THE SNP have won a seat from Scottish Labour in a by-election in East Ayrshire.
Councillor Caroline Barton has been elected to represent Kilmarnock North. Cllr Barton was elected at stage eight under the single transferable vote system, with the SNP candidate picking up 758 first preference votes.
Scottish Labour's Greg MacKenzie picked up 582 of the total first preferences, while independent candidate Ian Grant managed 277 votes.
Reform UK came forth, with Sandra Kirkwood scoring 212 first preferences, beating out the Tories' Allan MacDonald’s 159 votes.
The lowest scoring candidate was Stephen McNamara, who managed two votes. McNamara is a political activist who ran under a libertarian platform.
This by-election was called following Scottish Labour's Cllr Maureen McKay passing away late last year.
McKay had been leader of the Labour group on the council and had been serving for 21 years.
Kilmarnock North (East Ayrshire) by-election, first preferences: SNP: 748 (35.8%, -11.8) Labour: 582 (27.8%, -0.1) Ind Grant: 277 (13.2%, +5.1) Reform UK: 212 (10.1%, new) Conservative: 159 (7.6%, -6.2) Green: 75 (3.6%, new) Lib Dem: 37 (1.8%, new) Ind McNamara: 2 (0.1%, new) SNP elected stage 8.[image or embed]
— Ballot Box Scotland (@ballotbox.scot) 20 February 2025 at 23:27
Congratulating the new councillor, the First Minister John Swinney said on Twitter/X: “Perfect start to the Scottish Labour Conference.”
The SNP also congratulated the councillor on Twitter/X.
The turnout was 21.7%, down by 18.7% from the last council election held in the area.
This election result comes as the Scottish Labour Conference kicks off today in Glasgow. Leader Anas Sarwar has recently been under fire from unions over his stance on LGBT+ issues and the closure of the Grangemouth oil refinery.
BREAKING NEWS : @theSNP WIN Kilmarnock North by-election. Well done to Cllr Caroline Barton and her team. Perfect start to the Scottish Labour Conference. https://t.co/hVc5G4NNAL
— John Swinney (@JohnSwinney) February 20, 2025
The trade union Unite has accused both the Labour and Scottish governments of being “on the verge of colluding in a catastrophe”, with the oil refinery set to close as early as May.
The union is planning on laying 400 yellow hard hats outside of the entrance to the conference on Friday, each representing a job lost at Grangemouth.
