06/05/2016 Scotland 2016

An historic third term for the SNP and the Conservatives

overtake Labour as the second largest party in the

Even the Prime Minister admits he wouldn't have bet on that.

The SNP wins the largest ever number of constituency seats

in a Holyrood election - not quite enough,

The Tories double their number of seats and push Labour

And the Green Party wins six seats, overtaking the Liberal Democrats.

Well, if it was derided as a rather dull election campaign,

You wait decades for one seismic shift in politics then two

The SNP won last night in Holyrood for a remarkable third time.

Then the real shocker for many - the Conservatives replaced Labour

With me throughout tonight's programme to reflect

on all that has happened are the journalist Pennie Taylor.

And the law lecturer and blogger Andrew Tickell.

Any particular highlights? As you say, after a lacklustre campaign, I

thought last night was gripping. For me, I dozed off at several points,

but at one point when I woke up, the Dumbarton constituency and clear

nerves about what would happen and Jackie Baillie, the shadow Finance

Minister defending her seat against an intensive SNP assault. They

really wanted it, and it came down to fewer than 100 votes and Jackie

Baillie kept her seat and it was nail-biting. Andrew? I like the

overwhelming triumph of the SNP in Glasgow and it makes me think of

history. Something which people in the party have been fighting for

since 1979 and to see that work completed is quite a disturbing as

well as exciting thing! Before we go on to chew over

all this in more detail, let's have a look at how things

unfolded for all the Our political correspondent

Nick Eardley has only had a couple of hours' sleep -

so dedicated, he's been following Continuity and once unthinkable

change. The reasons to cheer for the SNP. A return to Holyrood, the

biggest group by some distance. The party won a clean sweep in Glasgow

on route to becoming the first to win three Hollywood elections but

failed to meet the magic figure of 65. Nicola Sturgeon said she had a

personal mandate and would seek to govern Holyrood at the head of a

minority administration. With such a large group of MSPs collected I do

not intend to seek any formal arrangement with any other parties.

However, the government I lead will be an inclusive government. It will

be firm on our determination to deliver on commitments we made to

the Scottish people and it will also reach out and seek to work with

others across the parliament. The key race was always going to be for

second place but few predicted how well the Conservatives would do.

Dominating in the Borders and seeing the vote climb. Up 16 seats and is

now officially the second party at Holyrood. As a minority

administration I think the SNP will be forced to listen, learn and

improve. I am proud our performance has helped to bring this about. We

went into the SN he in check and last night we made good on that

promise. By beating them in seats across Scotland and winning seats on

the regional list, we have stopped the SN heave from returning that

majority. A devastating night for labour and their worst result is

Scotland for over a century, relegated to third. Some said the

party failed to persuade people of the need to move on. With no

appetite for a change in leadership, where now? It is a bad result for

the Scottish Labour Party, we lost a third of MSPs. The belief the

Scottish Labour Party has ideas and values fit for the future of

Scotland. The idea of healing the nation divided along lines of Yes

and No. To make different choices from the Tories. For the Greens,

Ross Greer, 21 the Parliament's youngest member among their

contingent. They won six seats, aching them a fourth force in

Holyrood. The Greens will do what we can to provide what Labour haven't,

which is constructive, progressive ideas that will push the Scottish

Government beyond its comfort zone. We will be constructive and drag

them in the right direction and I believe will get results. Despite

falling to fifth, strong constituency results for the Liberal

Democrats, winning Fife North East and Edinburgh West from the SNP,

Knutsford celebration says the leader. People were writing us off

before the election but what we have now is we have won seats from the

SNP in Edinburgh and from the SNP in Fife and we have big majorities in

Orkney and shuttle -- Shetland. That shows the Liberal Democrats are

buoyant today after these results. But no electoral breakthrough for

Ukip. Have they just missed their best chance of a seat at Holyrood?

