Conservatives could make gains in Scotland, says senior MSP

A senior Scottish Tory MSP has claimed his party could make gains in Scotland.

Speaking to journalists at the Perth election count on Thursday, Murdo Fraser said the exit poll was in “two parts”, with voters south of the border “looking for a change”, while those in Scotland were voting against the SNP.

The joint BBC/Sky/ITV poll suggested the Tories would drop to 131 seats, with Labour on course for a landslide with a 170-seat majority.

The SNP, however, were forecast to drop to just 10 seats – dropping from 48 in the 2019 election.

“The exit poll clearly is in two parts, you’ve got the situation south of the border which very much is in line with polling, what we expected,” said Mr Fraser.

“Clearly people are casting a verdict on 14 years of Conservative government, five prime ministers, and the country was looking for a change.

“The situation in Scotland, clearly, is a very different one because it looks like people are actually making up their minds how to vote based primarily on a verdict on 17 years of the SNP in government and clearly have not liked what they have seen from the SNP and they’re up for an even bigger change, potentially, in Scotland.

“It does look like, on the basis of the exit poll, the Conservatives might not just be looking to hold the seats we have in Scotland but actually might make gains.”

But Mr Fraser’s party chairman Craig Hoy warned against using the UK-wide exit poll to predict results in Scotland.

Speaking to the BBC from the Glasgow election count, he said: “I think all of our seats are going to be very, very close in Scotland.”

Asked about analysis of the exit poll pointing to possible Tory gains in Scotland, he said: “I think we should be very cautious about taking a UK-wide exit poll and trying to extrapolate something in Scotland from it.”