Stirling constituency covers the wooded glens, braes and lochs of the rural Trossachs region, which contains within it Loch Ard and Loch Venachar - the sources of the River Forth and the River Teith respectively. These two rivers flow along the wide valley plains of the Forth east through a number of picturesque towns and villages onto the city of Stirling, where they flow out as the River Forth on to the Firth of Forth estuary which separates Fife in the north from Edinburgh and the Lothians in the south.
The constituency includes remote villages in its extreme northern and western fringes, with more rural towns and villages in the centre and the more urban city of Stirling and its environs in the south-east.
In the east of the constituency on the borders of the Trossachs is the scenic town of Callander, sitting on the River Teith. Callander is one of a number of popular tourist desinations in the Trossachs region which is often dubbed the "Gateway to the Scottish Highlands".
And this distinction between Highland and Lowland, between urban and rural, very much defines the constituency of Stirling.
A chain of more populous towns and villages in the south-east of Stirling constituency sit on the fertile plains of the Forth Valley which open out towards Falkirk to the south and Clackmannanshire to the east. This area is dominated by the city of Stirling and its adjoining localities. Stirling itself is an attractive city and increasingly popular area for commuters based in Glasgow with a short 30-minute commute into Glasgow City Centre by train.
Dominating the cityscape of Stirling is Stirling Castle, the historical centre of the Kingdom of Scotland's political scene between the 12th and early 15th centuries, and the Wallace Monument, commemorating Scottish hero William Wallace who successfully supported the cause of Scottish independence from England in the 13th and 14th Centuries during the wars of independence. This monument was constructed in the heyday of the British Empire between 1851-1869 as a celebration of democratic values against tyranny. Also celebrated within the Hall of Heroes of the monument are prominent Tory figures in Scotland's history including economist Adam Smith and novelist Sir Walter Scott.
The Stirling urban area contains Bannockburn to the south-east, the site of the famous Battle of Bannockburn in which English forces were repelled from Scotland in Wars of Scottish Independence in the early 14th century, and the more affluent Bridge of Allan to the north, with Dunblane, hometown of Scottish Tennis player Andy Murray, just north of here and the old mining villages of Fallin, Cowie and Plean located to the south-east.
With all these great Scottish heroes and figures, perhaps it is no surprise that the Stirling area is where the pro-independence Scottish National Party draws the most strength in local elections compared to the more rural parts of the constituency. Stirling is also the site of Stirling University, and the polling district covering the university campus had a remarkably strong Green vote in the 2022 local elections, voting 56% Green, 27% SNP, 7% Labour and 5% Conservative.
The urban area like many other areas on the fringes of the Scottish Central Belt contains a mixture of affluent suburbs and deprived ex-council estates. In the most affluent parts of the Greater Stirling area, it is the Conservatives who tend to perform best, including the Torbrex area in the west of the city and Causewayhead in the north, as well as Dunblane and Bridge of Allan further north. Dunblane and Bridge of Allan was recently the site of a local council by-election held after the announcement of Nicola Sturgeon's resignation as the First Minister of Scotland where the Conservatives took 41% of the vote - up 11% on last year - while the SNP increased their vote share by 1% but the Greens fell back 7%, owing to their popular local ward councillor not being the candidate in the by-election. The city of Stirling is estimated to have voted 56% against Scottish independence in 2014, with the more deprived Bannockburn, Fallin, Plean and Cowie area rejecting independence by 55% No in spite of the area's more working class nature and historical ties to the Battle of Bannockburn, and Bridge of Allan & Dunblane ward returning a more convincing 65% vote against independence. Despite the relatively compact nature of the Stirling urban area, wards covering this area contain 72% of electors for this constituency.
In the more rural wards of Trossachs & Teith and Endrick & Forth, which represent 28% of electors, the Conservatives tend to perform better. These two wards follow the historic border where Stirlingshire and Perthshire used to meet, as Trossachs & Teith previously belonged to the county of Perthshire until the wholesale review of local government in Scotland in 1975.
Trossachs & Teith ward includes many popular tourist desinations including Callander, Blair Drummond - the home of Scotland's only Safari Park, picturesque lochs such as Loch Venachar, Loch Lubnaig, Loch Voil and Loch Earn as well as the Falls of Dochart in Killin and the Falls of Falloch, and many cottages, lodges, hamlets and villages peppering the glens and braes in between. While the social profile is mostly affluent, there is some deprivation in ex-council areas within Lochearnhead, Callander and Killin among other places. This ward counts as the Conservatives' best in Stirling Council area, which they won on 45% of the vote ahead of the SNP's 33.4%, with Labour on 9% and the Greens on 8%. The ward is estimated to have rejected Scottish independence at 62% No.
