Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Daily Record
Daily Record
National
Kevin Dyson

SNP overtake Conservatives to secure biggest share of vote in South Ayrshire local elections

The SNP secured their biggest ever share of the vote in South Ayrshire Council elections.

And the Conservatives vote slumped almost 11 per cent compared to five years ago.

And the Tories lost two seats to independents, one in Ayr West to publican Bob Sheilds and in Prestwick, to former Tory council leader Hugh Hunter.

From a high of 43.4 per cent in 2017, the Conservatives fell to 32.6 per cent on Friday.

At the same time the SNP were able to increase their vote share by 3.2 per cent, rising from 30.2 percent in 2017 to 33.4 percent, overtaking the Conservatives but failing to add to their nine seats.

Labour benefitted from the national swing from the Conservatives to their party, but not to the same level, picking up 1.1 percent more of the first preference vote share.

The two incumbent independents, Alec Clark and Brian Connolly, were joined by Hugh Hunter, who sat out the last few months of the last council as an independent, and Bob Shields. Overall the independent share of the vote rose by 4.6 percent.

There was little impact from the other parties involved with the Liberal Democrats picking up 1.5 percent of first preferences, Alba, just 0.6 percent and the Scottish Family Party, 0.2 percent.

None of these parties had stood in 2017, while the Greens, who secured 0.6 per cent of the vote in 2017, never put up a candidate this year.

The turnout was similar to 2017.

2022 Overall Election Results

Party Vote share (%) (v 2017) no. votes
SNP: 33.4 (+3.2) 14,849
Conservatives: 32.6 (-10.7) 14, 520
Labour: 16.3 (+1.1) 7,276
Independents: 15.3 (+4.6) 6820
Lib Dems: 1.5 (n/a) 671
Alba: 0.6 (n/a) 275
Scot Family Party: 0.2 (n/a) 108

Don't miss the latest Ayrshire headlines – sign up to our free daily newsletter here

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.