Post by Robert Waller on Jan 24, 2023 21:09:08 GMT
Although it has only been in existence for 40 years, the North East Scotland constituency of Gordon has already had an interesting and varied electoral history. From its creation in 1983 until 2015 it was held by the Liberal, then Liberal Democrat, Malcolm Bruce, twice narrowly (1983, 1992) but often very safely. Then Bruce retired, but even as a 32 year incumbent he would have been unlikely to have survived the SNP sweep of 2015 which knocked out every LD seat in Scotland except for Orkney & Shetland. The winner in this case was the high profile former First Minister and ex-party leader, Alex Salmond, returning to Westminster having previously been the MP for neighbouring Banff & Buchan (1987-2010). However only two years later Salmond was out, as Gordon produced one of the most remarkable results in the 2017 general election. It was not a return of the Liberal Democrats, but an extraordinary advance by the Conservatives, whose share increased by 29% from a distant third with 11.7% to a win by over 2,600 votes with 40.7%. This was arguably the best Tory performance that year in the whole of Britain, and a clear rejection of Salmond. Yet the Nationalists as a party were not finished in Gordon by any mean, and in December 2019 Colin Clark, who vanquished ‘Wee Eck’, was himself defeated by Richard Thomson, previously the leader of the SNP group on Aberdeenshire council. There had been three changes of hand in Gordon in four years, and three different parties represented the constituency at Westminster in the 2010s.
Gordon has also gone through transformations in terms of boundary changes in its relatively brief existence. Initially, it was largely based on the former West Aberdeenshire, which provided 83% of its electors in 1983, compared with 17% from East Aberdeenshire. Its initial favour for the Liberals was therefore not a complete surprise, as West Aberdeenshire had been one of the mere dozen Liberal seats between 1966 and 1970, when James Davidson was ousted by the Colin (‘Mad Mitch’) Mitchell, previously known for his trenchant stance and actions as an army officer in Aden. However Gordon’s lines have been significantly altered twice. The first changes came in 1997. No constituency in Scotland had increased in population so rapidly between the 1981 and 1991 Censuses as Gordon. This was very much connected with the effects of the oil boom radiating from the port of Aberdeen, Scotland’s third largest city. This expansion created an extra constituency in the Grampian region in time for the 1997 Election, which took a substantial part of the more suburban section of Gordon into Aberdeen North. Malcolm Bruce had no problem coping with the effects of this review, nor indeed when the next one came just eight years later.
In 2005, when the boundary changes (in Scotland only that year) recued the number of Scottish Westminster constituencies due to the creation of the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood, many of the 1997 alterations were reversed as Aberdeen went down from three city seats to two. Gordon regained six (at that time) Aberdeen city wards, and has ever since been a mixture of rural and small town Aberdeenshire and the northern fringes of the Aberdeen conurbation.
The first mentioned section includes a number of communities long known either as royal or as small burghs in Scotland. The furthest from Aberdeen is Huntly, in the north western corner of the Gordon constituency (population around 4,500) where the Rivers Bogie and Deveron meet, a market and former textile manufacturing town. Geographically more central are whisky making Oldmeldrum (2,000) and the larger Inverurie in the (Scottish, not Yorkshire or Russian) Don Valley, which has nearly 15,000 inhabitants. A clue as to part of its past is given by the name of its Highland League football club, Inverurie Loco Works FC, although the train construction and repair facility, opened in 1902, closed as long ago as 1969. Its paper mill is also gone, though more recently in 2009. But Inverurie remains a prosperous centre, with a livestock market reflecting its nature as the heart of a large agricultural area. Kintore (4,700 or so) is also on the banks of the Don but further south. Finally in the north eastern corner of Gordon is Ellon, a fairly substantial community of 10,000 on the river Ythan, and the closest town to Gordon’s generally undeveloped coastline.
Between them all these areas constitute six of the large wards of Aberdeenshire council created by the need to elect by STV since 2007. In the most recent local elections in May 2022 the SNP secured most first preferences in four of these, and the Conservatives in two (those based on Huntly and Ellon); but between them six Nationalists and eight Tories were elected, along with five Liberal Democrats and three Independents. The SNP’s strongest ward was East Garioch (where the largest community is Kintore and which is nearest to Aberdeen) with just over 40% of first preferences. The Conservatives only exceeded 40% - and that not by much - in the ward colourfully named Huntly, Strathbogie and Howe of Alford, which is the furthest away from the city of Aberdeen. Generally though no single party dominated in the rural section of the Gordon division, and the Liberal Democrats managed to get over 20% in Ellon & District, and an incumbent Independent did so in Inverurie & District. In this ‘Aberdeenshire’ section of Gordon there is some tendency for the Nationalists to do better as one approaches Aberdeen itself, but too much should not be made of this.
