Trying something a little new to expand the BBS reach over the run up to the election, for those over on Instagram... www.instagram.com/reel/DO06fL3...

Stirling East by-election set for the 30th of October; given the SNP won a December by-election here with an advantage over Labour of around 7% after transfers, and things have only gotten worse for Labour since, you'd have to assume the money's on another SNP win.

Oh hells bells I had a typo in the URL for this piece so I fixed that and then accidentally went two posts deep into deleting because my brain shut down, anyway here's a preview of Ayr North, be glad I wrote 90% of this pre-holiday because post is poorly functional ballotbox.scot/preview-ayr-...

Počkajte, to tiež nie je škótsky parlament! (Not actually going in this one...)

Not quite an election but sad to report Team Edinburgh placed 18 out of 25 at the World Tram Driver Championships 🫠 Thoroughly gubbed, especially by the host (they have the advantage mind, but also it was very sweet how exciting that was for the crowd)

Einen moment, bitte! Das is nicht das Schottische Parlament!

I know I keep saying we need more Scottish polling but nobody is allowed to publish any for the next week as I won't be in the country

Long-time followers of Ballot Box Scotland may be familiar with my preferred "Scandinavian" voting system; Norway is the closest to what I advocate adopting in Scotland (and the UK), so why not follow their elections tonight? www.vg.no/valg/norge/2...

I haven't been posting about every retirement announcement but with Kevin Stewart (SNP, Aberdeen Central) also today announcing he's standing down next year due to ill health, we're now up to a remarkable 59% minimum turnover of MSPs in the North East, with 10 of the 17 on their way out.

New Campaign-Period(ish) projection just dropped on the Holyrood Hub page! Holyrood Projection as of 1st of September (vs 2021 on new boundaries): SNP ~ 61 (-2) Lab ~ 18 (-3) RUK ~ 18 (+18) Con ~ 11 (-20) Grn ~ 11 (+1) LD ~ 10 (+6) Full details here: ballotbox.scot/scottish-par...

A brief section in this piece about the perils of thinking yourself very clever in telling your opponent, at the high point of the parliamentary week, they're headed for the door when your recent polling has been weak and a further bad poll could drop at any moment... and did.

Poll Analysis: More in Common 21st of August - 1st of September 2025 Holyrood Seat Projection: SNP ~ 63 Labour ~ 17 Reform UK ~ 17 Lib Dem ~ 15 Conservative ~ 11 Green ~ 6 Independence: No ~ 52% Yes ~ 48%

Ian Murray (MP for Edinburgh South) out as Secretary of State for Scotland; wonder if we'll see any Scottish MPs taking up cabinet posts outside that one after this reshuffle?

The Regional Preview series ahead of next year's election is now complete - at least in terms of the descriptions and expectations for each region and constituency! Candidates will be added as and when they are available (focus will be on the big parties for now): ballotbox.scot/scottish-par...

Only the best analysis, from experience, on Ballot Box dot Scot

Some bizarre figures in here (Lib Dem figure wild, but then, Ipsos had a wild Green figure, so pick your small party house effect), but regardless, Holyrood's voting system is not holding up well; the "correct" proportional AMS outcome should be: SNP ~ 46 RUK ~ 21 Lab ~ 20 LD ~ 18 Con ~ 14 Grn ~ 10

New Scottish Parliament poll, More in Common ?? Aug/Sep (vs 2021 Election (first MIC Holyrood)): List: SNP ~ 32% (-8) Lab ~ 16% (-2) RUK ~ 16% (+16) LD ~ 14% (+9) Con ~ 12% (-11) Grn ~ 8% (nc) Constituency: SNP ~ 37% (-11) Lab ~ 17% (-5) RUK ~ 16% (+16) LD ~ 12% (+5) Con ~ 12% (-10) Grn ~ 5% (+4)

SP26: West Scotland Region Preview Sure, the SNP vs Labour contests will be most important here, but Eastwood could really piss on Russell Findlay's chips and this is also one of the best bets for Lib Dem recovery anywhere in the country.

🚨New Research 🚨 Ahead of the release of Wave 30 of the BES Internet Panel, the team has examined Labour's decline since the 2024 GE. Labour's support has splintered into mostly indecision or left-liberal parties, but they've also lost their few right-wing voters. 🧵⬇️ tinyurl.com/3m62exph

We are now up to a total of 38 explicitly retiring MSPs and 3 that I would consider effectively deselected; realistically the most recent retirement strikes me as "was on road to being knocked out via deselection so jumped before being pushed" but such is politics. ballotbox.scot/scottish-par...

Buckhaven, Methil and Wemyss Villages by-election, following this deeply unsavoury situation, due up on the 6th of November. A narrow SNP lead over Labour of about 5.5% after transfers in 2022, so I'd put this in tossup territory at the moment.

Ayr North by-election set for the 16th of October. Ayr as a town is considered quite Conservative leaning, but not so in this ward. SNP beat Labour by around 13% in single-seat terms here in 2022; Labour *generally* haven't overturned those kinds of leads lately, so, perhaps an SNP lean here?

SP26: South Scotland Region Preview What do Eyemouth and East Kilbride have in common? Beats me, but they're in the same region now. Will the Greens fill in their one 2021 gap, and can the Conservatives keep the whole border blue?

SP26: A Tale of Two Civil Wars A summer of strife concludes with the Greens in a happier position than they might have expected, whilst the Conservatives plumb new depths of misery.

SP26: A Tale of Two Civil Wars A summer of strife concludes with the Greens in a happier position than they might have expected, whilst the Conservatives plumb new depths of misery.

