Ayr (Scottish Parliament constituency)

Not to be confused with Ayr (UK Parliament constituency) or Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (UK Parliament constituency).

Ayr
county constituency for the Scottish Parliament
150px
Ayr shown within the South Scotland electoral region and the region shown within Scotland
Current constituency
Created	1999
Party	Conservative
MSP	John Scott
Council area	South Ayrshire

Ayr is a constituency of the Scottish Parliament (Holyrood) which elects one Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) via the plurality (first past the post) electoral system. It is also one of nine constituencies in the South Scotland electoral region which elects seven additional members to the Scottish Parliament via a proportional electoral system known as the Additional Members System (abbreviated AMS) which allows for fairer representation for the region as a whole.

Electoral region

See also: South Scotland (Scottish Parliament electoral region)

The other eight constituencies of the South Scotland region are Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley, Clydesdale, Dumfriesshire, East Lothian, Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire, Galloway and West Dumfries, Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley and Midlothian South, Tweeddale and Lauderdale. The region covers the Dumfries and Galloway, East Ayrshire, Scottish Borders and South Ayrshire council areas in full and elements of the East Lothian, Midlothian and South Lanarkshire council areas.

Constituency boundaries and council area

1999-2011

The Ayr constituency was created at the same time as the Scottish Parliament, in 1999, following the same boundaries as the existing Ayr constituency at Westminister. In 2005 however, most UK Parliamentary constituencies in Scotland were replaced with new constituencies, with the Ayr constituency being abolished and replaced by the Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock and Central Ayrshire constituencies. This had no impact on the boundaries of the Ayr constituency within the Scottish Parliament, which used the old Westminister boundaries during the 2007 election to the Scottish Parliament.

The constituency covered the electoral wards of:

• Troon, Prestwick, Ayr North, Ayr East (part: excluding Masonhill, Castlehill, Holmston, south Belmont, Kincaidston and Forehill), Ayr West (part: excluding the suburbs of Alloway and Doonfoot) and Kyle (part: excluding Mossblown, Annbank and St. Quivox).

The remaining section of South Ayrshire was covered by the Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley constituency.

2011-

Following the First Periodic review of constituencies to the Scottish Parliament in time for the 2011 Scottish Parliament election, the Boundary Commission for Scotland recommended alterations to the existing Ayr constituency which were then implemented and used at the 2011 Scottish Parliament election. These boundaries remain in place today and will be used at the 2016 Scottish Parliament election.

The review suggested that the Ayr constituency take in the electoral wards of:

• Troon, Prestwick, Ayr North, Ayr East and Ayr West

All remaining wards in South Ayrshire form part of the Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley constituency.

Constituency profile and voting patterns

Constituency profile

The Ayr constituency incorporates the towns of Ayr, Prestwick and Troon which run along the west coast of Ayrshire. The constituency is exclusively contained within the South Ayrshire council area.

All three towns within the constituency are well-established sea-side resorts. Ayr annually hosts the Scottish Grand National and the Scottish Airshow whilst the Golf Courses of Prestwick and Troon have both played host to the British Open Championship. The seat also takes in Glasgow Prestwick International Airport and Robert Burns cottage in Alloway, Ayr.

Data derived from the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation and Office for National Statistics indicates that the Ayr seat contains a diverse and muddled mix of affluent suburban areas and deprived council estates, with 43% of the seat's populous living in the 30% most affleunt datazones in Scotland.

Voting patterns

Historically, the Ayr seat has held a higher level of support for the Conservative and Unionist Party in comparison to elsewhere in Scotland and the United Kingdom as a whole. The equivalent Westminister seat of Ayr was gained by the Conservative Party at its creation in 1950. In subsequent elections, the seat went on to return Conservative MP's until the 1997 General Election, when the boundaries of the constituency were altered in a move which saw a number of Conservative-voting suburbs being transferred to the adjoining Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley constituency which subsequently altered the demographics of the constituency - benefiting the Labour Party. In spite of this, in the 1997 election the Ayr seat returned one of the smallest pro-Labour swings in Great Britain at just 5%.

Prior to this the Ayr Burghs constituency (which incorporated a number of towns in coastal Ayrshire including Irvine, Troon, Prestwick, Ayr, Saltcoats and Ardrossan) voted continuously Conservative from 1906 until it's abolishment in 1950, making Ayr the longest seat to be held continuously by the Conservatives in Scotland (continuously having a Conservative MP at Westminister for 91 years). Ayr has been represented by a Conservative MP or MSP for a total of nearly 120 years - the longest of any constituency in Scotland. Most of the Conservative party's support is found in Ayr's most affluent areas.

