2007 Scottish Parliament election

The 2007 Scottish Parliament election was an election held on 3 May 2007 to elect members to the Scottish Parliament.

2007 Scottish Parliament election

3 May 2007 (2007-05-03)
All 129 seats to the Scottish Parliament 65 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Turnout	Constituency - 53.9% 4.2pp Regional - 54.0% 4.3pp
First party Second party Third party   Leader Alex Salmond Jack McConnell Annabel Goldie Party SNP Labour Conservative Leader's seat Gordon Motherwell and Wishaw West of Scotland Last election 27 seats 50 seats 18 seats Seats won 47 46 17 Seat change 20 4 1 Constituency vote 664,227 648,374 334,743 % and swing 32.9% 9.1% 32.1% 2.5% 16.6% Regional vote 633,611 595,415 284,035 % and swing 31.0% 10.1% 29.2% 0.2% 13.9% 1.6%   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Nicol Stephen Robin Harper / Shiona Baird Colin Fox Party Liberal Democrats Green Scottish Socialist Leader's seat Aberdeen South Lothians / North East Scotland (defeated) Lothians (defeated) Last election 17 seats 7 seats 6 seats Seats won 16 2 0 Seat change 1 5 6 Constituency vote 326,232 2,971 525 % and swing 16.2% 0.8% 0.1% 0.1% 0.0% 6.2% Regional vote 230,651 82,577 13,096 % and swing 11.3% 0.5% 4.0% 2.9% 0.6% 6.1%
The map shows the election results in single-member constituencies. The additional member MSPs in the 8 regions are shown around the map.
First Minister before election Jack McConnell Labour First Minister after election Alex Salmond SNP

Going into the election, the Scottish Labour Party had the largest number of seats and had a coalition agreement with the Scottish Liberal Democrats with Jack McConnell as First Minister. The Scottish National Party won 47 seats in the election, which was the largest number of seats for any party in the election, but was not enough to form a majority government. The Scottish National Party then formed a minority government with Alex Salmond as First Minister.

This was the first time since the 1964 UK General Election in which the Labour Party did not get the highest number of votes in Scotland and it also gave the Scottish National Party it's largest ever number of votes. The final results were: Scottish National Party (47 Seats), Scottish Labour Party (46 Seats), Scottish Conservative Party (17 Seats), Scottish Liberal Democrats (16 Seats) and the Scottish Green Party (2 Seats). Parties which had won seats in the 2003 Scottish Parliament election including the Scottish Socialist Party and the Scottish Senior Citizens Party, lost all of their seats.

Voting system

Scotland is divided into 73 constituencies with roughly the same number of people in each one. Each of these constituencies elects one Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) using the First Past the Post voting system. These 73 constituencies are grouped into eight regions. Each of these regions elects seven MSPs using proportional representation which means that the total number of MSPs is 129.

Party leaders

Scottish National Party - Alex Salmond

Scottish Labour Party - Jack McConnell

Scottish Conservative Party - Annabel Goldie

Scottish Liberal Democrats - Nicol Stephen

Scottish Green Party - Robin Harper / Shiona Baird

Next election

The next election to the Scottish parliament was held on 5 May 2011.