Not as much to a Green leadership election as other parties, but nonetheless everything is now added to this page, which caps off this particular contest! ballotbox.scot/scottish-par...

Scottish Green Party Co-Leadership election 2025, first preferences: Gillian Mackay MSP: 322 (33.9%) Ross Greer MSP: 298 (31.4%) Lorna Slater MSP: 264 (27.8%) Dominic Ashmole: 66 (6.9%) Gillian Mackay and Ross Greer elected Co-Leaders.

By-Election Preview: Caol and Mallaig (Highland) 25th of September 2025 Unfinished business from 2022, as this ward was uncontested then. Highland = Independent has been the recent tale, but the Lib Dems have been gunning for Lochaber lately too.

This article on the BBC has a section which is not quite accurate I'm afraid. I appreciate that "more parties standing = more competition for list seats" seems like a really obvious claim to make, but it's actually not as direct as that. It's vote share that matters. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Parliamentarian defections are great fun because nobody likes them regardless, but in Scotland we get extra huffiness when it's a list MSP and everyone suddenly pretends that constituency MSPs have a special magical personal mandate when actually it's functionally just a party list of one candidate.

Indeed, there's a reason it was the example region for this piece: ballotbox.scot/snp-didnt-br...

SP26: North East Scotland Region Preview If constituencies don't change hands here the SNP are going to *wreck* the proportionality, which is a huge threat to everyone else's fair representation. Also expect this to be Reform's strongest region.

Coming back to this the only other sitting and re-standing Conservative (including Jeremy Balfour before he quit) *not* yet is assigned a constituency is... Russell Findlay himself. Simpson may have been snubbed, whereas that reads like panic about how to find a region their Leader won't lose in...

Anyway it sure would be good if people could bother their backsides to commission polling (not from charlatans) for the election due in May, maybe just *one* of your weekly Westminster polls which find MoE shifting could be replaced with a Holyrood each month? As a treat?

Graham Simpson, Conservative MSP for Central Scotland since 2016, has just defected to Reform UK. This is the second time they've had an MSP via defection, following Michelle Ballantyne ahead of 2021. She led the Scottish arm to 0.2% of the vote; times have certainly changed since then.

By-Election Preview: Tain and Easter Ross (Highland) 25th of September 2025 Not another one! Our third by-election of the term in this ward will probably be another Independent win, but if not, money would be on the Lib Dems.

Caol and Mallaig meanwhile also has four of the Holyrood parties (this time it's the Greens missing, despite being the party vacating), Reform, and three Independents. No 2022 results to compare but given the area and recent results I'd say it's between the Independents and the Lib Dems.

Candidates for Tain and Easter Ross are four of the Holyrood parties (no Labour), Reform UK and an Independent. Given the past two by-elections for the ward this term have went Independent, it's likely (but not guaranteed) to be the same again.

By-Election Result analysis: Barrhead, Liboside and Uplawmoor A strong win for Labour (against recent council by-election trend; a shift not caught in polling, or local factors?), whilst the Conservatives sink like a stone to place behind the Greens.

SP26: Mid Scotland and Fife Region Preview Conservative collapse likely secures the SNP in Perthshire, but Labour will be challenging for southern Fife, whilst Lib Dems and Greens have to hope chances at a double aren't done in by the big two overhanging

With this week's suspension of Colin Smyth from Labour and Jeremy Balfour quitting the Conservatives (and, reading between the lines, standing down at the election), we're now at a total of 40 MSPs already guaranteed not to be returning to the Holyrood chamber in May, almost a third of the total.

Not the crayon scribblers at the Daily Express completely lying about what I predicted for their own political advantage! Say it ain't so! Multiple instances in the preview piece where I state it's a tossup and give reason for why, misrepresented as "predicted a narrow victory for the SNP". Tsk.

Voting closed a little while ago in the Scottish Greens Co-Leader election; as it's bunched with the party's wider internal elections, we won't get a result for a week yet but you can refresh yourself on the process quirks (relative to other parties) here ballotbox.scot/scottish-par...

Barrhead, Liboside and Uplawmoor (East Renfrewshire) by-election, first prefs: Labour: 1901 (41.9%, +21.7) SNP: 1142 (25.1%, -8.3) Reform: 1018 (22.4%, new) Green: 247 (5.4%, +2.0) Conservative: 207 (4.6%, -6.2) Abolish: 27 (0.6%, new) (Non-returns: Inds 26.0% & 5.1% Alba 1.1%) Lab elected stage 6

Jeremy Balfour, MSP for Lothian since 2016 and formerly of the Evangelical Alliance has quit the Conservatives citing "reactionary politics" - is it... good when (broadly) social conservatives think you're too reactionary? Does that seem good? I feel not. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

By-Election today for East Renfrewshire's Barrhead, Liboside and Uplawmoor ward. Running 2022 excluding the popular local Independent gives the SNP a slight edge over Labour; it's hard to say right now whether that will hold up.

SP26: Highlands and Islands Region Preview The Lib Dems have their eyes on several gains - one easy, others not so much - in a historically relatively diverse region. Watch to see if Labour can re-gain a second MSP and the Conservatives fall back to that

A wee mystery in Scottish politics today is Labour suspending South Scotland MSP Colin Smyth, who is now listed as an Independent on the Parliament's website. No other info as yet. Smyth has been an MSP since 2016, and was also already selected as their Dumfriesshire constituency candidate for May.

SP26: Glasgow Region Preview Glasgow remains Scotland's largest city, but the region has shrunk a little. Expect constituencies to be SNP vs Labour, whilst the Greens aim for their first Glasgow double and the Conservatives risk a zero.