In the 2003 local council election for South Ayrshire, the Scottish Conservative party's support was concentrated in suburban areas along the boundaries of the constituency, primarily contained within Doonfoot and Seafield, Alloway, Ayr Fort, St Leonard's, north Belmont, Masonhill, Holmston, Castlehill, Barassie, Muirhead, south Troon and in north, west and central Prestwick. The Labour party have traditionally found success in more deprived areas of the constituency, winning in council estates such as Kincaidston, Forehill and Prestwick Toll, throughout north Ayr and in western Troon at the 2003 local council election.

Area Classification mapping conducted by the Office for National Statistics suggests that the majority of those defined as Urban- and Suburbanites in the constituency tend to vote for the Conservatives, whilst those described as "Constrained City Dwellers", "Hard-Pressed Living" and "Cosmopolitans" are more likely to vote in favour of Labour and the SNP. The Ayr constituency contains a mixture of both Urban/Suburbanites and Constrained City Dwellers/Hard-pressed Living, with most areas south of the river Ayr and in Prestwick and Troon being classed as Urban/Suburbanites and north of the river Ayr being overwhelmingly composed of Hard-Pressed Living and Constrained City Dwellers. Ayr east is a mix of the two, with Kincaidston, Forehill and south Belmont all being largely Hard-Pressed Living whilst St. Leonard's, much of north Belmont, Masonhill, Castlehill and Holmston being defined as Suburban.

The rural north east of the former Ayr constituency (1999-2011) incorporated the majority of the Kyle electoral ward with the exception of Mossblown, Annbank and St. Quivox. The area is similar to the rest of Ayr in that it contains a mixture of affluent and deprived areas, with the former mining community of Tarbolton voting largely in favour of the Labour Party and more lately the SNP: the Scottish Socialist Party performed strongly in the area at the 2000 Ayr by-election. The villages of Loans and Symington have voted quite strongly Conservative on a local level which suggests that the area has voted largely in favour of the Conservatives as part of the Ayr constituency. At the 2003 local election, the Conservatives were able to secure over 50% of the vote in the section of Kyle which was covered as part of the former Ayr constituency. The remainder of the Kyle electoral ward (Mossblown, Annbank and St. Quivox) shares similar characteristics to Ayr North and Tarbolton, voting strongly in favour of the Labour party at local elections (55% in the 2003 local council election) - this was the only part of Kyle to form part of the Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley constituency until 2011, when boundary change subsequently led to the entire Kyle electoral ward being incorporated in to the Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley constituency.

Until the late 2000s, the Labour Party held a significant level of support in the more deprived parts of the constituency and were able to win the constituency by 25 votes at the 1999 Scottish general election as a consequence of a high turnout and the constituency's boundaries, which excluded various Conservative-voting suburbs in southern Ayr (including Alloway, Doonfoot, Masonhill, Holmston and Castlehill). Labour's decline in support in the Scottish parliament coupled with a lower turnout enabled the Conservatives to secure the constituency comfortably at the 2000 Ayr by-election following the resignation of Ayr's first MSP, Ian Welsh. The by-election was the first by-election of the Scottish parliament, making Ayr the first Scottish Conservative constituency seat in the Scottish parliament (who won no constituency seats at the 1999 Scottish Parliament election). The Conservatives went on to hold the constituency at the 2003 and 2007 Scottish Parliament elections, despite marginally losing the seat to the Labour Party at the 2001 UK General Election. Data from the 2007 Scottish parliamentary election and the 2012 local council election suggests that the SNP have made considerable gains in Kincaidston, Forehill and south Belmont by topping the poll in the Ayr east electoral ward. In 2011, the constituency boundaries were altered, with the electoral ward of Kyle being transferred to the Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley constituency. Alloway, Doonfoot and Masonhill along with part of Forehill and Kincaidston were transferred back to the Ayr constituency. The Ayr seat returned Conservative MSP John Scott with a reduced majority in the 2011 Scottish Parliamentary election.

Members of the Scottish Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1999	Ian Welsh	Labour
	2000 by-election	John Scott	Conservative
	2003
	2007
	2011

Election results

2016 election

Scottish Parliament election, 2016: Ayr

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	John Scott
	Liberal Democrats
	SNP	Jennifer Dunn
	Labour
Majority
Turnout
	[[|N/A]] hold		Swing

2011 election

Scottish Parliament election, 2011: Ayr
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the electorate vote. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list. Yellow background denotes an electorate win by a list member. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate		Votes	%	±%	Party Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Y John Scott		12,997	38.9	-1.04	8,539	25.51
	SNP	Chic Brodie		11,884	35.6	+9.28	14,377	42.96
	Labour	Gordon McKenzie		7,779	23.3	-4.01	7,513	22.45
	Liberal Democrats	Eileen Taylor		713	2.1	-3.58	744	2.22
	Scottish Green						685	2.05
	All Scotland Pensioners Party						595	1.78
	UKIP						293	0.88
	Scottish Christian						237	0.71
	BNP						211	0.63
	Socialist Labour						168	0.50
	Scottish Socialist						76	0.23
	Solidarity						30	0.09
Informal votes				118			67
Total Valid votes				33,373			33,468
	Conservative hold		Majority	1,113	3.34

