Ward Profile
Cause of By-Election
In the immortal words of the great Brenda from Bristol: you’re joking, not another one?! If the name Colinton and Fairmilehead feels familiar to you, it should. There was a by-election here just two months ago, which saw the Lib Dem’s Louise Spence surge from fourth place to an easy victory. Immediately afterwards, SNP councillor for the ward Marco Biagi announced his resignation to take up a job with the Scottish Government, triggering another by-election.
Now, these things happen, it’s not ideal, people were a bit frustrated by the timing, and there’d probably have been some more grumbling, but nothing too intense. What doesn’t usually* happen, what is absolutely astonishing it did, what was and I have to be honest here truly, wonderfully, screamingly hilarious, is that one week after being elected Louise Spence resigned too.
The Daily Record spotted that just the day after the vote, Spence’s house went up for sale. This was the house that was a central part of the Lib Dem campaign, their leaflets pointing out she was local and the incumbent councillors weren’t. That seemed to be a bit odd, to say the least. As pressure mounted, it was widely reported that she was intending on moving abroad, possibly to Dubai.
Given putting one’s house on the market to move overseas isn’t something that happens without some prior planning, that obviously had to have been in train for a while. The local Lib Dems were apparently just as stunned as everyone else, made clear this was unacceptable, that joining meetings from abroad was completely untenable, threw her out of the party, and then she resigned, and here we are: a double by-election, and no one is going to remember Biagi’s half of it.
This is hands down one of the most outrageous little moments in recent Scottish politics. The absolute cheek, the gall, the audacity and the gumption of Spence thinking she could get away with that. Posting leaflets through people’s doors talking up your local credentials whilst planning to swan off to another continent! It’s appalling and look, at this point I have to really ham up my natural campness, it’s… a little iconic? I’m sorry, but it was, this queen is going down in history! Not for good reasons but hey! Social media is, frankly, cooked, but let me tell you the day this all happened was my favourite day on it for months.
For rather obvious reasons, much of what follows in the details and past results sections is a direct lift from the earlier preview.
Ward Details
Colinton and Fairmilehead is one of 17 wards in Edinburgh, and elects 3 councillors at a full election. As you might expect, this includes the Colinton and Fairmilehead areas ofthe city, as well as Oxgangs, Hailes and Bonaly. There were some very small changes to the ward in 2017, adding the area around a couple of schools (which will account for next to zero voters), whilst losing the Comiston estate.
For elections to the Scottish Parliament, the ward is entirely within the Edinburgh Pentlands constituency which has been held by the SNP since 2011 when they gained it from the Conservatives, who had themselves won it from Labour in 2003. At the UK Parliament it’s split between two seats, with most of the area in the Edinburgh South West constituency that Arthur won from the SNP in July. Fairmilehead is within Edinburgh South, which was the one seat that remained consistently in Labour hands even through the SNP’s era of dominance. This area has a real tendency towards prominent representatives in both parliaments.
The old Edinburgh Pentlands UK seat had been Conservative for a very long time, represented for over 20 years by Malcolm Rifkind who served as Secretary of State for Scotland under Thatcher and then a range of roles under Major. The inaugural holder of the Holyrood equivalent was Iain Gray, who would go on to lead the Scottish Labour Party, but only after a term out office because he lost the seat to then-leader of the Scottish Conservatives, David McLetchie. Latterly, the South West seat was held by the SNP’s Joanna Cherry, a high profile figure who wasn’t to everyone’s liking and scored the fourth-heaviest loss of support for any SNP candidate in last year’s UK Genearl Election.
Electoral History
One of the most Conservative-friendly parts of urban Scotland, the first three elections for this ward saw them with two councillors. The third seat started out with Labour, went to the SNP in 2012, then went back to Labour in 2017, when this was one of very few wards in the country not to have an SNP councillor at all. In 2022 the Conservatives fell to a single seat for the first time, losing their second councillor to former SNP MSP for Edinburgh Central Marco Biagi.
In voting terms, we can see the Conservatives were completely dominant at those first three elections, whereas Labour and the SNP were mostly scrapping to see who could place a distant second. What’s perhaps most interesting though is that Conservative support was apparently already at saturation point because despite significant national and local gains in 2017, their vote here actually went down a little bit.
For whatever reason, in 2022 their support took a massive knock – not quite collapsing, but certainly plummeting. That saw Labour overtake them as the most popular party here for the first time, which is how the SNP were able to nab the final seat despite dropping a fair bit back below 20%, and facing a strong challenge from the Lib Dems who were only 2.5% behind at the decisive stage. In their November win, the Lib Dems tore into first place, as the other two major Pro-Union parties near enough tied and the SNP further slumped.