Some questions for the future. How will the SNP govern as a minority,

can Conservatives maintain support, is there any way back for the Labour

Party? What the next five years has in store for Scottish politics is

unlikely to be boring. A moment that sticks in the mind was

the eastward decoration. Held by Labour's Ken Macintosh since the

advent of the Scottish Parliament taken by the Conservatives. We have

seen swings all night away from Labour towards the Conservatives,

and that was the point when you realised it could mean something and

it went on and on through the evening. Edinburgh Central was a big

one. Ruth Davidson taking the Conservatives from fourth, almost

nowhere, to winning that seat. The SNP got more votes than last

time but ended up with fewer seats. There has been grumbling among

supporters about that. Is the Scottish Parliamentary election

system is supposed to be fairer? More votes on higher turnout so

numerically more but slightly down in percentage terms. It is a quirk

in the system. The 2011 results broke the system, which was designed

to avoid majorities. A lot of people in the SNP are disappointed they did

not quite make it, only two away, but that is what the system was

designed to do. Take the history of the Scottish Parliament as one, it

is not a surprise. Andrew, it was a huge win for the S, but might the

campaign have backfired, robs people the wrong way? You have to campaign

for your party to win. It is hard to see a scenario where they would say

give your vote to someone else. You write a number of people are perhaps

disappointed with the overall result but the SNP did not get more than

50% of the vote and democratically speaking, why should they have more

than 50% of seats? Nicola Sturgeon is on record as saying a

minority-owned and is arguably a healthy way to govern because you

are more closely challenged. It will make for an exciting next few years.

If you believe in PR, as the SNP has, it is it a bit cheeky to make a

pitch to squeeze out smaller parties? It will be interesting. A

lot of people will be all over the results. I want to know how the very

young people voted, 16 and 17-year-olds, did turn out? Looking

at voter behaviour, why did people choose to vote what they did if they

voted differently on the two ballot papers? There is a lot of

navel-gazing yet to come. If I were at SNP HQ, I would not be concerned

about changing the system, I would look at the seats they failed to

win. The two the Lib Dems gained from the SNP and some that the

Conservatives took will stop have they maintain them, they might have

made it over the finishing line. Nicola Sturgeon said they won a

clear mandate, did they? I think they did within a proportional

system and we cannot expect them to get a majority most years and I

think they did tremendously well. I think we are losing a sense of

perspective. 1 million votes is what they manage to attract, half the

electorate. That is a stonking performance and we should not lose

sight of that, something the Labour Party did not achieve. Any party

would be thrilled to end up with the response the SNP got last night. To

be in such a strong position after nine years in government is nothing

short of remarkable. What difference is losing that overall majority

going to make to what the SNP can achieve? I think it will be

negligible. The majority they had when the old Scottish Parliament was

dissolved, it was marginal. One or two. It is getting quite late! It

was quite small. There will be a presiding officer and two people who

will take up the deputy presiding Officer positions. There is a fairly

good chance the SNP will be able to govern largely as they want to. What

will be interesting is whether the Greens can put pressure on from the

left. Just how organised opposition to them is from the Conservatives,

labour and the Lib Dems. One thing mentioned was the name to persons

legislation, something the Conservatives are dead against.

Labour came out kind of against in the election and the Lib Dems are

largely in favour. It will be interesting to see on those issues

whether the opposition parties will club together and try to change what

the SNP is doing. Some grumbling about the offensive behaviour, the

Football Act. James Kelly had a plan to introduce to repeal the offensive

behaviour of football acts. It remains to be seen how these parties

play the system. Do the Lib Dems apart from their usual hostility to

the SNP and seize the opportunity to be more relevant in terms of the

power play in parliament? How does Labour react to defeat? It is not

obvious even strategically how they will play the minority situation.

Potential for realignment. People are talking about Cabinet changes.

There have been interesting people coming into the scene. I am a health

specialist. Jeanne Freeman won for the SNP and she is a former health

board chair and architect of the National Clinical Strategy and being

tipped for significant jobs that might mean we see real action around

health in Scotland from within the parliament and that will be very

challenging then for the other parties. How do they position

themselves around that? Many thought the Scottish

Conservative leader was sticking her neck out somewhat,

as she confidently predicted the party she leads would overtake

Labour in this election. It wasn't only commentators who have

admitted to being taken aback. A couple of years ago, somebody came

to my office and said, Prime Minister, the Conservatives are

going to be the second biggest party in Scotland pretty soon. I would

have told them to go away, lie down, stop taking whatever they were

taking and come back and tell me what they really thought!

So how did the Tories manage to push Labour into third place?

Here's what their Scottish leader had to say about their campaign

We knew that they were going to build this huge, presidential style

campaign around Nicola, all the fans that said, I'm with Nicola, Nicola

for First Minister, all the rest of it. People were looking for somebody

to take on the colour sturgeon and the SNP. I make no concern about the

Gerina campaign -- Nicola Sturgeon. It was anybody who wanted me to do a

job for them, to be the stronger opposition and to hold the SNP to

account, to say no to a second referendum on independence and get

back to the day job, focus on schools and hospitals and public

sector and are, me. -- and our economy.

So a definite strategy from the Tories.