The boundaries do not quite coincide, but two Aberdeen city wards with a combined electorate of 31,000 are also currently included in the Gordon Westminster seat. Here the electoral pattern is clearer. The SNP were the most popular by some margin in May 2022 in both Bridge of Don and Dyce/Bucksburn/Danestone (the Bucksburn section is south of the river Don and is in Aberdeen North constituency not Gordon). In the former their two candidates amassed 40.4% of all first preferences between them, and both were elected; in the latter the same result transpired on the basis of 41.3%. The Tories were second in both Aberdeen wards, but a long way behind with 29% and 26% respectively. Bridge of Don itself is a small historic community over the river from Aberdeen itself, but its ward is mainly made up of large modern private housing estates such as those near Denmore and along Jesmond Drive (sometimes called Middleton Park). This ward was 90% owner occupied at the time of the latest available Scottish Census. The ‘Dyce and Danestone’ ward is similar in character. Both wards are mixed social class, with a strong presence of C1 supervisory, clerical, and junior managerial workers. There is an ancient village at Dyce, but the name is now much better known as the site of Aberdeen’s airport (an aerodrome from 1934, but much expanded as a commercial airport after the Second World War, especially in the 1960s with the beginnings if the North Sea oil boom). There is also a major industrial estate (Kirkhill) at the airport, although Dyce has also been known as a centre of quarrying. The whole A96 corridor has been extensively developed for both commercial and residential purposes, so Gordon has incorporated a dynamic sector of Greater Aberdeen for decades now.
Overall, the demographic statistics of the Gordon constituency do not reflect those suggesting a rural backwater, tucked away in a corner of Scotland. In fact it is in the lower half of the rankings as far as residents ‘born in Scotland’ are concerned, so has many incomers. It is well into the top decile for owner occupied housing, and has a relatively very low proportion of private rented accommodation. Its employment and education figures reveal a population somewhat, but not massively, above the median in class terms. The population is slightly younger than average and very much among the most organized in single family groups. It is also near the top of seats throughout the United Kingdom as far as self-ascribed ‘very good health’ in concerned. Politically the battle would not seem to be predominantly between the SNP and the Conservatives who have cornered the ‘unionist’ market since the collapse of the Liberal Democrats in 2015, due to the retirement of Malcolm Bruce but also more perhaps because of their status as junior coalition partners at Westminster for the previous five years. The Tories seem in free fall nationally at present, but the Liberal Democrat local base, though it exists, does not seem strong enough as yet at least to reignite an effective challenge. Labour have only reached the 20% level in the constituency in 2005 and 2010, and seem to have no real platform, even accounting for tactical voting.
However there is another factor to be taken into consideration. In the latest proposals of the Boundary Commission for Scotland, the Gordon name is scheduled to disappear; after all, it has not been used for a local authority unit since 1996. Just over 30% of Gordon is to be placed in a revised Aberdeen North seat, in the form of the two wards from the city council based in Dyce and Bridge of Don. The remaining 70% is to join 21,000 voters from the Banff & Buchan seat in a new constituency to be called Aberdeenshire Central. The Banff/Buchan donation comprises the wards of Turriff & Disrrict and Central Buchan (a large inland rural area with no towns but covering villages such as New Pitsligo, Fetterangus, New Deer and Maud). Both of these had Tory pluralities in the May 2022 Aberdeenshire council elections.
www.bcomm-scotland.independent.gov.uk/sites/default/files/revised_constituency_maps/Aberdeenshire_central.pdf
The loss of the Aberdeen suburbs, which at least at municipal level are the most SNP parts of Gordon (and the SNP did easily won the Aberdeen Donside seat in the Scottish Parliament election of May 2021, while the Conservatives held West Aberdeenshire, partly composed of the rest of Gordon), and the fact that the Conservatives did hold on to the Banff & Buchan constituency in the 2019 general election with a majority of over 4,000, does all suggest that the notional results for the new Aberdeenshire Central in 2019 would actually have a Conservative lead. Therefore, technically, the SNP would have to gain it all over again. It would be a brave, and possibly misguided, pundit who predicts that the era of changes in hand between the parties in this part of Scotland is over.
