How YOUR tactical vote is key to the nation’s future: Part Three of our unmissable guide to beating the SNP

Deeply held party loyalties can be a difficult habit to break for many. Abandoning the party one has always voted for may well be a step too far for some.

But voting tactically for another party, however much of a wrench it seems, could prove decisive in blocking the SNP’s path to a Holyrood majority at the forthcoming election.

For those whose chief concern is fending off the Nationalist threat to the Union, a different approach may be necessary.

And that means, potentially, voting for a party you have never voted for, solely on the basis that it has the best chance of defeating the SNP.

Around a million Scots are expected to begin voting by post in the coming days, roughly a quarter of the electorate. To aid you in arriving at your decision, The Mail has produced a tactical voting guide covering every single seat in the country.

Today we look at Edinburgh and Lothian East, and South Scotland. While the SNP are defending large majorities in several seats, they are susceptible in others – such as East Lothian Coast where a slight swing to Labour could see them gain control.

The same is true in Edinburgh, where Labour or the Lib Dems could win through in a number of constituencies if voters back the candidate best-placed to defeat the Nationalists.

In South Scotland, the Conservatives need pro-Union voters to rally behind them to defend the constituencies they hold, while in the likes of Ayr the party could easily gain control if enough people choose to vote tactically, given the SNP is defending a tiny majority of just 170.

Be in no doubt that an SNP majority would plunge Scotland into another five wasted years of chaos, punitive taxation and shambling failure.

Tactical voting may well be the best way to prevent that nightmare scenario. The final part of our series will appear in tomorrow’s paper – providing a comprehensive analysis of how your vote can best be used to prevent a separatist majority.

EDINBURGH AND LOTHIAN EAST

East Lothian Coast and Lammermuirs

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 1,179

Second-placed: Labour

Previously one of the staunchest Labour seats at Holyrood, thanks to well-attended Labour social clubs across the former mining area, this seat first went to the SNP in 2021. Paul McLennan, who proved a hapless housing minister, is now defending a small majority against Labour’s Martin Whitfield, a former lawyer and primary teacher and is a good contender to take the seat back for Labour.

It won’t hurt that local MP Douglas Alexander is co-chair of Scottish Labour’s campaign.

Tactical vote: Labour

Edinburgh Central

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 4,732

Second-placed: Conservative

IF only they could both lose, Unionists may well mutter when looking at the big names in contention. Defending the seat is the SNP’s modesty-free Constitution Secretary Angus Robertson.

Against him, in the top target for the Greens, is former co-leader Lorna Slater whose party is desperate for a first constituency win.

A strong showing by the Greens could deny Robertson victory by splitting the Nationalist vote, as happened here in 2016, when Tory leader Ruth Davidson was the surprise winner. Hoping to come through the middle in a crowded 11-candidate field is Labour city councillor James Dalgleish.

Tactical vote: Labour

Edinburgh Eastern, Musselburgh and Tranent

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 10,117

Second-placed: Labour

A NEW seat mashed together from three others, with the biggest slice out of Edinburgh Eastern. Former Scottish Government minister Ash Regan won for the SNP in 2021 but then fell out with the party over gender reform.

After failing to become party leader she defected to Alba, then left that to be an Independent.

Though credited as a powerful women’s rights advocate, she leaves behind a messy legacy.

Trying to tip-toe around it for the SNP is Edinburgh councillor Kate Campbell. Well known in Labour circles as head of the Scottish Fabians think tank, Katherine Sangster is the key pro-Union alternative.

Tactical vote: Labour

Edinburgh North Eastern and Leith

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 11,569

Second-placed: Labour

CENTRED on Leith, this is one of the fastest growing and most painfully hipster parts of Scotland. Higher education minister Ben Macpherson is aiming for his third stint as its MSP. His majority looks good on paper, but Labour won the equivalent Westminster seat in 2024 by over-turning a bigger one.

NHS doctor Oliver Thomas is the political rookie trying to repeat the feat for Labour at Holyrood. Potentially hurting the SNP – and her own party – is loose cannon Green candidate Kate Nevens, already notorious in this election for demanding jails be abolished.

Tactical vote: Labour

Edinburgh North Western

Incumbent: Liberal Democrat

Majority: 9,885

Second-placed: SNP

A SEAT where the drama is in guessing Alex Cole-Hamilton’s margin of victory. The Scottish Lib Dem leader gained what was then Edinburgh Western in 2016 by less than 3,000 votes over the SNP. But he dug in and amassed the biggest haul in Scotland in 2021, collecting more than 25,500 votes, or 55 per cent of ballots cast.

