Author: Ballot Box Scotland

The big beasts of Scottish politics, by rights the SNP should be headed to a bruising election. Instead, Labour’s total collapse has opened the door to a big SNP win and potentially even a majority.

Oh, how the Scottish Conservatives have fallen: from de-toxified champions of the Union under the socially liberal Ruth Davidson, back to the Nasty Party.

Anas Sarwar’s dreams of Bute House have become nightmares, as a floundering UK Government drags its Scottish (and Welsh) arms down with it.

Currently headed for their best result in history, even accounting for a history of underperforming against polling, the Greens may become a truly national party for the first time this year.

The Lib Dems have had a decade of stagnation in the Scottish Parliament, born of an oddly FPTP-obsessed strategy for a proportional voting system. This time around that approach may actually bear more fruit, especially when paired with positive polling.

New kids on the block Reform UK are guaranteed to end up with a big group at Holyrood, but it’s unclear whether they will win constituencies or live up to polling overall.

With 42 MSPs already retired or deselected, this year’s Holyrood election is all but guaranteed to have the highest turnover in the parliament’s history – but of the 81 MSPs trying to get back in, which are at most risk?

Nominations have closed for this year’s Holyrood election, with 686 candidates, representing 29 parties plus Independents, vying to take up 129 MSP seats.