South Ayrshire Council 2022

As with its northern counterpart, this one is a simple renaming of what was an existing 70’s reform District, in this case Kyle and Carrick. In addition to Ayr itself, and the beach almost every wean in the west of Scotland is familiar with, the council includes the neighbouring towns of Prestwick and Troon to the north. The Carrick portion is much larger and much more rural, with the main population centres at Girvan and Maybole. Ayr and its attendant towns have historically been notably more affluent than the rest of the county, though by no means universally so.

The relative affluence of the urban core of this area was reflected in the consistent election of Conservative MPs to Westminster for various iterations of the Ayr constituency until Labour finally won it in 1997. However, the Holyrood equivalent would become the first constituency the Conservatives ever won for that parliament, gaining it at the first ever by-election in 2000. The SNP gained the Carrick-inclusive Holyrood constituency in 2011 and the Westminster seats in 2015. They lost the one covering the bulk of the area to the Conservatives in 2017 then regained it in 2019, and in 2021 picked up Ayr itself in the Scottish Parliament.

Turning to the old District council, it had solid Conservative majorities for the first two elections, then they traded off with Labour each election for the following four. Labour then won the first two for the rebranded South Ayrshire, and the final FPTP vote saw a straight tie between the two. This area was such a Labour-Conservative battleground that, in the absence of PR, only two of the nine elections elected any councillors from outwith those two parties.