Scottish Parliament election, 2007 Notional Result: Ayr

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative		13,820	40.0	-0.7
	Labour		9,445	27.3	-0.8
	SNP		9,101	26.3	+0.7
	Liberal Democrats		2,013	5.8	+0.2
	Others		187	0.5
Majority			4,375	12.7
	Conservative hold		Swing

2007 election result

Scottish Parliament election, 2007: Ayr
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the electorate vote. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list. Yellow background denotes an electorate win by a list member. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate		Votes	%	±%	Party Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Y John Scott		12,619	40.67	-0.05	8,983	28.90	-6.60
	Labour	John Duncan		8,713	28.08	-6.67	8,871	28.54	-2.29
	SNP	Iain White		7,952	25.63	+11.91	8,560	27.54	+13.73
	Liberal Democrats	Stuart Ritchie		1,741	5.61	+0.01	1,601	5.15	-0.18
	Scottish Green						840	2.70	-1.92
	Scottish Senior Citizens						723	2.34	-0.25(a)
	Solidarity						346	1.11	+1.11
	BNP						338	1.09	+1.09
	Scottish Christian						253	0.81	+0.81
	Socialist Labour						146	0.47	-0.29
	Scottish Socialist						134	0.43	-5.29
	UKIP						120	0.39	-0.14
	Christian Peoples						90	0.29	+0.29
	Independent - Paddy Scott Hogg						46	0.15	+0.15
	Scottish Voice						27	0.09	+0.09
Informal votes				873			820
Total Valid votes				31,898			31,708
Turnout				32,681
	Conservative hold		Majority	3,906	12.5	+6.52

^(a)-comparison with Pensioners Party (Scotland)

2003 election result

Scottish Parliament election, 2003: Ayr
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the electorate vote. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list. Yellow background denotes an electorate win by a list member. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate		Votes	%	±%	Party Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Y John Scott		12,865	40.72	+2.72	11,221	35.51	+4.58
	Labour	Rita Miller		10,975	34.75	-3.36	9,745	30.84	-1.31
	SNP	James Dornan		4,334	13.72	-5.60	4,366	13.82	-8.82
	Liberal Democrats	Stuart David Ritchie		1,769	5.60	+1.20	1,684	5.33	-0.84
	Scottish Socialist	James Scott Stewart		1,648	5.22	+5.22	1,808	5.72	+4.79
	Scottish Green						1,462	4.63	+2.40
	Pensioners Party						813	2.57	+2.57
	Socialist Labour						240	0.76	-3.27
	UKIP						166	0.53	+0.21
	Scottish People's						65	0.21	+0.21
	Am Partaidh Dhuthchail - The Rural Party						32	0.10	+0.10
Informal votes				145			136
Total Valid votes				31,591			31,602
	Conservative hold		Majority	1,890	5.98

2000 by-election result

Ayr by-election, 2000
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the by-election. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list prior to the by-election. Yellow background denotes the winner of the by-election, who was a list MP prior to the by-election. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	John Scott	12,580	39.44	+1.43
	SNP	Jim Mather	9,236	28.95	+9.48
	Labour	Rita Miller	7,054	22.1	-15.97
	Scottish Socialist	James Stewart	1,345	4.22	+4.22
	Liberal Democrats	Stuart Ritchie	800	2.51	-1.91
	Scottish Green	Gavin Nelson Corbett	460	1.44	+1.44
	The Radio Vet	William Clifton Botcherby	186	0.53	+0.53
	UKIP	Alistair David Mconnachie	113	0.35	+0.35
	ProLife Alliance	Robert Graham	111	0.35	+0.35
	Independent	Kevin James Dillion	15	0.05	+0.05
Informal votes			58
Total Valid votes			31,900
	Conservative gain from Labour	Majority	3,344	10.48

1999 election result

Scottish Parliament election, 1999: Ayr
Notes: Green background denotes the winner of the electorate vote. Pink background denotes a candidate elected from their party list. Yellow background denotes an electorate win by a list member. A Y or N denotes status of any incumbent, win or lose respectively.
Party		Candidate		Votes	%	±%	Party Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Ian Welsh		14,263	38.08		12,039	32.14
	Conservative	Phil Gallie		14,238	38.01		11,582	30.92
	SNP	Roger Mullin		7,291	19.47		8,477	22.63
	Liberal Democrats	Elaine Morris		1,662	4.42		2,312	6.17
	Socialist Labour						1,510	4.03
	Scottish Green						832	2.22
	Scottish Socialist						347	0.93
	Liberal						150	0.40
	UKIP						119	0.32
	Natural Law						87	0.23
Informal votes				114			97
Total Valid votes				37,454			37,455
	Labour win new seat		Majority	25	0.07