Tories put SNP's gas at a peep

While the Makerfield by-election result will be the one grabbing most of the headlines today, the outcomes of yesterday’s two Westminster by-elections in Scotland also merit more than passing interest.

Make no mistake, the Conservatives’ convincing win in Aberdeen South is a chastening defeat for the incumbent SNP and a very consequential victory for a party that badly needs to claw back support lost to Reform since 2024. After the Tories’ disastrous showing at last month’s Holyrood elections, where they lost sixty percent of their seats and were relegated to fifth place, this result shows that while they may be down, they are very far from out. They can still cause an upset when it matters. And if they can defeat the SNP in Scotland, in a seat where they came third in 2024, they can revive their electoral prospects in other parts of the UK too.

The Conservatives badly need to reassert their position as the natural home of right-wing voters. The emergence of Reform as serious electoral challengers has come mostly at the Conservatives’ expense, and in Scotland, that split vote has given the SNP a free pass in many first-past-the-post constituency contests.

Aberdeen South is a classic marginal seat that has changed hands frequently over recent decades, with a sophisticated electorate and a disproportionate number of voters whose livelihoods directly depend on Scotland’s contracting oil and gas sector. Conservative candidate Douglas Lumsden was out of the blocks well ahead of the pack. While other parties, including the SNP, were still dithering over candidate selection, Lumsden was setting the agenda, making the future of North Sea oil and gas the defining issue of the campaign.

The Conservatives were able to exploit the SNP’s diffidence on energy policy, exposing their weakness on the issue that matters most to the economic well-being of the region. While it’s easy to forget that it was the Conservatives who presided over much of the damage inflicted on the energy sector over the last decade, under Kemi Badenoch’s leadership, and with the luxury of opposition, the Conservatives have become born-again champions of the fossil fuel industry. Better a sinner that repents … it would be churlish to deny that they have secured a triumphant victory.

The SNP, meanwhile, really only has itself to blame. Their internal post-mortem will no doubt focus on the hubris of triggering an unnecessary contest, and the impact on weary voters of several weeks of headlines inspired by the Murrell scandal. But these were not defining issues. What the SNP really needs to understand is that their ambivalent, mealie-mouthed approach to energy policy just doesn’t cut it. John Swinney has tried to keep a lid on internal differences by bringing greater nuance to the SNP position, but the party has ended up sounding weak and inconsistent, arguing for transition, but doing too little to drive it forward.

The SNP’s unique selling point over the last fifty years has been that when push comes to shove, they will stand up for Scotland’s interests, but by failing to defend the North Sea and the sector that underpins Scotland’s industrial base – not just in the North-east, but right across the country — they are damaging the prospects for a meaningful energy transition, undermining their credibility as Scotland’s champions, and effectively abandoning the foundations of their own economic case for home rule.

In Arbroath and Broughty Ferry, the SNP secured a clear victory in what is a much safer seat. Lara Bird, a Westminster policy adviser and lawyer who grew up in the area, has been elected as the new MP to succeed Stephen Gethins. The Conservatives came a distant second, edging a close contest with Reform for second place by fewer than two hundred votes. That second place is important as it reinforces their status as the SNP’s most credible challengers. Even if the combined votes of Conservative and Reform would not have been enough to dislodge the SNP from this electoral stronghold this time around, establishing pole position for future contests has to be a key strategic objective for Kemi Badenoch’s party if they are to restore their electoral fortunes.