It is a bit rich hearing the presidential Ruth Davidson

criticised the presidential Nicola Sturgeon! I would imagine that it

came down to the people who were worried about a continued talk of a

referendum, there was only one place to put your vote if you were not for

that. And that would be with the Conservatives. Because the Labour

Party was confused, I think, about its position on that. Was

unsurprising? I can't think in recent times in Scotland while we

have been used to seeing Labour voters switched direction in such

numbers to the Conservatives. They might do it down south, but nothing

that we have seen here. I don't know if they did. It looks as if it is

ten points down for Labour and ten points up for the Tories, but

underneath the skin of these resulted is more complicated than

that. It may be different voters. If last night proved anything, it is

that we are in a new political landscape. The old kind of tribal

allegiances and alliances perhaps don't hold any more, because, you

know, there so many different opportunities now. One of the things

that struck me was the differences between for instance the

Conservatives north and south of the border, and the Labour Party north

and self of the border, how much more semidetached they felt and

whether they are heading for properly detached. Is it the roof

effect? Has she managed to detoxify the Tory brand north of the border

-- the roof effect. I remain sceptical, but we will see. Five

years ago, we had a campaign arguing for a range of different things. If

Nicola Sturgeon irritates you, and a good selection of the public do find

her irritating, there is somebody who is going to be rude to her, that

is quite compelling if that is your political outlook. There was also an

argument about the anxiety, that nationalists were in control of too

many could departments of political life in Scotland. That argument cut

through quite effectively, even with people who didn't actually agree

with their positions. But now that has gone, she has used her

independence referendum fears and threats to get herself into the

opposition spot, we're going to put Ruth Davidson under the microscope,

to see whether always people who voted for her or for the Tory

palsies which she is pushing. This is interesting. There has been a lot

of taunting of the SNP by the Conservatives in the last few

months, how you going to use these new powers at Holyrood, now that the

Tories are in opposition, are they going to have to come up with a bit

more detail about what they would like to see? I would certainly think

so, and I get the impression that Ruth Davidson is really going to

enjoy that role. It is extraordinary, I have been hearing

over the last day, people, you know, some people really wailing about,

you know, the Conservative advance in Scotland, talking about Margaret

Thatcher and what they remembered of those years. But actually, do you

know what, that is a long time ago now. And there are whole generations

of people for whom that is past history and that means nothing. It

is an opportunity to realign, do things differently. For those of us

long enough in the tooth, we will be watching very closely. Ruth Davidson

has called on the SNP to ruled out a second independence referendum. Is

she right to say, no majority, no mandate. I don't think so, but it

shows that the independence referendum is more important to the

political identity of Ruth Davidson than it is the Nicola Sturgeon. It

is largely off the table for the fuzzy ball future. We will test

whether Ruth Davidson has more to her than this fighting -- of the

table for the foreseeable future. Does it matter if it has got her

where it has got her? Well, it was a disastrous night

for Scottish Labour, Their leader insists she still has

a job to do, and there's no Clearly, though, voters didn't

like what they were offered from Labour, so where do

they go from here? This is what Kezia Dugdale had

to say to BBC News earlier today. What we've seen today is the result

of a timid campaign from the SNP, that they are back in power but with

no majority, an official opposition that will challenge them not to be

bolder and do more with the powers of government, but to do less and

cut more. I think it is the role of the Labour Party now in Scotland to

stand up and continue to make the case for how we can stop the cuts

using the powers of this parliament that lies behind me, make different

choices from the Tories to stand up for working people the length and

breadth of this country. Does that sound like

a winning strategy, Andrew? No it doesn't. This is an election

where we may well be seeing the strange death of Labour in Scotland,

I know it has been said the phrase is overused, but it is to see where

laser will -- where Labour will go from here. They are trapped between

two Mac monsters. It looks as if the situation, their substance has been

eaten away from the SNP in one hand and the Tories on the other. It

would be hard-hearted not to have human empathy for Kezia Dugdale

today. It was a devastating result for Labour in Scotland. I think it

is absolutely essential that buries a cold, hard clinical examination of

exactly what went wrong and wide -- that there is. It really is far too

early to predict the end of Labour in Scotland. Maybe I am a dinosaur,

but for me, you know, politics in Scotland, would it be healthy

without Labour there? Eight is an essential voice. They are promoting

redistribution of more radical tax policies, we have got to hear those

arguments in our parliament, or we are not hearing the whole picture.

Doesn't Andrew have a point, that the SNP is now clearly the

Independence party, the Conservatives are the defenders of

the union, how does Labour distinguish itself? This has been

the challenge, and these are the stools that has fallen between all

the way through this campaign. There has been no real position for Labour

as it stands at the moment in the political landscape I referred to

earlier. They have got to find their place, there must be a place for it.

