Scottish Conservatives
The Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party, known as the Scottish Conservatives or the Scottish Tories, is part of the UK Conservative Party active in Scotland. It currently holds 5 of the 57 Scottish seats in the House of Commons, 28 of the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament, and comprises 176 of Scotland's 1,226 local councillors.. The Scottish Conservative party has no separate Chief Whip at Westminster.
The party's policies in Scotland usually promote conservatism and the continuation of Scotland's role as part of the United Kingdom.
The party's policies promote conservatism and a pro-union position supporting Scotland continuing to be part of the United Kingdom. The Leader of the Scottish Conservative Party is Russell Findlay who was elected to the role in September 2024.
The party campaigns in elections to the UK Parliament, Scottish Parliament and local government.
The party evolved in its present structure from the Unionist Party which existed from 1912 to 1965, combining elements from the pre-1912 Conservative Party in Scotland and the Liberal Unionists. Gradually entering local government from the 1960s, the party replaced previous local groupings of Progressives and Moderates.
The party faced a decline in the latter half of the 20th century, reaching an electoral low-point in the 1997 UK election and returning no Members of Parliament. This was followed by a period of partial recovery in the 2017 election to hold 13 seats - and declining in subsequent elections.
From the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 as part of a process of devolution, the party fielded candidates resulting in 18 Scottish Conservative Members of the Scottish Parliament elected in the parliament's first election. In the 2016 election, the Scottish Conservatives replaced Scottish Labour as the second-largest party and largest opposition grouping, growing from 16 to 31 seats - a position they maintained in the 2021 election.
History
Scottish Conservatism pre-1912
Before 1912, the Conservative Party operated in Scotland. With the emergence of mass party political groups in the second half of the 19th century, distinct organisations emerged in Scotland. The voluntary party organisation, the National Union of Conservative Associations for Scotland, emerged in 1882, creating a distinct Conservative conference in Scotland.A previous organisation, the Scottish National Constitutional Association, existed from 1867, with the patronage of UK party leader Benjamin Disraeli. The Scotsman newspaper reported that following the 1874 election "Conservative Clubs and Working Men's Conservative Associations have spring up like mushrooms in all parts of ".
From the Representation of the People Act 1884 until 1918, the Liberal Party was the dominant political force in Scotland, operating in a largely two-party system with the Scottish Conservatives. In 1886, the Liberal Unionists had broken away from the Liberal Party in opposition to William Gladstone's proposals for Irish Home Rule. Joint Liberal Unionist and Conservative candidates were run across the United Kingdom, but with the organisations of these parties remaining separate.
The Unionist Party (1912–1965)
Following the merger of the Conservatives and Liberal Unionists to create the modern Conservative and Unionist Party in England and Wales, a committee was formed of the National Union of Conservative Associations for Scotland and regional Liberal Unionist associations which recommended a merger in Scotland. This was agreed in December 1912, creating the Scottish Unionist Association and the Unionist Party.From 1918 and through the 1920s, the Labour Party became more prominent, displacing the Liberals as one of the two main parties in Scottish politics. The Unionist Party had a number of electoral successes, topping the poll in Scotland in a number of elections from the 1930s to 1950s. During the period of its existence, the Unionist Party produced two Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom – Bonar Law and Alec Douglas-Home – and uniquely among parties in the post-war period, achieved more than half of the popular vote within Scotland in the 1931 general election and 1955 general election. The majority of the vote achieved in these two General Elections was combined with the National Liberal Party who later merged with the Conservative and Unionist Party in 1968 alongside the Unionist Party which had already merged into the Conservative and Unionist Party in 1965.
While taking the Conservative whip in the House of Commons, the Unionist Party had a lengthy "unionist-nationalist" tradition, emphasising its Scottish identity within the United Kingdom and the British Empire. This was represented by elected members such as John Buchan and those former Unionists who in 1932 founded the pro-home rule Scottish Party.
Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
Following a decline in performance, coming second to the Labour Party in seats though first in votes at the 1959 general election and both votes and seats at the 1964 general election, the Unionist Party proposed a number of reforms which involved amalgamation with the Conservative and Unionist Party in England and Wales – taking place in 1965. The modern Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party, as part of the wider UK Conservative Party, came into existence from this point.However its electoral fortunes continued to decline throughout the 1960s. Following Harold Wilson's failure to obtain a Labour majority in February 1974, a second general election was held in October of the same year which saw the party decline to below 25% of the vote and drop from 21 seats to 16. At the same time, the SNP were to gain an unprecedented 11 MPs, unseating a number of Conservative MPs in rural constituencies.
The party's fortunes recovered somewhat in 1979 under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher, but her tenure as Prime Minister was to see the party's fortunes drop further from holding 22 seats in 1979 to 10 in 1987. The party increased its share of the vote and number of MPs to 11 in 1992 under John Major's leadership before dropping to 17.5% of the popular vote and failing to have any MPs returned from Scotland in 1997. It continued to return only a single MP from Scottish constituencies at the 2001, 2005, 2010 and 2015 general elections, before winning 13 seats in 2017.
Following the 2010 general election performance, the party commissioned a review under Lord Sanderson of Bowden to consider the party's future organisation. The Sanderson Commission's report recommended a single Scottish leader, reforms to governance and constituency structures, the creation of regional campaigning centres, greater focus on policy development and a new membership and fundraising drive.
Scottish devolution
The party's commitments to a devolved Scottish Assembly were to decline under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher. Previously the party had offered some support for a Scottish Assembly, including in the so-called Declaration of Perth in 1968 under UK party leader Edward Heath. John Major, while endorsing further powers for the Scottish Grand Committee and the Scottish Office did not support a devolved parliament. With the Labour Party's victory in 1997, referendums on devolution were organised in Scotland and Wales, both receiving agreement that devolved legislatures should be formed.In 1999, the first elections to a devolved Scottish Parliament were held. Following the Conservatives electoral wipe-out in Scotland in 1997, devolution provided the party with a number of parliamentary representatives in Scotland. Less than a year following the first Scottish Parliament election, a 2000 by-election was held in the Ayr constituency with John Scott winning the seat from Labour.
In the party leadership elections in 2011, the previous deputy leader Murdo Fraser proposed disbanding the party and creating a new Scottish party of the centre-right, similar to the previous Unionist Party and compared this arrangement to the relationship between the Christian Social Union in Bavaria and the Christian Democratic Union in Germany. The move was opposed by the other three candidates. Victory went to the newly elected MSP Ruth Davidson who suggested that she would oppose further devolution beyond the new powers proposed by the Calman Commission.
The party was one of the three main Scottish political parties to join in the Better Together campaign opposing Scotland becoming independent in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. Although a Conservative majority government was returned in Westminster in the 2015 general election, David Mundell remained their only MP elected in Scotland and was appointed Secretary of State for Scotland. He replaced Liberal Democrat incumbents who served during the 2010–15 Coalition government. The UK Government set about implementing the recommendations of the cross-party Smith Commission.
Recent elections
2011 Scottish Parliament election
led the party into the 2011 Scottish Parliament election, having successfully campaigned in budget negotiations with the minority SNP Scottish Government for a number of concessions over the 2007–11 Scottish Parliament. This had resulted in commitments to 1,000 extra police officers, four-year council tax freeze and £60m town regeneration fund.The election saw the SNP win a majority and the Scottish Conservatives were reduced from 17 seats to 15, losing the Edinburgh Pentlands constituency to the SNP, seeing notional loses in Eastwood and Dumfriesshire to Labour. Following the election, Annabel Goldie resigned as leader and a leadership election was held in November 2011 – the first to appoint a Leader of the Scottish Conservatives, rather than the Scottish Parliament group, as required by the Sanderson Commission. Ruth Davidson was returned, beating the original front-runner and former deputy leader Murdo Fraser.
Davidson drove forward a number of the Sanderson Commission's reforms, including replacing the party's Banyan tree logo with a "union saltire".