Boundary changes have given him even more Lib Dem-friendly areas to mine. East Lothian councillor Lyn Jardine is his long-shot SNP rival, while Labour’s Irshad Ahmed is a non-starter who has been dogged by infighting and claims of selection ‘irregularities’.

Tactical vote: Liberal Democrat

Edinburgh Northern

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 11,569

Second-placed: Labour

A BLEND of three seats rooted in the plusher parts of the old Edinburgh Northern & Leith.

Although the SNP won that constituency in 2021, the council elections in 2022 saw the Lib Dems beat them in the area covered by the redrawn seat.

Next-door to Alex Cole-Hamilton’s base, this is a top target for the Lib Dems, with Edinburgh city councillor Sanne Dijkstra-Downie their candidate. Fellow councillor Euan Hyslop is running for the SNP, while Labour have turned to charity worker Eleanor Ryan-Saha after the suspension of former MSP Foysol Choudhury over alleged misconduct.

Tactical vote: Liberal Democrat

Edinburgh South Western

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 3,897

Second-placed: Conservative

FORMERLY Edinburgh Pentlands, this seat has been in Nationalist hands since 2011, when SNP bruiser Gordon MacDonald snatched it from ex-Scottish Tory leader David McLetchie.

MacDonald’s retirement from Holyrood leaves Simita Kumar, combative leader of the SNP group on Edinburgh Council, defending it. But it’s a shaky majority and Labour won the Westminster equivalent from the SNP’s Joanna Cherry, KC, in 2024.

Labour’s candidate is former EU competition lawyer Catriona Munro, who narrowly lost a council by-election last year, but now has a good shot at Holyrood.

Tactical vote: Labour

Edinburgh Southern

Incumbent: Labour

Majority: 4,022

Second-placed: SNP

Boundary changes make this a jumpy race for Labour incumbent Daniel Johnson, whose old seat has been halved and mixed with three others, including a slab of working-class Edinburgh Eastern.

He is aided by having Labour’s former Scottish Secretary Ian Murray, the party’s sole survivor of the 2015 SNP tsunami, as the area’s canny MP.

Also helping is a scandal over original SNP candidate Sally Donald, who quit over an alleged £20,000 benefits fraud and became a poster girl for Nationalist entitlement. Former Leith MP Deidre Brock is her eleventh-hour replacement.

Tactical vote: Labour

Midlothian North

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 7,906

Second-placed: Labour

THE oldest MSP who is seeking re-election to Holyrood, Colin Beattie is no stranger to controversy. As SNP treasurer he was arrested and quizzed during the police probe into the party’s finances but not charged.

His determination to stand again led to infighting and claims of using cash to sway the selection, after he promised to ensure the campaign was ‘sufficiently funded’ if he was picked as the candidate.

Taking him on is Labour policy wonk Caitlin Stott, who is buoyed by the fact the overlapping Midlothian seat at Westminster has swapped between SNP and Labour at the last four elections, with Labour winning in 2024.

Tactical vote: Labour

SOUTH SCOTLAND

Ayr

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 170

Second-placed: Conservative

A TORY stronghold, this seat was first won by the SNP in 2021 – but only barely. Siobhan Brown’s 170-vote majority is the smallest at Holyrood. The dour community safety minister now faces an uphill task defending it.

Tory challenger Sharon Dowey has plenty of voter gripes to highlight, not least anti-social behaviour in Ayr high street and the woeful ferry service from Troon in the north of the seat to Arran.

Tactical vote: Conservative

Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 4,337

Second-place: Conservative

LABOUR for the first three Scottish parliaments and SNP for the next three, this former mining seat was last represented by drugs minister Elena Whitham.

But she is quitting after a single term at Holyrood. The SNP have parachuted in Dumfries & Galloway Council deputy leader Katie Hagmann, a senior figure in local government group Cosla, as their candidate. Labour gained the Westminster seat here in 2024 from third place on a monster 20 per cent swing from the SNP. Former list MSP Carol Mochan is aiming for another win in May.

Tactical vote: Labour

Clydesdale

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 4,578

Second-placed: Conservative

SNP incumbent Màiri McAllan will be fighting extra hard to hang on in Clydesdale. The Housing Secretary is tipped as a future party leader after John Swinney’s time ends, and losing the seat would be an awkward blot on her CV.

Hoping to frustrate her is Labour’s Lynsey Hamilton, chair of education on South Lanarkshire Council. Much of the seat is within the Tory-voting Westminster constituency of Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale, but Labour is seen as having the best chance of upsetting McAllan’s applecart.

