Elections to Clackmannanshire Council took place on 5 May 2022 on the same day as the 31 other Scottish local government elections. As with other Scottish council elections, it was held using single transferable vote (STV) – a form of proportional representation – in which multiple candidates are elected in each ward and voters rank candidates in order of preference.
For the third consecutive election, the Scottish National Party (SNP) were returned as the largest party with nine seats but remained shy of an overall majority. Labour gained back some of the ground they had lost at the previous election and were again returned as the second-largest party with five seats. The Conservatives lost 40 per cent of their seats to return three councillors while the Greens their first seat in a Clackmannanshire election.
The minority SNP administration retained control of the council with incumbent council leader Cllr Ellen Forson re-elected to the post. Cllr Donald Balsillie was elected Provost and Cllr Phil Fairlie was selected as the council's first convener.
Background
Previous election
At the previous election in 2017, the Scottish National Party (SNP) again won the most seats and governed with a minority administration having returned eight councillors. Labour were on the end of heavy losses as their number fell from eight to five as they became the second largest party. The Conservatives made a net gain of four to hold five seats.
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Electoral system
The election used the five wards created under the Local Governance (Scotland) Act 2004, with 18 councillors being elected. Each ward elected either 3 or 4 members, using the single transferable vote (STV) – a form of proportional representation – electoral system where candidates are ranked in order of preference.
Composition
The only change to the composition of the council came in March 2018 when Conservative councillor Chris Dixon resigned from the party and sat as an independent. Three by-elections were held and resulted in two SNP holds and a Conservative hold.
Retiring councillors
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Candidates
The total number of candidates increased from 35 in 2017 to 36. The SNP again stood the most candidates at nine, however this was two less than they had fielded in 2017. Similarly, the number of Labour candidates was less than 2017 with eight candidates standing across the five wards – one fewer than 2017. The Conservatives stood six candidates – up one from 2017 – while the Greens also contested every ward standing five candidates – the same number as they had in 2017. The number of Liberal Democrats standing (three) was one fewer than in 2017 and the number of independent candidates (three) increased by two. For the first time, the Alba Party contested an election in Clackmannanshire as they stood two candidates.
Result
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Note: Votes are the sum of first preference votes across all council wards. The net gain/loss and percentage changes relate to the result of the previous Scottish local elections on 4 May 2017. This is because STV has an element of proportionality which is not present unless multiple seats are being elected. This may differ from other published sources showing gain/loss relative to seats held at the dissolution of Scotland's councils.
Ward summary
|- class="unsortable" align="centre" !rowspan=2 align="left"|Ward !% !Cllrs !% !Cllrs !% !Cllrs !% !Cllrs !% !Cllrs !rowspan=2|TotalCllrs |- class="unsortable" align="center" !colspan=2|SNP !colspan=2|Lab !colspan=2|Con !colspan=2|Green !colspan=2|Others |- |align="left"|Clackmannanshire West |bgcolor="#efe146"|43.6 |bgcolor="#efe146"|2 |26.8 |1 |22.8 |1 |4.0 |0 |2.7 |0 |4 |- |align="left"|Clackmannanshire North |bgcolor="#efe146"|41.4 |bgcolor="#efe146"|2 |18.7 |1 |21.9 |1 |5.7 |0 |12.3 |0 |4 |- |align="left"|Clackmannanshire Central |bgcolor="#efe146"|43.5 |bgcolor="#efe146"|2 |34.7 |1 |17.3 |0 |4.5 |0 |colspan="2" |3 |- |align="left"|Clackmannanshire South |bgcolor="#efe146"|37.9 |bgcolor="#efe146"|2 |23.1 |1 |16.5 |0 |19.5 |1 |3.0 |0 |4 |- |align="left"|Clackmannanshire East |30.8 |1 |19.6 |1 |bgcolor="#add8e6"|37.3 |bgcolor="#add8e6"|1 |6.3 |0 |6.0 |0 |3 |- class="unsortable" class="sortbottom" !align="left"|Total !39.4 !9 !23.8 !5 !23.2 !3 !8.4 !1 !5.2 !0 !18 |}
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Seats changing hands
Below is a list of seats which elected a different party or parties from 2017 in order to highlight the change in the political composition of the council from the previous election. The list does not include defeated incumbents who resigned or defected from their party and subsequently failed re-election while the party held the seat.
