Scottish local elections, 1980

Scottish local elections, 1980

1 May 1980 (1980-05-01)

First party Second party   Leader James Callaghan Margaret Thatcher Party Labour Conservative Leader since 5 April 1976 11 February 1975 Seats won 469 232 Seat change 34   Third party Fourth party   Leader Gordon Wilson David Steel Party SNP Liberal Leader since 1979 7 July 1976 Seats won 52 33

Colours denote the winning party with outright control

There were elections for the Scottish district councils in 1980.

These were the third elections held to the 53 district councils established by the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973. The previous elections had been held in 1977. The elections took place a year after the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher had come to power. The local elections, which also took place in England and Wales, were seen as the first electoral test of the Thatcher ministry.^[1]

Background

The poll was held on 1 May and all 1,182 district council seats were to be filled.^[2] Districts formed the second tier in local government in Scotland under the 1975 reorganisation, with regional councils forming the upper tier. It was intended that elections would normally take place on a four-year cycle. Regional elections were also to be on a four-year cycle, held midway between district elections.

Party performance

Labour had a very good electoral performance, more than regaining the ground they had lost at the 1977 elections. They gained 18 councils: 3 from the Scottish National Party, one from Liberals and 14 from no overall control. Notable gains were the cities of Aberdeen, Dundee and Glasgow.^[3] The Conservatives suffered the loss of Edinburgh but held another six councils. The SNP vote collapsed and they lost control of the three councils they controlled. In a number of councils all of the party's sitting councillors were defeated, most notably in Glasgow where they lost all 16 seats they held. The Liberal Party lost the only council they controlled.^[3]

Summary of the 1980 Scottish District local council election results^[4]

Results by council area

The seats on each council before and after the election were as follows:^{[2] [3]}

Borders

Central

Dumfries and Galloway

Fife

Grampian

Highland

‡ Changes in ward boundaries

Lothian

‡ Changes in ward boundaries

Strathclyde

Tayside

References

Elections and referendums in Scotland
Scottish elections	Pre-1707 1999 2003 2007 2011 2016 Next
UK elections	1801 co-option 1802 1806 1807 1812 1818 1820 1826 1830 1831 1832 1835 1837 1841 1847 1852 1857 1859 1865 1868 1874 1880 1885 1886 1892 1895 1900 1906 1910 (Jan) 1910 (Dec) 1918 1922 1923 1924 1929 1931 1935 1945 1950 1951 1955 1959 1964 1966 1970 1974 (Feb) 1974 (Oct) 1979 1983 1987 1992 1997 2001 2005 2010 2015
Local elections	1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1977 1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1995 1999 2003 2007 2012 2017
Referendums	1979 1997 2014
Local referendums	Scottish licensing referendums Strathclyde (water) 1994 Edinburgh (congestion charge) 2005
See also: Elections in the Kingdom of Scotland (Pre-1707) Great Britain (1707–1800) United Kingdom Politics of Scotland

(1979 ←) United Kingdom local elections, 1980 (→ 1982)
Metropolitan boroughs	Barnsley Birmingham Bradford Bolton Bury Calderdale Coventry Doncaster Dudley Gateshead Kirklees Knowsley Leeds Liverpool Manchester Newcastle North Tyneside Oldham Rochdale Rotherham Salford Sandwell Sefton Sheffield Solihull South Tyneside St Helens Stockport Sunderland Tameside Trafford Wakefield Walsall Wigan Wirral Wolverhampton
District councils (England)	Adur Amber Valley Barrow-in-Furness Basildon Basingstoke and Deane Bassetlaw Bath Blackburn Brentwood Broadland Broxbourne Burnley Cambridge Cannock Chase Cherwell Chester Chorley Colchester Congleton Craven Crawley Crewe and Nantwich Daventry Derby East Devon Eastbourne Eastleigh Ellesmere Port and Neston Elmbridge Epping Forest Fareham Gillingham Gloucester Gosport Great Grimsby Great Yarmouth Halton Harlow Hart Hartlepool Hastings Havant Hereford Hertsmere Huntingdon Hyndburn Ipswich Leominster Lincoln Macclesfield Maidstone Milton Keynes Mole Valley Newcastle-under-Lyme North Hertfordshire Norwich Nuneaton and Bedworth Oadby and Wigston Oxford Pendle Penwith Peterborough Preston Purbeck Reigate and Banstead Rochford Rossendale Rugby Runnymede Rushmoor Scunthorpe Shrewsbury and Atcham South Bedfordshire South Cambridgeshire South Herefordshire South Lakeland Southampton Southend-on-Sea St Albans Stevenage Stoke-on-Trent Stratford-on-Avon Swale Tamworth Tandridge Thamesdown Three Rivers Thurrock Tonbridge and Malling Tunbridge Wells Watford Welwyn Hatfield West Lancashire West Lindsey West Oxfordshire Weymouth and Portland Winchester Woking Wokingham Woodspring Worcester Wyre Forest York
District councils (Scotland)	Aberdeen Angus Annandale and Eskdale Argyll and Bute Badenoch and Strathspey Banff and Buchan Bearsden and Milngavie Berwickshire Caithness Clackmannan Clydebank Clydesdale Cumbernauld and Kilsyth Cumnock and Doon Valley Cunninghame Dumbarton Dundee Dunfermline East Kilbride East Lothian Eastwood Edinburgh Ettrick and Lauderdale Falkirk Glasgow Gordon Hamilton Inverclyde Inverness Kilmarnock and Loudoun Kincardine and Deeside Kirkcaldy Kyle and Carrick Lochaber Midlothian Monklands Moray Motherwell Nairn Nithsdale North East Fife Perth and Kinross Renfrew Ross and Cromarty Roxburgh Skye and Lochalsh Stewartry Stirling Strathkelvin Sutherland Tweeddale West Lothian Wigtown