South of here is the Forth & Endrick ward, which also contains areas of affluence situated between Loch Lomond, the edges of the Trossachs, the fringes of the Greater Glasgow area and Stirling.
This shines a light on the actual size of this constituency, which is one of the largest in the UK. The villages of Balfron, Buchlyvie and Fintry are better areas for the SNP, where despite social indicators pointing to them being more affluent, there are some ex-council houses. In the west of the ward, villages like Drymen, Milton of Buchanan and Balmaha are closely situated to Loch Lomond and benefit from tourism associated with the Loch, which forms the western border of the constituency with Argyll and Bute. North from Balmaha is a rugged drive zig-zagging from the eastern shore of Loch Lomond up to the western face of Ben Lomond, a very popular 'easy' climb for tourists in the Loch Lomond region. This area alongside the adjacent village of Killearn is the best part of the ward for the Conservatives. Forth & Endrick ward as a whole is estimated to have returned a slightly higher No vote to independence than neighbouring Trossachs & Teith in 2014 at 63% No, with the Conservatives narrowly topping the poll here at last year's local elections on 36% of the vote ahead of the SNP's 35% and Labour's 14%.
Stirling constituency as a whole rejected Scottish independence by just under 60% No in the 2014 referendum, and it voted 68% in favour of remaining within the EU in 2016. The seat is primarily urban in spite of its size, and more affluent than Scotland as a whole, with higher deprivation in parts of eastern and northern Stirling, Bannockburn and the ex-mining towns of Plean, Cowie and Fallin. At the 2017 general election, a high point for the Conservatives and low point for the SNP, Stirling returned a very narrow win for Conservative Stephen Kerr who gained the seat from the SNP by just 148 votes before losing it back to the SNP's Alyn Smith who won the seat with a 9,254 majority on 51.1% of the vote in 2019. The 2021 Scottish election suggests with Brexit being less of a factor, the SNP should fall back here and Conservative regain a bit of ground relative to other areas, as on less favourable boundaries the SNP vote here was 2.5% lower in 2021 compared to 2019 in spite of being 3% higher in Scotland as a whole.
The boundaries are not set to change here, so a mariculous Conservative recovery into first place seems highly unlikely unless they can surpass their 2017 general election result, making this one of the SNP's safest seats in the whole of Scotland in spite of not being a natural pro-independence area - despite its history!
Touching briefly on the seat's history, until 1983 the constituency was divided between three seats, with the city of Stirling forming part of Stirling and Falkirk which voted Labour for most of its history from the 1922 general election, voting Liberal once in 1923 and Conservative once in 1931. West Stirlingshire, covering areas on the periphery of the city and Forth and Endrick as well as Denny and Dunipace in Falkirk returned Labour MPs consistently from 1935 onwards, whilst Kinross and Western Perthshire - covering Trossachs & Teith ward - was a reliable Conservative/Unionist constituency from 1922.
The combined Stirling constituency which actually excluded the highly Labour-leaning villages of Plean, Cowie and Fallin at that time, was won by Conservative Michael Forsyth in 1983 with a 5,133 vote majority, before becoming a hotly contested marginal seat with a Conservative majority of under 1,000 until Labour won the seat in 1997 and retained it until the SNP's landslide win at the 2015 general election.
The 2017 general election win for the Conservatives was the most marginal result in the seat's history, indicating it will be a difficult challenge for the party to regain in the foreseeable future as we can see from the recent by-election in Dunblane & Bridge of Allan where the Conservatives won 41% of the vote, 2.6% lower than their result in the 2017 local election when the party was enjoying a peak in Scotland under popular leader Ruth Davidson.
2017 general electionCON 18,291 (37.1%)
SNP 18,143 (36.8%)
LAB 10,902 (22.1%)
LIB 1,683 (3.4%)
WEP 337 (0.7%)
2019 general election
SNP 26,895 (51.1%)
CON 17,641 (33.5%)
LAB 4,275 (8.1%)
LIB 2,867 (5.4%)
GRN 942 (1.8%)
2014 independence referendum
NO 37,153 (59.8%)
YES 25,010 (40.2%)
2016 EU membership referendum
REMAIN 33,112 (67.7%)
LEAVE 15,787 (32.3%)
