South Ayrshire by-election, 1970

The South Ayrshire by-election of 19 March 1970 was held after the death of Labour Member of Parliament (MP) Emrys Hughes on 18 October 1969. The seat was retained by the Labour Party.

In what was a fairly common occurrence at the time the Scottish Liberal Party did not run a candidate for the by-election. However, in this case the move had been in part instigated by former party leader Jo Grimond who had privately mooted the idea of an electoral pact with the Scottish National Party. Whilst Grimond's idea was rejected by the Scottish Liberal Party as they opposed Scottish independence they did nonetheless agree to give the SNP a free run in this instance.^[1]

Results

South Ayrshire, 1970^[2]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Labour	Jim Sillars	20,664	52.68	-14.57
	Conservative	Christopher Graves	9,778	24.93	-7.82
	SNP	Sam Purdie	7,785	19.85	N/A
Majority			10,886	27.75	-6.75
Turnout			39,227
	Labour hold		Swing

References

↑ Michael McManus, Jo Grimond: Towards the Sound of Gunfire, Edinburgh, 2001, p. 308
↑ "1969 By Election Results". Archived from the original on 2012-03-14. Retrieved 2015-08-27.

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1966	July: Carmarthen

1967	March: Glasgow Pollok Nuneaton Rhondda West Honiton April: Brierley Hill September: Cambridge Walthamstow West November: Hamilton Leicester South West Manchester Gorton West Derbyshire

1968	March: Kensington South Acton Dudley Meriden Warwick and Leamington June: Oldham West Sheffield Brightside Nelson and Colne July: Caerphilly October: Bassetlaw November: New Forest

1969	March: Brighton Pavilion Walthamstow East Weston-super-Mare April: Mid Ulster May: Chichester June: Birmingham Ladywood October: Glasgow Gorbals Islington North Newcastle-under-Lyme Paddington North Swindon December: Louth Wellingborough

1970	March: Bridgwater South Ayrshire

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