On Thursday 9 June 1983, the 1983 United Kingdom general election was held in Scotland, to elect all 650 members of the House of Commons, with 72 constituencies being in Scotland.

As a result of the third periodic review of Westminster constituencies undertaken by the Boundary Commission for Scotland the number of seats representing Scotland had increased by one to 72 constituencies from the 71 contested between the general elections in 1955 and 1979.Third Periodical Report, Boundary Commission for Scotland, HMSO, 1983 ()

When combined with results from across the United Kingdom, the election saw the Conservatives winning a landslide victory, improving on their 1979 result and achieving their best results since 1935. Although there was a slight drop in their share of the vote, they made significant gains at the expense of Labour. This was at odds with the Scottish result, as Labour remained by far the largest party in Scotland.

Candidates

Below is a table summarising the candidates of the 1983 general election in Wales.

Affiliation CandidatesLabour Party 72Conservative Party 72Scottish National Party 72Liberal Party 36Social Democratic Party 36Ecology Party 11Communist Party of Great Britain 10Workers Revolutionary Party 2British National Party 1Animal Rights Anti-Vivisection 1Independent Conservative 1Total 314

Analysis

The Labour, Conservative and Scottish National parties all sustained modest losses in vote share to the SDP–Liberal Alliance. The Labour Party won 41 seats, with the Conservative Party winning 21, the Alliance winning eight and the Scottish National Party winning two. The Scottish Conservatives have been unable to match their 1983 Westminster seat total since, although they did record a slightly larger share of the Scottish vote in 2017.

Results +PartySeatsAggregate votes Total Gains Losses Net Of total (%) Total Of total (%) Change (%)   Labour 41 0 4 4 56.9 990,654 35.1 6.5   Conservative 21 0 1 1 29.2 801,487 28.4 3.0   SDP–Liberal Alliance 8 5 0 5 11.1 692,634 24.5 15.5 5 2 0 2 6.9 356,224 12.6 3.6 3 3 0 3 4.2 336,410 11.9 11.9   SNP 2 0 0 2.8 331,975 11.8 5.5   Ecology Party 0 0 0 — 3,854 0.1 0.1   Communist 0 0 0 — 3,223 0.1 0.1   Workers Revolutionary 0 0 0 — 262 0.0   BNP 0 colspan ="3" — 103 0.0   Ind. Conservative 0 colspan=3 — 249 0.0   Animal Rights Anti-Vivisection 0 colspan=3 — 139 0.0 Total 72 0 100.0 2,824,580 100.0 0.0 Registered voters, and turnout 72.7 4.1

See also 1983 United Kingdom general election in England 1983 United Kingdom general election in Northern Ireland 1983 United Kingdom general election in Wales List of MPs for constituencies in Scotland (1983–1987)

Notes

References