Election Results for the Scottish Parliament, 5 May 2011

Alex Salmond and the Scottish Nationalist Party are celebrating a historic victory tonight after the most convincing win since the Scottish Parliament re-opened in 1999.

Election results across Scotland
Edinburgh Consituency Election Results
Lothian regional list results

The SNP won 23 more seats at Holyrood at the expense of all the other major parties: the Liberal Democrats losing 12 seats, Labour losing 7, and the Conservatives losing 5. The SNP needed 65 seats to form a majority in the 129-seat parliament. They surpassed that with 69 seats.

The Greens won 2 seats, as they did in the 2007 election, but less than many forecast, and independent MP Margot MacDonald was re-elected on the Lothian Regional list.

Such was the strength of support for the SNP (and anger at the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government in London) that the nationalist party swept across the country.

In terms of the overall vote the SNP won 45.4% of the constituency vote and 44.7% of the regional vote.

As well as a thumping for the Liberal Democrats, reduced to a handful of seats, former Conservative leader David McLetchie lost his previously safe seat in Edinburgh Pentlands, as all but one of Edinburgh's six constituency seats went to the SNP. Labour's Malcolm Chisolm was the only non-SNP to hold a constituency seat in Edinburgh.

McLetchie was re-elected on the Regional list. Labour's Sarah Boyack was also re-elected on the Regional list after narrowly losing her Edinburgh constituency seat.

Referring to the results for Labour last night, Alex Salmond offered the barbed observation: "It's a bit like the American bison. I dare say we'll still see one or two dotted about here and there, but the great herds of Labour, they've gone for ever."

THE RESULTS

The results of the fourth election to the Scottish Parliament held on 5th May 2011 are:

Scottish National Party (SNP): 69 seats
Scottish Labour: 37 seats
Scottish Conservatives: 15 seats
Scottish Liberal Democrats: 5 seats
Scottish Green Party: 2 seats
Independent: 1 seat

Total: 129 seats

Edinburgh Constituencies

In bold is the winner. An asterisk marks the 2007 election winner.

Edinburgh Eastern

* Kenny MacAskill, Scottish National Party: 47.4%, 14,552
Ewan Aitken, Scottish Labour Party and The Co-operative Party: 40.1%, 12,319
Cameron Buchanan, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party: 8.6%, 2,630
Martin Veart, Scottish Liberal Democrats: 4%, 1,227

Edinburgh Central

Marco Biagi, Scottish National Party (SNP): 32.7%, 9,480
* Sarah Boyack, Scottish Labour Party: 31.9%, 9,243
Alex Cole-Hamilton, Scottish Liberal Democrats: 20.5%, 5,937
Iain McGill, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party: 15%, 4,354

Edinburgh Northern and Leith

* Malcolm Chisholm, Scottish Labour Party: 41.6%, 12,858
Shirley-Anne Somerville, Scottish National Party (SNP): 39.7%, 12,263
Sheila Catriona Dorothy Low, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party: 9.5%, 2,928
Dan Farthing, Scottish Liberal Democrats: 9.2%, 2,836

Edinburgh Pentlands

Gordon MacDonald, Scottish National Party (SNP): 37.3%, 11,197
* David William McLetchie, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party: 31.4%, 9,439
Ricky Henderson, Scottish Labour Party: 26.6%, 7,993
Simon James Clark, Scottish Liberal Democrats: 4.7%, 1,420

Edinburgh Southern