: 25.9%
Owner-Occupied: 76.8%
Social Housing: 15.1% (Council: 13.3%, Housing Ass.: 1.7%)
Privately Rented: 5.6%
Homes without central heating and/or private bathroom: 4.5%
I personally think he will come 3rd, maybe even 4th. Don’t think the LDs are going to recover north of the border.
The Lib Dem vote in northern Scotland will switch largely to the SNP, who will win comfortably here and in Argyll, Inverness and Caithness as well. Charles Kennedy’s personal vote will ensure he’s the only Lib Dem left north of Fife NE.
………….except for Alistair Carmichael.
If the Lib Dems come close to being wiped out in Scotland and Alexander, Bruce, Swinson, Smith, Campbell, Reid, Crockart, Thurso and Moore all lose then if it’s just Kennedy and Carmichael left then that would effectively mean the death of the Liberal Democrats- The last time they had only two MPs in Scotland I think was just after the Second World War so if they lose nearly everything in Scotland then they’ll probably do badly nationwide in the UK as a whole.
Oh dear, you’re falling for the assumption that voters in Scotland don’t know the difference between Westminster and Holyrood elections.
The vote split for Westminster won’t be the same as the 2011 Scottish elections. Different constituencies, different percentages, different voters, different priorities.
There will be no LibDem wipeout in Scotland come 2015. Guaranteed.
Perhaps not, but they will lose a lot of seats in Scotland.
The problem is if you dont like tory or liberal in england you vote LD, and if you are middle class, wet, and indecisive you vote LD. That in itself is a relativley small core (and the former shrinking thanks to UKIP) but should still get you 15% in England
In Scotland you have the SNP mopping up those votes (and the wet middle class is probably smaller)
You aren’t a real liberal party, so you don’t attact real liberals, who will vote tory. So, who exactly are your voters in Scotland, you dont stand for anything so won’t attract anybody.
CK will win on his personal vote. Orkney and Shetland will vote LD as they dont like the SNP, Ming might well win on his personal vote and the fact that there is a lot of wet middle class voters in his consituancy. That will be it in Scotland.
I still think they will probably survive in Berwickshire Roxburgh & Selkirk as well. I would not totally rule out Bruce surviving here either though that will be more difficult.
I have to say that if Michael Moore does hold on that wouldn’t at all be surprising- Since 1965, the closest the Tories have come to winning in the Scottish Borders was in 1970. Although in John Lamont the Tories have got a decent enough candidate who works hard and is an MSP for the Holyrood equivalent seat.
What do people think about Aberdeenshire West? That looks like the Conservatives’ best hope in Scotland- they could probably win it on about 32% of the vote if the Lib Dem vote falls appreciably from 38% and the SNP vote bobs up to c 25%.
I’ve got the Lib Dems to hold Orkney, Ross and Skye (Kennedy’s majority is 37%), Fife NE, and possibly Berwickshire (in Scotland one can never count on the Tories to capitalise on another party’s weakness).
I’ve got them losing Aberdeenshire W to the Tories, Dunbartonshire E, and Edinburgh W to Labour, and Argyll, Inverness, Caithness, and Gordon to the SNP.
I haven’t quite been able to decide how many seats I think they will lose in Scotland. But they will almost certainly keep hold of Orkney and Shetland and Ross, Skye and Lochaber. North East Fife abd Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk are places where the Conservatives have had a long streak of bad luck- I don’t see that changing anytime soon, so yes I agree with Tory they may well hold these as well.
RE WA&K Smith will have a hard time trying to hold on- It seems more than plausible that the SNP vote might surge at his expense, but whether that would be enough to let the Tories in is difficult to say.
Doktorb-
“There will be no LibDem wipeout in Scotland come 2015. Guaranteed.”
Well I suppose it depends what you mean by wipeout.
If you read my posts I am someone who has consistently warned other posters to be careful when forecasting complete armageddon for the Lib Dems in 2015. I think the Lib Dems will hold on to around 40 seats overall and will hold on to most of theire seats where the Tories are currently in second place.
Scotland however is a different matter. It is not a case of failing to appreciate that voting is different between Westminster and Holyrood elections….it is a case of accepting that a very large percentage of the Lib Dem vote in Scotland will never vote for them again due to their going into coalition with the Tories.