2011 Census
Age 65+ 15.4% 428/650
One family household 70.7% 10/650
Very good health 56.7% 14/650
Owner-occupied 77.4% 35/650
Private rented 8.3% 631/650
Social rented 12.9% 443/650
White 97.5% 180/650
Black 0.6% 346/650
Asian 1.3% 443/650
Managerial & professional 35.2%
Routine & Semi-routine 24.5%
Employed in mining or quarrying 8.1% 3/650
Degree level 28.2% 229/650
No qualifications 21.0% 410/650
Students 6.0% 485/650
General Election 2019: Gordon
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
SNP Richard Thomson 23,885 42.7 +6.8
Conservative Colin Clark 23,066 41.3 +0.6
Liberal Democrats James Oates 5,913 10.6 −1.0
Labour Heather Herbert 3,052 5.5 −6.3
SNP Majority 819 1.4
2019 electorate 79,629
Turnout 55,916 70.2 +1.8
SNP gain from Conservative
Swing 3.2 C to SNP
Gordon has also gone through transformations in terms of boundary changes in its relatively brief existence. Initially, it was largely based on the former West Aberdeenshire, which provided 83% of its electors in 1983, compared with 17% from East Aberdeenshire. Its initial favour for the Liberals was therefore not a complete surprise, as West Aberdeenshire had been one of the mere dozen Liberal seats between 1966 and 1970, when James Davidson was ousted by the Colin (‘Mad Mitch’) Mitchell, previously known for his trenchant stance and actions as an army officer in Aden. However Gordon’s lines have been significantly altered twice. The first changes came in 1997. No constituency in Scotland had increased in population so rapidly between the 1981 and 1991 Censuses as Gordon. This was very much connected with the effects of the oil boom radiating from the port of Aberdeen, Scotland’s third largest city. This expansion created an extra constituency in the Grampian region in time for the 1997 Election, which took a substantial part of the more suburban section of Gordon into Aberdeen North. Malcolm Bruce had no problem coping with the effects of this review, nor indeed when the next one came just eight years later.
In 2005, when the boundary changes (in Scotland only that year) recued the number of Scottish Westminster constituencies due to the creation of the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood, many of the 1997 alterations were reversed as Aberdeen went down from three city seats to two. Gordon regained six (at that time) Aberdeen city wards, and has ever since been a mixture of rural and small town Aberdeenshire and the northern fringes of the Aberdeen conurbation.
The first mentioned section includes a number of communities long known either as royal or as small burghs in Scotland. The furthest from Aberdeen is Huntly, in the north western corner of the Gordon constituency (population around 4,500) where the Rivers Bogie and Deveron meet, a market and former textile manufacturing town. Geographically more central are whisky making Oldmeldrum (2,000) and the larger Inverurie in the (Scottish, not Yorkshire or Russian) Don Valley, which has nearly 15,000 inhabitants. A clue as to part of its past is given by the name of its Highland League football club, Inverurie Loco Works FC, although the train construction and repair facility, opened in 1902, closed as long ago as 1969. Its paper mill is also gone, though more recently in 2009. But Inverurie remains a prosperous centre, with a livestock market reflecting its nature as the heart of a large agricultural area. Kintore (4,700 or so) is also on the banks of the Don but further south. Finally in the north eastern corner of Gordon is Ellon, a fairly substantial community of 10,000 on the river Ythan, and the closest town to Gordon’s generally undeveloped coastline.
Between them all these areas constitute six of the large wards of Aberdeenshire council created by the need to elect by STV since 2007. In the most recent local elections in May 2022 the SNP secured most first preferences in four of these, and the Conservatives in two (those based on Huntly and Ellon); but between them six Nationalists and eight Tories were elected, along with five Liberal Democrats and three Independents. The SNP’s strongest ward was East Garioch (where the largest community is Kintore and which is nearest to Aberdeen) with just over 40% of first preferences. The Conservatives only exceeded 40% - and that not by much - in the ward colourfully named Huntly, Strathbogie and Howe of Alford, which is the furthest away from the city of Aberdeen. Generally though no single party dominated in the rural section of the Gordon division, and the Liberal Democrats managed to get over 20% in Ellon & District, and an incumbent Independent did so in Inverurie & District. In this ‘Aberdeenshire’ section of Gordon there is some tendency for the Nationalists to do better as one approaches Aberdeen itself, but too much should not be made of this.
