Winner in 2016: Gordon Macdonald (SNP)
ANOTHER way of identifying locations where the SNP might be at risk, and indeed probably a much better way, is to pick out the constituencies currently held by them but which have also been held in recent memory at either Holyrood or Westminster by the Tories.
The reason is that the Tories, unlike Labour, are still polling at a relatively high level compared to their performances in most recent elections. And if that approach is taken, the mere mention of Edinburgh Pentlands is enough to set off loud warning klaxons.
Back in the day it was the Westminster seat of Margaret Thatcher’s secretary of state for Scotland, Malcolm Rifkind, and more recently it was held at Holyrood between 2003 and 2011 by the former Scottish Tory leader David McLetchie.
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With that track record, it’s a bit mysterious that the SNP managed to retain the seat in 2016 when the Tories were enjoying their Davidson surge. But McLetchie in particular represented a very different kind of Toryism from the Davidson brand – he was consensual in style and almost social democratic in tone, outflanking Labour on the left on issues such as free personal care and tuition fees.
Perhaps that had greater appeal to the swing voters of Edinburgh Pentlands than a militant Nat-bashing stance, and if so, the Tories will be no better off now that Douglas Ross has replaced Davidson as leader. They require a swing of almost 4% to take the seat back, which if replicated across Scotland would bring them to within 17 percentage points or so of the SNP nationally.
That’s unlikely to happen if recent polling is to be believed, so to have a chance they may need to somehow generate extra momentum locally.
A complicating factor is that the constituency has by no means been a straight Tory-SNP marginal since the start of devolution. Iain Gray held it for Labour between 1999 and 2003, and Labour remained in second place as late as 2007, the year the SNP first entered government.
Even in 2016, there was a substantial Labour vote of 23%. Are those voters more likely to stick with Labour this year, or to back the SNP tactically to keep the Tories out, or to vote Tory to stop independence?
If the experience of the 2019 Westminster General Election is anything to go by, it’s unlikely to be the latter.
The most important fact about Edinburgh at the moment is that it’s firmly Remain country, and that will probably be enough to see the SNP home, but perhaps not without a few jitters along the way.
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