Tactical vote: Labour

Dumfriesshire

Incumbent: Conservative

Majority: 4,066

Second-placed: SNP

THIS huge seat, which runs from the Solway Firth north to the Ayrshire coalfields, has been won by the Tories in the last two elections, but not comfortably.

Oliver Mundell’s majority over the SNP was a tense 1,230 in 2016 and a still sweaty 4,000 in 2021. His stepping down in May sees capable Tory finance spokesman Craig Hoy stepping up in his place.

His SNP challenger is Dumfries & Galloway Council leader Stephen Thompson. Potentially helping the SNP is independence- supporting Reform UK candidate David Kirkwood, who threatens to split the vote and let Thompson snatch victory.

Tactical vote: Conservative

East Kilbride

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 8,672

Second-placed: Labour

THE SNP may be firefighting scandals Scotland-wide, but Labour also has a few as well. In East Kilbride, MP Joani Reid recently gave up the Labour whip after her husband was arrested on suspicion of spying for China.

Lurid claims about her private life followed. But the eyebrow- raising headlines haven’t deterred Labour candidate Joe Fagan, energetic leader of South Lanarkshire Council.

His SNP opponent is lacklustre incumbent Collette Stevenson, who was last year reportedly put on a list of deadwood MSPs by senior SNP figures.

Tactical vote: Labour

Ettrick, Roxburgh and Berwickshire

Incumbent: Conservative

Majority: 6,863

Second-placed: SNP

MAKING up most of the Border with England and home to the historic market towns of Hawick, Jedburgh and Kelso, this vast seat knows the value of the Union.

Liberal Democrat-held for two terms, it has been in Conservative hands since 2007.

Scottish Tory deputy leader Rachael Hamilton is the incumbent fighting for a third term as its MSP. Her SNP opponent is arch Nationalist John Redpath, founder of Yes Berwickshire, who says a majority of SNP and Green MSPs at Holyrood would be a mandate for another referendum.

Tactical vote: Conservative

Galloway and West Dumfries

Incumbent: Conservative

Majority: 2.635

Second-placed: SNP

THE southernmost seat in Scotland has been Tory for most of devolution, with the SNP only winning it once in 1999.

But the Conservative wins since have never been easy, with majorities always below 3,500 and once below 100. So former farmer Finlay Carson is going flat out in his re-election campaign.

A key issue is the SNP failure to upgrade the A75, the east-west lifeline between Stranraer and Dumfries.

Plodding SNP loyalist Emma Harper is his challenger, while Reform’s Senga Beresford, who has backed Tommy Robinson and the deporting of British Muslims, risks splitting the anti-SNP vote.

Tactical vote: Conservative

Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 4,582

Second-placed: Labour

THE scene of the only by-election in the last Scottish parliament, it was won in 2021 by the SNP’s much-missed Christina McKelvie. Her death from cancer last year saw her party lose by 602 votes to Labour’s Davy Russell in a major upset for John Swinney.

The contest also marked the arrival of Reform in Scottish politics, as the party came a close third. The likeable Russell, who seemed to win by knowing all of Hamilton, is standing again. SNP apparatchik Alex Kerr, the party’s national secretary, is his Nationalist challenger.

Tactical vote: Labour

Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 11,681

Second-placed: Labour

A SEAT that has endured two of the biggest non-entities yet seen at Holyrood, Labour’s Margaret Jamieson and SNP backbencher Willie Coffey. With Coffey standing down, the SNP are fielding the area’s ex-MP Alan Brown, who lost to Labour at the general election after a crushing 22 per cent swing against him.

Labour’s choice is globe-trotting Killie boy Ewan McPhee, a former policy adviser in Brussels and to the New Zealand government. A diverse CV also includes a stint as a charity volunteer in Uganda living on £1 a day.

Tactical vote: Labour

Midlothian South, Tweeddale and Lauderdale

Incumbent: SNP

Majority: 6,826

Second-placed: Conservative

ALTHOUGH large parts of the seat, which includes Galashiels and Melrose, are represented by a Tory MP, so far it has always been Liberal Democrat or SNP-held at Holyrood. Since 2011, the formidable Christine Grahame has been its MSP, but she is stepping down after 27 years in parliament.

Hoping to replace her is Calum Kerr, who lasted two years as a local MP before voters kicked him out in 2017. The Conservative candidate is former Borders councillor and businessman Keith Cockburn, who has been campaigning against plans for a 96-kilometre pylon line through the Borders.

Tactical vote: Conservative