Scottish Labour’s Michael Shanks has won the Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection in an overwhelming victory over the SNP that the party leadership declared “seismic”, and a clear demonstration that Scotland could lead the way in delivering a Labour government at Westminster at the coming general election.
In a result that exceeded Scottish Labour expectation, Shanks beat his closest rival, the SNP’s Katy Loudon, by 17,845 votes to 8,399 – a majority of 9,446 and a resounding swing of over 20%.
I have to presume tactical voting was rife, plugging these figures into a Scotland electoral calculus with their most recent national figures suggests the SNP would be completely wiped out in Scotland. I’m not convinced things are that bad for them yet. Still, I think Labour are likely to take a majority of Scottish seats.
Curtis on the radio this morning was saying that labour would most likely get half the seats.
That does make their task at the next election a lot easier.