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%.
Great result, but winning back a seat they last held in the 2017-19 parliament (and whose predecessor seats were Labour from 1964 and 1970 respectively until 2015) is not really seismic.
Mm, a swing of 20% is still a big swing - no?
It is, but the history of the seat suggests it’s the sort of seat a Labour Party on the up should be winning without difficulty - even Corbyn won it in 2017. So I don’t see it as something on the scale of Somerton and Frome, or Tiverton and Honiton, or North Shropshire, or if either the Lib Dems or Labour were to win in Mid-Bedfordshire.