It was revealing to hear the SNP leadership speak of working with other parties at Holyrood while ruling out any arrangement involving Reform. The obvious question is why they are running so scared of them. Perhaps it is because Reform candidates are capable of asking searching questions, as many come from Main Street and the real world rather than the insulated political bubble dominating Holyrood.
The urgency for Reform stems from the SNP again emerging as the largest party despite years of failed policies and growing public frustration. Nearly two decades after devolution, Holyrood feels increasingly detached from the taxpayers and workers who fund it.
Too many MSPs have little meaningful experience outside politics, yet wield enormous influence over legislation and public spending. In the real world it takes years to build a business, master a trade or become a professional. In politics, however, party loyalty too often matters more than competence.
I hope Reform Scotland pushes for a strict three-term limit for MSPs. That would halt career politicians in their tracks and help return Holyrood to serving ordinary Scots. Those who genuinely want Holyrood to survive and thrive should hope Reform acts as a Trojan Horse into this protected political bastion, bringing positive change regardless of which party is represented in the Scottish Parliament.
Ian Lakin, Aberdeen.
Read more letters
- Any chance we could now see consensus? Or is that just a dream?
- Consensus is needed, not another independence referendum
- So you voted yesterday? Be proud of your good intentions
Beware English nationalism
While I am in agreement with Dr Gerald Edwards (Letters, May 11) that the latest election results do not necessarily imply Scotland is ready for an independence vote, if Nigel Farage eventually becomes PM I would be happy to put money on Scotland wanting to leave the UK within a year of his election.
Reform’s right-wing agenda does not sit well with many north of the Border. Nigel Farage is a populist leader looking for the main chance and as such is unlikely to deliver any of the meaningful change he promises.
Wales, for the first time in decades, has abandoned Labour and voted in Plaid Cymru. This could well be the start of the break-up of the UK. A Reform government would almost certainly accelerate this process. English nationalism is much more likely to cause a break-up of the UK than the actions of the devolved governments.
Ian Smith, Troon.
Continuing the damage
I strongly suspect that many of the people who supported Brexit then went on to cast their vote for Liz Truss in the Conservative leadership contest. Disillusioned with the Tories, a significant number have now given a huge boost to Reform in the recent election.
I would like to ask these people a simple question: good God folks, have you not inflicted enough damage on our poor country?
Alan Harrow, Campbeltown.
How to end tactical voting
George Rennie (Letters, May 11) correctly argues that, with a combined vote share of some just 42%, there can be no case for the SNP and Greens to claim that the election result shows that there is a sustained majority for independence in Scotland and thus a case for another referendum. The pro-independence majority of MSPs is not the result of how Scotland voted. It is down to the use of the first-past-the post electoral system used to elect the constituency MSPs.
In an election where there are at least six electorally credible parties in the race, the first-past-the post system it little better than a lottery. To see how it distorts the results, you only have to look at the results for the SNP and Scottish Labour at the last two Westminster elections and at this year’s Holyrood election.
In 2021 the SNP ended up with 81% of Scotland’s MPs with just a 45% vote share. In 2024 its vote share fell to 30% but its share of MPs collapsed to 16%. This year it won in 78% of the constituencies with just 38% of the votes. So it went from being grossly overrepresented to grossly underrepresented and now back to grossly overrepresented.
Over the two Westminster elections Scottish Labour went from winning just 2% of the MPs, with a 19% share, to 65% of MPs on a 36% vote share. And last week it won just 4% of the constituencies with its 19% vote share.
The first-past-the post electoral system must be ditched for the election of our Westminster MPs and of our Holyrood constituency MSPs. Ideally, both parliaments should be elected by the Single Transferable Vote system with multi-member constituencies (the number of MPs/MSPs per constituency being adjusted to reflect geographical realities).
But if this is rejected, a small but worthwhile improvement for Holyrood would be to elect the constituency MSPs by the Alternative Vote system where the successful candidate would have to accumulate at least 50% of the votes plus one. Last week two constituency MSPs were elected with just under one-third of the votes. With AV voting they might have accumulated enough second/third/etc preference votes to get elected, but they might well not.
Such a change would end the need for tactical voting. The share of first preference votes cast in each region for each party could even be used to share out the regional list seats to provide an as proportional as possible overall regional result. And the selection of regional list MSPs for each party could be from lists of their unelected constituency candidates listed in order of the percentage of the vote they achieved in their constituency.
Alistair Easton, Edinburgh.
• Stan Grodynski’s letter (May 12) makes a poor argument in promoting democracy. In my opinion no referendum should be valid without a two-thirds majority in favour of change. In this way it is possible that 51% of the electorate will be in favour of change.
The Brexit and Scottish independence referendums were flawed and should not have been held in the way they were. The Brexit referendum resulted in less than 40% of the electorate changing our constitution which in my opinion is not democratic. By all means promote an independence referendum but aim for two-thirds majority in favour which may result in more than 51% of the electorate supporting change.
Charles Scott, Edinburgh.
Tell us about the candidates
Holyrood costs Scottish taxpayers a lot of money. Recent events have highlighted the apparent lack of scrutiny concerning the selection of some candidates. MSPs are elected to serve the people of Scotland, at a not inconsiderable cost. This is a privilege but it appears some political parties are being somewhat elastic with the criteria they are using for selecting candidates.
There must be an urgent overhaul of just who can stand for this important role and the public must have information about exactly who they are voting for, even on the list vote. Leaving it up to parties to just add almost anyone to the list is not in the public interest.
Politicians owe a duty to the public that some appear to be disregarding. No one is saying that candidates should be excluded. We simply need to know, in some depth, about them first. This is not unfair, it is necessary to avoid Holyrood being brought into disrepute. The public cannot be expected to continue to fund a parliament that is not open, transparent and working for all, not just small pressure groups.
Dr Gerald Edwards, Glasgow.
Voicing discontent
That a made-up political party was yet again allowed to deliberately mimic the Scottish Greens' name and branding to siphon votes raises serious questions about the robustness of our electoral law.
Independent Green Voice ran no campaign to speak of, yet took nearly 2,500 votes in Mid Scotland and Fife – more than enough to deny the Scottish Greens a second seat in that region.
This is not a peripheral matter. The Electoral Commission was alerted to an identical problem at the 2021 election and failed to act. Now it has happened again. It's a democratic outrage.
Whatever one's view of the Scottish Greens as a party, the principle at stake here transcends politics: voters must be able to trust that the name on the ballot paper represents who they think it does. When that trust is exploited for tactical ends by those with no intention of mounting a genuine campaign, democracy itself is diminished.
The Electoral Commission must be given the tools – and the will – to prevent this. If its leadership is unwilling to act, then Gillian Mackay's call for the chief executive's resignation deserves to be taken not only seriously, but demanded by the very political system it claims to represent.
Shaun Milne (Former Communications Manager, Scottish Greens), Kinross.
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