Background
On another busy week for by-elections, we had four on the go last Thursday. All of these came about following Labour councillors who had become MPs resigning. Here in West Lothian, that was Whitburn and Blackburn councillor Kirsteen Sullivan becoming MP for Bathgate and Linlithgow.
Although I anticipated a Labour win here, one thing I did think worth keeping an eye on lower down the ballot was how well Reform UK would do. They did very well (with the same candidate) in the neighbouring Armadale and Blackridge ward earlier this year, and there are enough demographic similarities here (as well as with also-neighbouring Fortissat in North Lanarkshire) that I thought a harder line Pro-Union option could do quite well.
Headline Results
Councillors and Key Stats
1 Councillor Elected:
Labour: David Russell
Change vs 2022 (notional): Labour Hold
Change vs vacating: Labour Hold
Turnout: 20.7% (-16.7)
Electorate: 17247
Valid: 3542 (99.0%)
Spoiled: 35 (1.0%)
Quota: 1772
3 Continuing Councillors:
SNP: Jim DicksonLabour: George PaulSNP: Mary Robertson Dickson
Candidates
SNP: Aileen Brown
Lib Dem: Douglas Butler
Green: Cameron Glasgow
Conservative: Charles Kennedy
Independent: Thomas Lynch
Reform UK: David McLennanLabour: David Russell
First Preferences
First Preference History
That was well judged on both counts. Labour did indeed regain their lead over the SNP, though both parties suffered quite significant declines in support that left them on their worst results yet. Reform UK catapulted up into third place, seeming in part to absolutely cannibalise the Conservative vote, which crashed down into single-digits.
That placed them behind the Independent candidate, who did very respectably by the standards of your average first-timer without a party affiliation. Swapping places at the bottom of the ballot were the nearly tied Lib Dems and Greens, of which the Lib Dems were the only returning party to increase their vote share in the face of those Reform and Independent gains.
Transfers
Two-Candidate Preferred
Given the preferences available, it was all but certain that Labour’s narrow lead would translate to a comfortable lead by the end of the process. However, it wasn’t actually all that substantial, at just over 5%. A significant increase in exhausted ballots badly affected the top two parties, resulting in the margin between them on this measure barely changing compared to 2022.
Especially given the SNP lost -3.5% more of first preference share than Labour, to only be down an additional -0.7% after transfers is a lot less painful than it could have been. It’s not a huge surprise that with more parties on the paper that more votes would exhaust, but it might also speak to the fact that both parties are experiencing a bit of a slump at the moment.
Detailed Results
Results by Polling District
Note: I haven’t actually been able to find the GIS data for West Lothian’s polling districts following the Westminster boundary changes, so have simply assumed a 1:1 correspondence with the 2022 districts based on the final letter.
The distribution of votes across the ward ends up quite interesting in that although Labour and the SNP swap places in terms of overall vote lead, the number of district leads flips to the SNP leading in more. Labour ended up leading across Greenrigg and most of Whitburn, whilst the SNP led in north eastern Whitburn, East Whitburn (which is a separate village albeit I haven’t labelled it on the map as part of a purely personal Bit) and Seafield. Of these areas, Labour did best in south eastern Whitburn and the SNP in Blackburn.
For the other parties, the opposing ends of the political spectrum met in Seafield, which showed the greatest support for both Reform UK and the Greens. The Independent’s top spot was the merger between north eastern Whitburn and East Whitburn, the Conservatives in wester Whitburn and Greenrigg, and the Lib Dems in east central Whitburn.
Second Preferences
My go-to phrase for second preferences is “a lot of the usual patterns here”, but not this time. We had two crossings of the constitutional divide, with Labour voters most preferring the SNP and Lib Dem voters the Greens. In both cases that really wasn’t very far ahead of other parties on the same side of the debate, but it’s not a common occurrence.
The SNP kept to another Pro-Independence party with the Greens, but only a bit ahead of Labour, whilst the Green return flow was pretty overwhelming; that’s a pretty wide gulf even by recent standards. More normal (though it hasn’t been universal) was the mutual flow between Reform UK and the Conservatives. Last but not lead, Independent voters proved most favourable to Labour.
There’s not long left of 2024, but still plenty of by-elections. We have another four vote week coming up, with three of them in Glasgow: in the North East, Maryhill, and my own Drumchapel and Anniesland ward. The always busy Highland council also has one in Fort William and Ardnamurchan.
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