I notice that in the June 2009 elections to the European Parliament, UKIP got 5.23% of the Scottish vote. While not enough to elect any Members of the European Parliament, parties have had Members of the Scottish Parliament elected on smaller shares of the vote.
UKIP's vote is not evenly distributed, but a breakdown by local authority area is available, and the Boundary Commission for Scotland has the breakdown of electoral regions by local authority areas.
Now, not all local authority areas remain in one electoral region - Argyll & Bute; East Lothian; Midlothian; and Moray are each split across two regions and South Lanarkshire across three. When this happens, I assume that each party's vote is evenly spread across the local authority area.
So, what would the result of the May 2011 Scottish election be if the regional vote was the same as the 2009 European?
For each region, I only list parties getting over 5% of the vote.
Begin with Glasgow, where the Scottish National Party won 5 constituencies and Labour 4.
Labour and the Greens would each get 2 additional MSPs, while the SNP, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats get 1 each.
Hence, in Glasgow, Labour would have 6 MSPs, the SNP 6, the Greens 2, the Conservaives 1 and the Liberal Democrats 1.
Labour achieve their highest share of the vote in this region, while both the Conservatives and the UK Independence Party (on 3.97%) get their lowest share of the vote.
Next it's Highlands & Islands, where the Scottish National Party won 6 constituencies and the Liberal Democrats 2.
The Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives would each get 2 additional MSPs, while Labour, the Greens and UKIP get 1 each.
Hence in Highlands & Islands, the SNP would have 6 MSPs, the Liberal Democrats 4, the Conservatives 2, Labour 1, the Greens 1 and UKIP 1. The Liberal Democrats and UKIP each achieve their highest share of the vote in this region, while Labour gets its lowest share of the vote.
Next is Lothian, where the Scottish National Party won 8 constituencies and Labour 1.
Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats would each get 2 additional MSPs, while the Greens gets 1.
Hence in Lothian, the SNP would have 8 MSPs, Labour 3, the Conservatives 2, the Liberal Democrsts 2 and the Greens 1.
The Greens achieve their highest share of the vote in this region, while the SNP gets its lowest share of the vote.
Now on to Scotland Central, where the Scottish National Party won 6 constituencies and Labour 3.
Labour and the Conservatives would each get 2 additional MSPs, while the Liberal Democrats, Greens and UKIP get 1 each.
Hence in Scotland Central, the SNP would have 6 MSPs, Labour 5, the Conservatives 2, the Liberal Democrats 1, the Greens 1 and UKIP 1.
The Liberal Democrsts and Green each get their lowest share of the vote in this region.
Next it's Scotland Mid & Fife, where the Scottish National Party won 8 constituencies and Labour 1.
The Conservatives would get 3 additional MSPs, Labour 2, while the Liberal Democrats and the Greens would get 1 each.
Hence in Scotland Mid & Fife, the SNP would have 8 MSPs, Labour 3, the Conservatives 3, the Liberal Democrats 1 and the Greens 1.
Now on to Scotland North East, where the Scottish National Party won all 10 constituencies.
The Conservatives would get 3 additional MSPs, Labour 2, while the Liberal Democrats and the Greens would get 1 each.
Hence in Scotland North East, the SNP would have 10 MSPs, the Conservatives 3, Labour 2, the Liberal Democrats 1 and the Greens 1.
The Scottish National Party achieves its highest share of the vote in this region.
Next Scotland South, where the Scottish National Party won 4 constituencies, the Conservatives 3 and Labour 2.
The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats would each get 2 additional MSPs, while Labour, UKIP and the Greens would get 1 each.
Hence in Scotland South, the Conservatives would have 5 MSPs, the SNP 4, Labour 3, the Liberal Democrats 2, UKIP 1 and the Greens 1.
The Conservatives achieve their highest share of the vote in this region.
Finally Scotland West, where the Scottish National Party won 6 constituencies and Labour 4.
The Conservatives would get 3 additional MSPs, the Liberal Democrats 2, and the Greens and UKIP getting 1 each.
Hence in Scotland West, the SNP would have 6 MSPs, Labour 4, the Conservatives 3, the Liberal Democrats 2, the Greens 1 and UKIP 1.
For Scotland overall, the result would be:
In this scenario, the SNP would be 11 seats short of the 65 needed for an overall majority - however, after the May 2007 election they chose to govern as a minority with only 47 MSPs. A coalition with the Greens would bring them up to 63.
And the only alternative - a Labour/Liberal Democrat/Green coalition - would be 4 seats behind the SNP.
Of course, in reality, the 2011 election was unusual, with the SNP winning 53 constituencies - the same as Labour did in the inaugural election of May 1999. But in 1999, Labour did poorly on the regional side of the election, and only got 3 additional MSPs (all in Highlands & Islands). In 2011, the SNP dominated the regional side, picking up additional MSPs in every region apart from Lothian.
Secondly, 2009 and 2011 are different elections. Not just for different elected bodies but from different eras. 2009 was the fag-end of an exhausted Labour government, while 2011 took place as part of a national backlash against a Conservative/Liberal Democrat government.
However, this does show that if UKIP repeats its European share of the vote, then it should get a few MSPs.
As a coda, 2009 might be electorally closer to the 2007 election, in that they both happened during a Labour government on its last legs. If we take the notional 2007 constituency results, we come up with something slightly different:
An SNP/Liberal Democrat/Green coalition would have an overall majority of just 1.
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