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Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross County constituency
Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross shown within Scotland
Created:	1997
MP:	John Thurso
Party:	Liberal Democrats
Type:	House of Commons
Council areas:	Highland
EP constituency:	Scotland

Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross is a constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom (Westminster). It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.

Contents 1 Boundaries 1.1 Local government area 2 Members of Parliament 3 Election results 3.1 2005 3.2 2001 3.3 1997 4 Notes and references 5 See also

The constituency was created in 1997 by merging Caithness and Sutherland with an area from Ross, Cromarty and Skye. The rest of Ross, Cromarty and Skye was merged into another new constituency, Ross, Skye and Inverness West.

In 1999 a Scottish Parliament (Holyrood) constituency was created with the name and boundaries of the Westminster constituency.

In 2005 the Westminster constituency was enlarged slightly, to include a small area from Ross, Skye and Inverness West. The rest of the latter was divided between two new constituencies, Ross, Skye and Lochaber and Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey.

For representation at Holyrood, therefore, the area of the Westminster constituency is now divided between two constituencies, Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (the Holyrood constituency) and Ross, Skye and Inverness West (the Holyrood constituency).

See also Politics of the Highland council area

Since it was created in 1997 the constituency has been one of three covering the Highland council area. Since 2005 the other two have been Ross, Skye and Lochaber and Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey. From 1997 to 2005 the other constituencies of the council area were Ross, Skye and Inverness West and Inverness East, Nairn and Lochaber. Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross is the most northerly of the constituencies, and it now has the Ross, Skye and Lochaber constituency on its southern boundary.

Highland council area Shown as one of the council areas of Scotland

In 2005 the Highland Council had eight management areas, Badenoch and Strathspey, Caithness, Inverness, Lochaber, Nairn, Ross and Cromarty, Skye and Lochalsh and Sutherland, and each was represented by an area committee. The management area and area committee structure dated from 1996, when the council itself had been creaated. The management areas had the boundaries of the districts of the Highland region, as abolished in 1996. In 1999 however, ward boundaries were redrawn but management areas were unaltered, and therefore area committees ceased to represent exactly the areas for which they were named and for which they took decisions.

As enlarged in 2005, the Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross constituency covered 23 out of the 80 wards of the council area: all ten wards of the Caithness area committee, all six wards of the Sutherland area committee and seven (Alness and Ardross, Invergordon, Ferindonald, Rosskeen and Saltburn, Seaboard, Tain East and Tain West) out of the 18 wards of the Ross and Cromarty area committee.

Ward boundaries were redrawn again, this year, 2007, and the management areas were abolished in favour of three new corporate management areas. The new areas consist of groups of the new wards, and boundaries are similar to those of the Westminster constituencies, as defined in 2005. Two areas, the Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross area and the Ross, Skye and Lochaber area, have the names of Westminster constituencies. The name of the third area, the Inverness, Nairn, and Badenoch and Strathspey area, is very similar to that of the third constituency.

The most recent general election of the Highland Council was this year, 2007, and its current political commposition is as follows:

34 independent councillors

22 Liberal Democrat councillors

17 Scottish National Party councillors

7 Labour Party councillors

The current convener of the council is an independent councillor and the current vice-convener is a Scottish National Party councillor.^[1]

• John Thurso, Liberal Democrat (2001−present)
• Robert Adam Ross Maclennan, Liberal Democrat (1997−2001)

Note: The constituency was slightly enlarged in 2005. Therefore +/- percentages are somewhat notional.

General Election 2005: Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal Democrat	John Thurso	13,957	50.5	+11.9
	Labour	Alan Jamieson	5,789	20.9	−3.4
	Scottish National Party	Karen Shirron	3,686	13.3	−7.0
	Conservative	Angus Ross	2,835	10.2	−3.3
	Independent	Gordon Campbell	848	3.1	+2.3
	Scottish Socialist Party	Luke Ivory	548	2.0	−0.2
Majority			8,168	29.5
Turnout			27,663	59.1	−2.0
	Liberal Democrat hold		Swing	+7.6

General Election 2001: Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal Democrat	John Thurso	9,041	36.4	+0.8
	Labour	Michael Meighan	6,297	25.3	−2.5
	Scottish National Party	John MacAdam	5,273	21.2	−1.8
	Conservative	Robert Rowantree	3,513	14.1	+3.3
	Scottish Socialist Party	Karn Mabon	544	2.2	(+2.2)
	Independent	Gordon Campbell	199	0.8	(+0.8)
Majority			2,744	11.1
Turnout			24,867	60.2	−9.8
	Liberal Democrat hold		Swing

General Election 1997: Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal Democrat	Robert Maclennan	10,381	35.6	N/A
	Labour	James Hendry	8,122	27.8	N/A
	Scottish National Party	Euan Harper	6,710	23.0	N/A
	Conservative	Tom Miers	3,148	10.8	N/A
	Referendum Party	C. Ryder	369	1.3	N/A
	Scottish Green Party	J. Martin	230	0.8	N/A
	UK Independence	M. Carr	212	0.7	N/A
Majority			2,259		N/A
Turnout				70.2	N/A

1. ^ Top Two Elected At The Highland Council, Highland Council news release

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