I'm not sure it is. I don't say it with malice or cold-hearted nuts,

you have to see the human side of it, but I'm not sure that buries a

place for Labour in Scottish politics -- that there is. We have

the SNP against Ruth Davidson, testing her arguments about right

wing solution for this country. Where is the left on the right in

that? We have people further to the left in terms of the Green Party. In

the Constitution we have the withering of the Labour Party about

where they sit. It is very hard to see, unless they pick which monster

they go for, it is very hard to see how they survived muddling their way

through. You do have to feel for Kezia Dugdale, because she has run

in many ways are quite decent campaign, but it has been ghastly.

They did set out a very distinctive policy on tax. Is it all about the

constitution, or could it be simply that although Scottish the ball may

say in opinion polls that they support tax increases -- the

Scottish people. But they don't vote for them. At some point, we are

going to have to move away from this being a purely constitutional

discussion. Because frankly, there is a country to run for the next

five years, there are other challenges that we must face in the

meantime. Whether or not there is a referendum at some stage. My concern

would be that we need a plurality of discussion about the challenges and

the solutions to those challenges. And I personally think we would all

lose out if we didn't hear the widest possible spectrum of voices.

And I really hope that the people who represent Labour in Scotland,

diminished though they are today, are still able to contribute to that

debate. They certainly are. There are a small number of them, and we

were talking about potential deals early. There is significant overlap

between the SNP and Labour manifestos. In terms of Social

Security powers, for example, developing a humane system for those

living with disability. There is constructive efforts for that

behalf. The overall position of Labour in politics in this country

looks very, very difficult to sustain.

Well, the Greens enjoyed their most successful

Back then, they had seven MSPs elected, but they faced

a Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition government with a decent majority.

So this time round, with Nicola Sturgeon saying she'll

head a minority government, could the Greens' six MSPs find

At 21 years old, one of them, Ross Greer, will become

Here's what he had to say on the matter when asked

on Reporting Scotland this afternoon.

I think this parliamentary term is probably going to see the most

influential Green group. In the last term of parliament we worked really

well and put pressure on the SNP over fracking and got moratorium, we

can push that further and got back with a bang. This time it is about

tax and rent, being a much more progressive country. Tackling

inequality but raising money. This comes back to finances, that is one

thing that we are going to discuss. So, the Greens seem to think they'll

have some leverage at the table. They might, they might. You have do

emphasise that we have another minority government, and minority

government which has a far, far strong mandate than we had in the

first minority SNP government. During that time, they had to cobble

together a pretty big coalitions in the parliament to get anything done.

In this Parliament, all that Nicola Sturgeon needs is the Corporation of

one party, it could be the Greens or the Liberal Democrats or the Labour

Party, or God help us it could be the Conservative Party on some

issues. That perhaps undermines to some extent that confident diagnosis

and sent among some Green people that they are going to be holding

the whip hand, if you like. Nicola has a range of options, and if she

is smart, and we know she is produce Bart, she will play Holyrood like

affordable in terms of getting her agenda through. Do you think they

will exert influence over things like land reform and tax? There are

certainly eloquent and articulate people in there who know a lot about

this subject areas. Fracking certainly is going to come up at

some point, and the Greens will have a lot to say about that. Again, land

reform. But as use a, I think Nicola Sturgeon and her team will be

picking and choosing their fight -- as you say. And who they are going

to pull in on their side. But also there are deals to be done to get

support for those. There will be trade-offs in various directions.

What about the Liberal Democrats? Willie Rennie was very chipper

earlier, has he reasons to be cheerful? Yes and no I think is the

answers to that. He did stalking me well himself, -- he did well

himself. Holding the Northern Isles is great. But the list looked pretty

gruesome for them. They didn't do tremendously well back, they got a

single list member returned. This is a very, very male, pale and stale

Parliament we have just elected. In part because of the large number of

Tories we have seen elected. 50-50 representation is a long way off,

but the gender balance is the same as the last Parliament, we have more

work to do on that front. The Lib Dems are example of why you

shouldn't write of political parties too early. I mean, if you look at

the Orkney result for instance, the Liberal Democrat there won 31%, up

on his boat, which was a protest, arguably, against the SNP -- up on

his vote. The SNP in Orkney and their attacks on Alistair

Carmichael. Again, they have a role in our world and our political

world, and they will have a role for the next five years. One thing that

is good about this election is that Scotland isn't a 1-party state, it

has never been a 1-party state, this is not the Parliament or 1-party

state, it is a floral Parliament elected on a proportional system,

that is something that we should be pleased about -- ape April

Parliament. -- eight floral Parliament.

And that's it, after a remarkable 24 hours in Scottish politics.

So join him then, usual time.