In northern Scotland this will benefit the SNP, further south it will benefit Labour. The personal votes for Kennedy and Ming, plus the resilience of liberalism in Orkney and Berwickshire, will I think be the Lib Dems’ only hope in Scotland.
They are bound to lose Edinburgh West, East Dumbartonshire, Argyll, Caithness, Inverness, Gordon, and probably Kincardine as well. I don’t think the Lib Dems stand any more chance of holding those seats than they do of holding university seats in England like Withington.
I’m afraid your comment reads a bit like Michael Fish saying there’s going to be no hurricane.
Berwickshire, Kincardine and here are possible holds but not probables.
Ming is a probable hold, if he retires it isnt.
Kennedy and O+S are certain holds. Without Kennedy his seat moves into probable.
Yes I think we are definitely in agreement that Carmichael and Kennedy are the only real certainties in Scotland for the Lib Dems in 2015. I’ve got Carmichael down to win by 4, 863 (26.8%) and for Kennedy to win by 6, 432 (18.4%).
I would have thought that there would be a possibilty CK would step down. I don’t know how good his health is. It certainly doesn’t look good.
This seat was as we know formed in 1983. It seems to be a mixture of the former West & East Aberdeenshire seats, which were politically very different from each by this time (although both were Conservative-held). I’d be interested to know whether the seat as constituted either now, or at that time, had more of the former East or West & if it took in parts of any other constituency.
When it was formed, Gordon took 50,089 voters from Aberdeenshire West (representing 83.2% of the total of the new seat) and only 10,094 from Aberdeenshire East. This was clearly the sucessor seat to Aberdeenshire West whereas Kincardine & Deeside was the ‘new’ seat which took the greater part (but not the majority) of its electorate from the old Angus North & Mearns seat – 23,000 against 18,000 from Aberdeen South and 16,000 from Aberdeenshire West. Obviously boundary changes have altered these balances since then, for example I think the areas which were in Aberdeen South before 1983 are again in that seat now
There cannot be many seats where the Tories have been so consistently frustrated since 1983 as Gordon.
In 1983 they were clearly expected to win the new seat easily yet lost to Liberal Malcom Bruce. I wonder what the explanation for the Liberal victory here was? The Tory candidate was James Cran – later MP for Beverley and a prominent euro-rebel who lost the whip in the 1990s.
The Tories were disappointed again in 1992 when they came within about 200 votes of winning, and yet again in 1997 when boundary changes had made it a “safe Tory seat” on 1992 notionals, yet they lost again massively.
Contrast with Kincardine where the Tories did OK through the 1980s and won the seat back in 1992 having lost it in a by-election. Even now the Tories have held up far better in Kincardine than here.
“There will be no LibDem wipeout in Scotland come 2015. Guaranteed.”
There will be at least a dozen lost deposits in the Central belt and a big crash in Edinburgh (they have closed down their Edinburgh S office) but they should retain 3 MPs.
The Lib dems will also do very badly in Edinburgh because the tories are the main opposition to the Lab/SNP council at a local level who’s core vote is stable so will not be able to squeeze their vote.
I also think the tories are likely to gain Berwickshire with 35% over a fractured opposition.
I live in Fairmilehead and the only political leaflets I’ve had recently are from the Tories and an independence leaflet.
Thanks Pete once again, and it’s also difficult to disagree with the points made by HH & AC.
Scotland Holyrood prediction 2016
SNP 53 (-16)
Lab 44 (+7)
Con 19 (+4)
LD 8 (+3)
Green 4 (+2)
Others 1
Lab gains from SNP: Anniesland, Shettleston, Paisley, Dunfermline, Kirkcaldy
Con gain from SNP : Edinburgh Pentlands
Turnout 54%
First Minister : Roseanna Cunningham
Are you predicting that Salmond will scuttle away with his tail between his legs having been defeated in the 2014 referendum? That doesn’t sound like him to me. He’s a Scottish Ken Livingstone who won’t give up till he’s been beaten then beaten again.
If he does stand down surely the SNP can do better than Roseanna Cunningham. She’s hideous.