The boundaries do not quite coincide, but two Aberdeen city wards with a combined electorate of 31,000 are also currently included in the Gordon Westminster seat. Here the electoral pattern is clearer. The SNP were the most popular by some margin in May 2022 in both Bridge of Don and Dyce/Bucksburn/Danestone (the Bucksburn section is south of the river Don and is in Aberdeen North constituency not Gordon). In the former their two candidates amassed 40.4% of all first preferences between them, and both were elected; in the latter the same result transpired on the basis of 41.3%. The Tories were second in both Aberdeen wards, but a long way behind with 29% and 26% respectively. Bridge of Don itself is a small historic community over the river from Aberdeen itself, but its ward is mainly made up of large modern private housing estates such as those near Denmore and along Jesmond Drive (sometimes called Middleton Park). This ward was 90% owner occupied at the time of the latest available Scottish Census. The ‘Dyce and Danestone’ ward is similar in character. Both wards are mixed social class, with a strong presence of C1 supervisory, clerical, and junior managerial workers. There is an ancient village at Dyce, but the name is now much better known as the site of Aberdeen’s airport (an aerodrome from 1934, but much expanded as a commercial airport after the Second World War, especially in the 1960s with the beginnings if the North Sea oil boom). There is also a major industrial estate (Kirkhill) at the airport, although Dyce has also been known as a centre of quarrying. The whole A96 corridor has been extensively developed for both commercial and residential purposes, so Gordon has incorporated a dynamic sector of Greater Aberdeen for decades now.
Overall, the demographic statistics of the Gordon constituency do not reflect those suggesting a rural backwater, tucked away in a corner of Scotland. In fact it is in the lower half of the rankings as far as residents ‘born in Scotland’ are concerned, so has many incomers. It is well into the top decile for owner occupied housing, and has a relatively very low proportion of private rented accommodation. Its employment and education figures reveal a population somewhat, but not massively, above the median in class terms. The population is slightly younger than average and very much among the most organized in single family groups. It is also near the top of seats throughout the United Kingdom as far as self-ascribed ‘very good health’ in concerned. Politically the battle would not seem to be predominantly between the SNP and the Conservatives who have cornered the ‘unionist’ market since the collapse of the Liberal Democrats in 2015, due to the retirement of Malcolm Bruce but also more perhaps because of their status as junior coalition partners at Westminster for the previous five years. The Tories seem in free fall nationally at present, but the Liberal Democrat local base, though it exists, does not seem strong enough as yet at least to reignite an effective challenge. Labour have only reached the 20% level in the constituency in 2005 and 2010, and seem to have no real platform, even accounting for tactical voting.
However there is another factor to be taken into consideration. In the latest proposals of the Boundary Commission for Scotland, the Gordon name is scheduled to disappear; after all, it has not been used for a local authority unit since 1996. Just over 30% of Gordon is to be placed in a revised Aberdeen North seat, in the form of the two wards from the city council based in Dyce and Bridge of Don. The remaining 70% is to join 21,000 voters from the Banff & Buchan seat in a new constituency to be called Aberdeenshire Central. The Banff/Buchan donation comprises the wards of Turriff & Disrrict and Central Buchan (a large inland rural area with no towns but covering villages such as New Pitsligo, Fetterangus, New Deer and Maud). Both of these had Tory pluralities in the May 2022 Aberdeenshire council elections.
www.bcomm-scotland.independent.gov.uk/sites/default/files/revised_constituency_maps/Aberdeenshire_central.pdf
The loss of the Aberdeen suburbs, which at least at municipal level are the most SNP parts of Gordon (and the SNP did easily won the Aberdeen Donside seat in the Scottish Parliament election of May 2021, while the Conservatives held West Aberdeenshire, partly composed of the rest of Gordon), and the fact that the Conservatives did hold on to the Banff & Buchan constituency in the 2019 general election with a majority of over 4,000, does all suggest that the notional results for the new Aberdeenshire Central in 2019 would actually have a Conservative lead. Therefore, technically, the SNP would have to gain it all over again. It would be a brave, and possibly misguided, pundit who predicts that the era of changes in hand between the parties in this part of Scotland is over.
2011 Census
Age 65+ 15.4% 428/650
One family household 70.7% 10/650
Very good health 56.7% 14/650
Owner-occupied 77.4% 35/650
Private rented 8.3% 631/650
Social rented 12.9% 443/650
White 97.5% 180/650
Black 0.6% 346/650
Asian 1.3% 443/650
Managerial & professional 35.2%
Routine & Semi-routine 24.5%
Employed in mining or quarrying 8.1% 3/650
Degree level 28.2% 229/650
No qualifications 21.0% 410/650
Students 6.0% 485/650
General Election 2019: Gordon
Party Candidate Votes % ±%
SNP Richard Thomson 23,885 42.7 +6.8
Conservative Colin Clark 23,066 41.3 +0.6
Liberal Democrats James Oates 5,913 10.6 −1.0
Labour Heather Herbert 3,052 5.5 −6.3
SNP Majority 819 1.4
2019 electorate 79,629
Turnout 55,916 70.2 +1.8
SNP gain from Conservative
Swing 3.2 C to SNP
