Scottish election results so far and possible coalition options

[Gingerkittykat]

I thought it would be good to have a thread to talk about the results. Right now 108 out of 129 seats have been declared and the seats so far are:

57 SNP
13Labour
10 Reform
10 Green
9 Tories
9 Lib Democrats

It's clear the SNP will not have an overall majority and still not clear who the 2nd place party will be. I'm not really surprised by these results. I wonder who the SNP will attempt to form a coalition with. The only other Indi party are the Greens and the last coalition was a disaster with the tail wagging the dog.

I wonder if Swinney is actually going to give kids free schoolbags and tell the supermarkets what they can charge us for food.

It's all just so depressing. Our parliament is a joke. I'm quite upset about the whole thing.

But to answer your question, if I was Swinney, I'd probably pick the Lib Dems as a feasible and least unpalatable option for coalition, but he'll probably pick the Greens.

The Lib Dems support self ID and reform of the GRA; apart from that they seem more sensible than the Greens.

I have no idea if Swinney would go into coalition with a unionist party.

Ours was a very close finish between SNP and Reform. What a bloody choice.
Beyond depressing.

The parliament is designed to have a minority government. No coalition is needed.

It’s been a sad, but thoroughly unsurprising day.

On the contrary I'm thrilled that Reform couldn't win a single first past the post seat here.

Appalled they are picking up seats through the PR system but it is what it is.

Me too

Me too

I just can't be bothered with it all. And I used to be so interested. I wanted to write "Dear Labour, I'm voting for you because I lean to the left and there's no-one else. Please don't take my vote as an actual endorsement because you're a pile of crap like all the others" but no-one would care what I thought anyway. Fucking pointless the whole thing..

Im appalled that the greens have such a low % of the voted, yet so many seats?!

I wonder who the SNP will attempt to form a coalition with

I don't believe they will.

The SNP have been operating as a minority administration for the past two years and I don't see any reason why they won't continue to do so. Formal coalition offers next to no benefit over support on an ad-hoc basis unless there is a situation whereby nobody is willing to even contemplate facilitating governance otherwise, and as previous SNP minority governments have been able to garner support from every single other party at various points, including the Tories, I don't see that changing when arguably those parties are less able to enact any influence on policy than ever before due to pitiful presence.

I don't think they will work with Reform, but that's mutual as I suspect RUK will soon descend into nothing more than a histrionic protest-group/obfuscator in much the same manner Farage operated in the EU parliament, so I don't think they'll be a serious proposition in any case, but there are still some more sane heads in the Lib Dems and Labour parties, and despite the lingering enmity the Greens will still offer support where and when the two parties' policy is sufficiently aligned.

Final total sees the SNP outnumber the entire Unionist bloc, so in actual fact all it would take is a categorical Green abstention and the SNP should still be able to govern with impunity provided all their members are present.

They don't need a coalition.

I’m absolutely gutted to see any Reform at all, but they didn’t win as many seats as the Tories lost so that’s something to hold onto a least.

I am just disgusted that they have got a foothold here

That 2% is of constituency votes, of which they won 2. 73 constituency seats up for grabs, 2% of 73 is 1.46 seats so it’s not unreasonably disproportionate there.

They have picked up in the list vote (14% region vote; 23% region seats) but that is how the ASM works and has also benefited Reform (16.6% region vote; 30% region seats), Labour (16% region vote; 25% region seats) and Conservatives (11.8% region vote; 14% region seats).

Im gutted but not surprised. Reform recently won a council bi-election in West Lothian.
Politicians across the whole of UK have not been listening to what’s concerning ordinary voters, but rather telling them what they should be thinking. And this is the result!
And now those same politicians are in a worse situation because, if they believe in a democratically elected parliament, they now have to respect the fact that a significant number of Scottish people voted Reform. And they will have to try to work with them for the good of the country.

Theres been a narrative pedalled that Scotland is somehow different which simply isn’t true and this has just been confirmed on Thursday!

That narrative of “Scotland being different” going back to at least late 2000s was always obviously not true if you spoke to people in Scotland. There has always been plenty of racism (and as someone with a foreign surname, plenty of micro-aggressions) but that narrative did make it somewhat socially unacceptable to actually voice or vote for those opinions. The BBC constantly platforming the far-right and running scaremongering immigration stories nearly daily have a LOT to answer for.

Thank you. Why is the tory ratio in the regions lower? Is it just the luck of the size of the region you win?

I think John Swinney is looking to the LibDems rather than the Greens. He doesn't seem focused on a referendum, and as a party now looking to govern rather than win votes it's about what can work over the next five years. I think it was the Fraser of Allander analysis that showed the LD manifesto was the most realistically costed while the Greens were uncosted. If it is LibDems I don't think it will be a formal coalition agreement though more a confidence and supply arrangement.

Sorry, I haven’t looked to closely at the Tory vote and I suspect it will be due to breakdown by region, which I also haven’t looked at closely! Likely to either be their vote spread too thinly or was too concentrated.

I think that may be a mistake.

I am absolutely with you on that. I am a bit disgusted in the Scottish electorate who I had thought better of. The constituency where they only missed out on winning by 300 votes was the biggest shocker for me.

Funny thing is, while loads of people are Reform and proud of it elsewhere in the UK, I can't find a single person who'll admit to voting for the bastards here 🤔

I think the SNP learned a lesson with the backlash to the Bute House agreement, and wouldn't ever enter into a formal coalition again unless desperate. I'm fine with that - they'll probably continue their working agreement with the Greens and they'll need to build consensus for the budget which is how it should be. I'm not the biggest fan of the Greens but their result is a direct result of their own work over the lifetime of the parliament and I don't grudge them their success at all. Actually yesterday was the best I've ever heard Lorna Slater speak.

Absolutely delighted that there's no real gains for the right wing. More or less a direct transfer from the Tories to Reform and they've hit pretty much the same ceiling the right always hits in Scotland. And in fact it's a pretty poor showing given the low turnout and the fact they chucked what they had at it. A shame we're going to have to put up with their wilful ignorance on pretty much everything but Scotland came through again.

They've failed to land a punch on anyone except the Tories, how they must rue the day they met David Cameron.

Yep, it's proportional and works the way it's supposed to, to ensure everyone is represented as best they can be. When people talk about reforming the Westminster elections isn't that what they mean? That in FPTP too many votes are discarded? Parliaments govern for everyone and not having proportional representation means a lot of people who didn't vote for the biggest party aren't properly represented. Not liking some of the parties - and I despise Reform - isn't a reason to not have it.

I'm wondering why people keep talking about coalitions and majority. It's explicitly designed to prevent a majority - the SNP broke the system once and have governed for almost all of their 20 years as a minority government. Is it to make it seem like a failure or do people just not bother to understand what they're talking about even when it's their job to understand it?