Councillors and Key Stats
1 Councillor Elected:
🟠Lib Dem: Louise Spence
Change vs 2022 (notional): Lib Dem Gain from Labour
Change vs vacating: Lib Dem Gain from Labour
Turnout: 37.4% (-22.0)
Electorate: 19907
Valid: 7401 (98.8%)
Spoiled: 45 (1.2%)
Quota: 3701
2 Continuing Councillors:
🔵Conservative: Jason Rust
🟡SNP: Marco Biagi
Candidates
⚪Independent: Bonnie Prince Bob
⚪Independent: Mev Brown
🟡SNP: Mairianna Clyde
🔵Conservative: Neil Cuthbert
🔴Labour: Sheila Gilmore
⚪Independent: David Henry
🟤Libertarian: Tam Laird
🟣Reform UK: Grand Lidster
🟤Family: Richard Lucas
🟢Green: Daniel Milligan
🟠Lib Dem: Louise Spence
⚪Independent: Marc Wilkinson
First Preferences
Transfers (Re-calculated for two winners)
Three-Candidate Preferred
Note: This measure is provided simply to show the margin for the second seat in a two-winner election. The Lib Dem initial share of 36.3% is reduced through the STV process to 33.3% by the transfer of their surplus vote; this does not mean the Lib Dems would have won 33.3% in a three-way split of first preferences if these were the only candidates available.
By-Election
Candidates
Almost every candidate that stood in the November by-election has made a return this time around. The exceptions are that Labour have replaced their former councillor/MP candidate with a fresh face and the Libertarians aren’t trying this time, having failed to get their first preferences into the double digits.
Joining the cavalcade of Independent vanity runs we have Nick Hornig who stood in Edinburgh West in the 2024 UK General Election and a punny candidate “Mark Ney-Party”. Given that Scots lacks an official orthography I perhaps shouldn’t be picky, but surely that should be rendered Nae-Party? Regardless, we can check back after the by-election to find out how many of those voters follow that advice and indeed do not give any preferences to party candidates.
⚪Independent: Bonnie Prince Bob
⚪Independent: Mev Brown
🟡SNP: Mairianna Clyde
🔵Conservative: Neil Cuthbert
⚪Independent: Nick Hornig
⚪Independent: David Henry
🟣Reform UK: Grand Lidster
🟤Family: Richard Lucas
🟢Green: Daniel Milligan
⚪Independent: Mark Ney-Party
🟠Lib Dem: Peter Nicolson
🔴Labour: Conor Savage
⚪Independent: Marc Wilkinson
Analysis
Normally with a by-election happening so soon after the previous one, I’d simply say the same party would win again. That’s not the case here for two reasons, the first obviously being that there are two vacancies this time. That means going back to the November data to figure out who would have won a second seat if one was up for grabs, which turns out to be Labour, with a 4.4% advantage over the Conservatives. Secondly and equally obviously, the circumstances surrounding this one are unique.
Generally speaking I wouldn’t expect all that many ordinary voters to know or be particularly interested in finding out what caused a by-election. Enough, certainly, to make a difference in tight races, but not to make the difference with the kind of lead the Lib Dems had in November. This isn’t “generally speaking”.
Quite apart from the significant national media coverage when Spence resigned, I think when a second polling card in the space of two months lands on people’s doorsteps, a lot more of them are going to look into why that’s the case. Combine this with a certain degree of – begging your pardon – nosiness about local goings on that is strongest in posher areas and I think rather a lot of voters are going to be keenly aware of what happened.
There’s a distinct possibility then that voters are deeply unimpressed by the Lib Dems – as much as they may as a party claim they were also hoodwinked – and choose to take their vote elsewhere this time. A second deluge of leaflets after the first made such a huge deal of your wonderful local candidate may get a much chillier reception. The big question is though whether enough will do so that it will sink them in a two seat by-election. In a single seater with the goalposts at 50%, it could absolutely do them in. With those posts instead at ~33% for this one, they’ll have an easier time of it, starting with a little bit more.
The thing is though, it’s not like Labour or the Conservatives have their troubles to seek either. Labour have been crashing in the polls and really struggling to cut through lately. In Edinburgh specifically they have also seen the resignation of Cammy Day, who had been leading the council for them, after allegations of inappropriate behaviour. The Conservatives meanwhile have had another couple of months with a new leader who seems determined to roll herself in the mud of every absurd bit of culture war nonsense that comes along. Conservative voters in this ward are by and large not the kind likely to be receptive to that.
On the other hand, there’s very little prospect of this particular ward suddenly deciding that it fancies an SNP or Green councillor, even with the much lower barrier to being elected. It’s equally not going to vote for any of the Independents that voters barely acknowledged in November, nor Reform UK. So it has to be two out of the three from the mainstream Pro-Union parties. I wouldn’t feel confident going so far as a “lean” but even in the circumstances I’d put the Conservatives as probably the least favoured of the three in what is nonetheless a tossup.
Prediction
Lib Dem-Labour-Conservative Tossup.
2024 By-Election Results (Detailed Data)
Transfers (Actual)
Two-Candidate Preferred
Results by Polling District
Second Preferences
If you find this or other Ballot Box Scotland output useful and/or interesting, and you can afford to do so, please consider donating to support my work. I love doing this, but it’s a one-man project and takes a lot of time and effort. All donations, no matter how small, are greatly appreciated and extremely helpful.
(About Donations)
