Labour facing worst result in Holyrood history

Scottish Labour is facing its worst electoral performance ever at Holyrood, according to early indications from counts across the country.

The party began its 2016 campaign trailing behind the SNP in the polls, and fighting the Scottish Conservatives for second place.

The prospect of a third-place finish follows the disastrous result for the party in last year's general election.

Labour won just one seat in that ballot, suffering huge losses at the hands of Nicola Sturgeon's SNP.

The first declarations for the Holyrood vote point to a swing away from Labour to the Tories, with suggestions Kezia Dugdale's party may fail to win any seats in its former heartland of Glasgow.

The SNP's Clare Haughey has won Rutherglen from Labour's James Kelly, while Stewart McMillan took Greenock and Inverclyde, again from Labour.

Elsewhere, Jackson Carlaw of the Conservatives won Eastwood from Labour's Ken Macintosh, who finished third behind the SNP.

Recriminations over what went wrong for Labour have already begun.

Former Labour MP Thomas Docherty said: The indications tonight and indeed from the opinion polls are that we are now fighting with the Conservative Party for second place.

The swing that we have seen tonight has been away from Labour and towards the Conservative Party.

And the indications we are seeing already is that something like seven out of 10, perhaps three-quarters of Scots who have gone to the polls tonight, have voted for a centre or a centre-right party.''

Mr Docherty pointed to Labour's tax policy, adding: The hard reality the Labour Party faces is that when you stand on a platform that promises to raise taxes for everyone earning over #20,000 - an unambiguously socialist platform that calls for the scrapping of Trident amongst other things, and with the UK leader we have, there is a correlation clearly with the fact that our support is going down perhaps even falling below one in five tonight and the Conservative vote at the same time going up.

And someone once described - very famously - the 1983 manifesto as the longest suicide note in history and if you bring it up to date, frankly, the manifesto we stood on is self-immolation for dummies.''

• Electionlive