West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine

[boogieeck]

One the three parliamentary constituencies within Aberdeenshire council, WA&K covers the southern third of the Council area. Consisting of the historic county of Kincardineshire to the south, which adjoins Angus to the south and the Aberdeen South Constituency to the north plus West Aberdeenshire, adjoining Angus and Perth and North Perthshire to the south, Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (all one constituency) to the west and Moray and Gordon ( 2 constituencies) to the North.

The Kincardineshire portion consists of fertile farmland rising into the eastern Cairngorms with towns and villages both rural and coastal which since the discovery of north sea oil have increasingly become commuter dormitories for Aberdeen. The western Aberdeenshire portion continues these commuter towns and villages among fertile farmland merging westwards into the Cairngorm National Park en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairngorms_National_Park of sparsely populated hill country once dependent on shooting and fishing estates, including the Queens Scottish holiday home, Balmoral Castle.

As such, employment rates in the constituency are high, poverty levels low but hidden. Property prices are high within the Aberdeen travel to work area. State education is of a high quality and the constituency enjoys good health. (references to follow) 

The parliamentary seat is the 1997 successor to the Kincardine and Deeside constituency, which included suburbs which now form part of the Aberdeen South seat. This seat had been a Lib Dem - Conservative marginal and under the new boundaries was won from the "sitting" Conservative MP George Kynoch by Sir Robert Smith. 

More to follow 

[boogieeck]

Sir Robert Smith (LIb Dem) won the new seat with a majority over the Conservative challenger of 2662 in 1997, increasing it in 2001 and again in 2005 before falling back to a majority 3684 in 2010.

The SNP landslide of 2015 saw the Lib dem vote drop by 17% and Sir Robert drop to third behind 2nd placed future Conservative MSP for the equivalent seat Alexander Burnet and Stuart Donaldson of the SNP who won with a majority of 7,033. Donaldson is the son of SNP MSP Maureen Watt and grandson of former SNP MP Hamish Watt and at age 23 was the second youngest MP elected after his party colleague Mhairi Black.

In the snap election of 2017, PM Theresa Mays shock losses in England were balanced by Conservative gains in Scotland, among them WA&K. Council elections a month earlier had seen sweeping gains for the Conservatives and firmly established them as the clear non-SNP contender. Andrew Bowie, age 28, the oldest candidate in the election, won the seat with a majority of 7950. Bowie was previously employed by Liam Kerr MSP, by Ian Duncan MEP and by Better Together.

He would serve as PPS first to Matt Hancock at DCMS then PM May before supporting Hancock then Jeremy Hunt in the leadership election won by Boris Johnson. In the election of 2019, he faced a revived challenge from the SNP but held on by 843 votes.

West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine voted against Scottish Independence and against Brexit by approximately 60%-40% ( votes were counted Aberdeenshire wide)

The main equivalent seat in the Scottish Parliament is Aberdeenshire West, Lib Dem held in the early days of the Scottish parliament before switching like WA&K first to the SNP then to the Conservatives, now Alexander Burnett MSP

The Mearns (South Kincardineshire ) part of the seat along with North Angus is SNP held and the town of Portlethen forms part of the Aberdeen South and North Kincardine seat held by Maureen Watt MSP of the SNP

At council level Aberdeenshire has a Conservative-led - Lib Dem/Independent supported administration, with and SNP main opposition. The Conservative contingent come disproportionately from the WA&K area.

The Labour party historically polls lowly across the seat only briefly coming as high as a distant third.

[therealriga]

Apr 8, 2020 18:22:07 GMT boogieeck said:

Andrew Bowie, age 28, the oldest candidate in the election, won the seat with a majority of 7950. 

Out of curiosity, if Bowie was the oldest of the four candidates, how old were the other three?

[boogieeck]

I don’t actually know but they are all a meter of easy record

Barry black labour is still their candidate for Wak
Jonathon Waddell Lib Dem is still their candidate
Stuart Donaldson SNP was the outgoing MP