Scottish Parliament elections, who to vote for?

[EdinburghCentral]

Nearly put this on the manifestos thread, but it would be a derail there. I think that, as someone who is mostly centre-left but think's it's absolutely crucial that we regain an understanding that sex exists, is immutable, and is sometimes important, I'm likely to vote Labour for my constituency and Ash Regan on the list. Anyone like to convince me I should do anything different?

Its horrific, yep. An incompetent party with a history of mismanagement and alleged embezzlement, teamed with the absolutely farcical Greens.

The trouble is that the Unionist vote splits among all the other options.

PR gives us chaos, and I don't see that it's remotely fixable.

https://www.pollcheck.co.uk/holyrood-polls

Interesting (or maybe not) how Labour and Reform's line are almost directly inverse (or do I mean converse) mirror images of each other. I'd have expected to see that pattern reflected more in Con/Reform. I suppose it indicates that Reform are taking more of the "working class" vote from Labour than middle class vote from the Tories.

I'm doing the same as the OP. Labour in the constituency ballot and Ash Regan in the regional. The More in Common polling published yesterday has my constituency as a very narrow SNP lead. The Labour manifesto is generally good on women's rights, my local candidate is good, and I want the SNP out, so it's a bit of a no-brainer for the constituency vote. I can't get my head around tactical voting on the regional ballot because the counting's so complicated, and I know I want Ash to get a decent number of votes because it'll be seen as endorsement or not of the stance she's taken.

Unless something seismic happens in the next couple of weeks, my mind's made up.

Edited to add link to the More in Common poll.
https://www.moreincommon.org.uk/latest-insights/more-in-common-s-2026-holyrood-mrp/

Crikey, Reform are polling better than I'd expected. They look to be in second place in almost every constituency, apart from Banff & Buchan, first, and Dumbarton, equal with Labour.

I suppose they are a 'fuck you' vote, really.

Caveat re stoprefornuk.vote
Their methodology means that where it's difficult to judge the best anti- vote they take into account how 'progressive' (sic) a party's policies are - this info is fairly well hidden on their site but has been confirmed by someone involved. In most cases it won't be relevant, but it's worth being aware of. Part of their justification is that they want to be able to make a recommendation in as many seats as possible, because it doesn't serve their cause if the 'progressive' vote splits, so they're willing to put an ideological finger on the scales.

Thanks, Bufo. There's a lot of things presented as neutral that end up being ... not.

OP, I am in the same situation as you - centre-left & GC. I'm probably going to do the same as you: vote Labour for my constituency and Ash Regan for the regional (assuming the Labour candidate is half decent, haven't checked that yet)

Tory is the only option

Although Ash Regan does not have a great stance on the environment 🙁

Why is it so hard to find decent politicians who care about both the environment and women's rights?

I find supposedly ‘environmental policies’, even (especially) from so-called environmentalists, are very muddled. Most are pretty fraudulent like Labour’s Net Zero that simply off-shores CO2 production making UK energy incredibly expensive and businesses uncompetitive so everything is simply imported from hugely CO2 producing countries with more CO2 produced by transporting it, and our economy tanks. Or they focus on CO2 production to the expense of environmental diversity or food production (wind farms, solar farms ) again leading to greater reliance on transport and degredation of land. Very little cradle to grave analysis. Very little understanding of behaviour. Very little serious science. Loads of hypocrisy and very much drawn to ‘fashionable’ causes regardless of the environmental impact of those causes.

If I remember correctly Banff and Buchan is Alex Salmond's former stamping ground where he was very popular. It's not surprising if the electorate have turned away from the SNP after the way he was (perceived to be) treated.

There is an independent, N D R McLennan, standing, who appears from a quick Google to be a former Tory with an axe to grind who may split the Con vote and allow Reform in.

Absolutely agree.

The Greens are nuclear-rejecting, for a start. The one weak stab they made at anything approaching an environmental policy was the arse-about-tit Deposit Return Scheme, and a (thankfully) failed attempt to ban woodburners (in favour of gas fires!).

I meant to add a link to the thread on party manifestos.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5517030-scottish-elections-party-manifestos-on-sex-gender-etc

I wouldn't vote Tory as a GC leftie. I don't think political parties are going to make the connection that you are doing so for GC reasons, they will just think you like Tory policy in general. Whereas voting for Ash Regan makes it clearer because she is a high-profile GC feminist standing as an independent on those issues

(obviously you personally can vote Tory if they are your preferred party)