Claims in local and nationwide media that Ferguslie Park has elected a Conservative Councillor ‘is nothing short of lazy and ill-informed journalism’ according to a local Councillor.
Hours after the result news reports online reported that Ferguslie, named in a Scottish Government report to be the most deprived community in Scotland, elected a Conservative councillor even though there is no Ferguslie council ward.
SNP Councillor, Kenny MacLaren, who won a seat on Ward 4 Paisley North West said: “Journalists, who probably couldn’t find Paisley let alone Ferguslie on a map, started to issue stories such as ‘Ferguslie elects a Tory councillor’.” However Ward 4, Paisley North West is a large Ward, as well as covering Ferguslie, it also covers some of the most deprived in Renfrewshire like the West End of Paisley and Shortroods. It also covers some of the richest areas like Castlehead and Oakshaw.
In the last few elections, the area has always had a large Conservative vote.
Kenny MacLaren said: “As the council election results started to get announced on Friday 5th May, there seemed to be an inordinate surprise that a Tory was elected in ward 4, Paisley Northwest. Journalists, who probably couldn’t find Paisley let alone Ferguslie on a map, started to issue stories such as ‘Ferguslie elects a Tory councillor’.
“However, as is so often the case – particularly with the mainstream media in Scotland – this was just another example of fake news. There is no Ferguslie council ward. There hasn’t been one since before the multimember wards were introduced in 2007. You would have thought journalists covering local council elections would have been aware of this simple fact.
“Paisley Northwest is the largest council ward in Paisley and covers a wide area ranging from the Bascule Bridge in Renfrew to Paisley town centre. There is a wide range of diverse communities within this ward including Ferguslie, the west end of Paisley, Shortroods, Gockston, Millarston, Castlehead and Oakshaw.
“Castlehead and Oakshaw, in particular, includes some of the most affluent, and expensive housing in Renfrewshire never mind Paisley.
“The voting pattern within this ward since 2007 has always included a significant Tory vote – although admittedly it did suffer, along with the Lib Dems, in the 2012 council election. To those of us who campaign regularly in this area we were well aware of the potential of a Tory councillor being elected.”
News outlets also reported that there was a mixup with similar candidate names and that voters may have voted for the wrong person.
Kenny said: “There was also talk about two candidates having the same name and that may have confused voters. However, this ward has always had independent candidates and they often achieve a similar level of votes as happened this time. There is also the same probability that Tories voted for the wrong candidates as well as supporters of the independent candidate voting for the Tory.
“The key issue in Paisley Northwest’s results was the SNP being the clear winner in this ward. Both SNP candidates were elected early on, in stage 1 and stage 2 of the count. It took until stage 8 before Labour could even gather enough votes to get one candidate elected and it was not until stage 10 before the Tory candidate eventually beat the other Labour candidate. The SNP took 43% of all first preference votes compared to only 27% for Labour and a paltry 13% for the Tories.”
With four seats up for grabs in Ward 4, Kenny’s wife Mags MacLaren also took a seat for the SNP with the other seat going to Labour’s Karen Kennedy.
Main Photo: Google Earth