The second election to

Lothian Regional Council Lothian (; sco, Lowden, Loudan, -en, -o(u)n; gd, Lodainn ) is a region of the Scottish Lowlands, lying between the southern shore of the Firth of Forth and the Lammermuir Hills and the Moorfoot Hills. The principal settlement is the Sc ...

was held on 6 May 1982 and yielded a swing to the Conservatives. Whilst the Labour presence was reduced, the Conservatives were unable to win an outright majority, and both parties exited the election with 22 seats. The council Conservative group, under Brian Meek, was able to take over the council however due to support from the SDP-Liberal Alliance councillors. Turnout was 47.6%, giving the Lothians the highest regional turnout rates in the

1982 Scottish regional elections Regional elections were held in Scotland on Thursday 6 May 1982, as part of the wider 1982 United Kingdom local elections. Whilst the 1982 elections saw the Conservatives hold up relatively well in England, the Tories did comparatively poorly i ...

. The turnout was also an increase of 3.7% on the turnout for the 1978 elections.https://www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/1842/9136/1983_6_Towards%20a%20four%20party%20system.pdf;jsessionid=27E104652661E4C136096D50BE13D81B?sequence=1 p.74

Background

The Lothian Regional Council had been a key battleground in a fierce ideological battle between a new, younger generation of radical left-wing Labour activists elected in the 1980 election, and the incumbent Thatcherite Conservative government. In a precursor to the

Rate-capping rebellion The rate-capping rebellion was a campaign within English local councils in 1985 which aimed to force the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher to withdraw powers to restrict the spending of councils. The affected councils were almost all r ...

, several Scottish councils had refused to implement spending cuts necessitated due to a cut in funding from George Younger, the then

Secretary of State for Scotland The secretary of state for Scotland ( gd, Rùnaire Stàite na h-Alba; sco, Secretar o State fir Scotland), also referred to as the Scottish secretary, is a Secretary of State (United Kingdom), secretary of state in the Government of the Unit ...

. Lothian in particular had seen its funding cut to the tune of £47 million in July 1981. The Labour leader of Lothian Regional Council; John Mulvey, pursued a policy of resisting the cuts, and claimed that Labour had a popular mandate to protect jobs and services through increasing local expenditure. The Lothian council, alongside the councils of certain other Scottish regions, planned spending above government guidelines. Younger responded by cutting the Lothian budget by a further £30 million, and the council caved in to pressure.

Aggregate results

278,772

Ward results

References

*Scottish Regional Elections 1982: Results and Statistics; J.M. Bochel and D.T. Denver {{United Kingdom local elections, 1982

Lothian Lothian (; sco, Lowden, Loudan, -en, -o(u)n; gd, Lodainn ) is a region of the Scottish Lowlands, lying between the southern shore of the Firth of Forth and the Lammermuir Hills and the Moorfoot Hills. The principal settlement is the Sco ...

1982 Events January * January 1 – In Malaysia and Singapore, clocks are adjusted to the same time zone, UTC+8 (GMT+8.00). * January 13 – Air Florida Flight 90 crashes shortly after takeoff into the 14th Street bridges, 14th Street Bridge in ...

May 1982 events in the United Kingdom