ALISTER Jack was today forced to concede the Tories lost the Holyrood election as he was pressed on the result of last week's poll.

The Scottish Secretary was giving evidence to MPs this morning when the SNP's Pete Wishart asked him to explain the outcome of the election.

Nicola Sturgeon's SNP won the election by a landslide, winning 64 seats allowing them to return to power in Edinburgh for a record fourth consecutive term. 

READ MORE: Douglas Ross launches extraordinary personal attack on Pete Wishart

The Scottish Conservatives came second on 31 seats, while Labour picked up 22, the Greens eight and Lib Dems four.

However, the political spin coming from the Tories in recent days has sought to emphasise the apparent success of their party despite losing significantly to the SNP.

In a briefing with Scottish journalists on Monday Cabinet Office minister Michalel Gove said voters in Glasgow stopped him the day before to congratulate the Tories on the election result.

READ MORE: Michael Gove claims Scots congratulated him on the street after election

Wishart pressed the UK Cabinet minister: "There does seem to be a lit bit of confusion about who actually won.

"There have been a number of competing statements on that over the past few days. Can you tell us who actually won the election a week ago today?"

Jack replied: "I am very happy to congratulate Nicola Sturgeon on her re-election as First Minister that is beyond doubt, so yes absolutely I congratulate her on that. 

"But I also, a member of your committee Douglas Ross, congratulate him on retaining the same tally of seats that Ruth Davidson achieved in 2016."

Wishart said the outcome of the election was "a overwhelming and decisive result" with the SNP winning a record number of constituency seats - 62 - on a higher percentage share of the vote.

He added: "Had this been a Westminster election the Scottish National Party would have won 552 seats with a majority of 454 but it was also a victory for parties of pro-independence and pro-referendums where an independence referendum was at the heart and core of their manifestos.

"So how will the UK Government respond to the request to hold an independence referendum when the pandemic is considered to have passed?"

Jack replied that he "would put some other statistics back" to  Wishart and insisted that while an independence referendum was one of "many things" in the SNP's manifesto not everyone who voted for the party wanted one.

He pointed to a BBC debate where the First Minister was asked how a voter should vote if he or she backed her for other reasons but did not want indyref2 saying she said the voter should back her party anyway.

"I would say less than a third of the electorate voted for nationalist parties, I think the figure was 31% and I would say that very little has changed since 2016 when you look at the numbers despite in that time we've had Brexit, we've had two general elections, we've had the Covid pandemic...but when you look at the overall numbers the changes are very very minor," said Jack.

The exchanges took place at the Commons's Scottish Affairs Select committee, with Jack giving evidence remotely.

Wishart, the SNP longest serving MP, is chair of the key committee.

Earlier this week Cabinet Office minister also claimed Scots didn't vote for a second independence referendum despite the SNP winning the election and forming a pro-independence majority with the Scottish Greens.