Local Government Candidates Survey 2022

3. Background Information

To date there has been limited information available on the demographics of candidates running for election in Scottish Local Government election. One area where there historically has been some evidence collected is in relation to the sex of candidates. Since 1999 data has been collected on the proportion of female candidates running for local government election however this has often relied on imperfect methods such as on names, knowledge of Returning Officers (RO's) and academic desk research. The data that is available shows that the proportion of female local government candidates rose by only four percentage points between 1999 and the 2017 election, from 26.8% to 30.5%.

With regards to protected characteristics beyond sex, it is recognized that such evidence is limited, or not available at all for some characteristics.

In terms of data that is available on these broader characteristics The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) produced a report on the diversity of candidates and elected officials in Great Britain^[1]. This drew on data from surveys of candidates at the 2016 Scottish Parliament election and 2017 local government elections as part of the cross-country Comparative Candidates Survey^[2]. The surveys ask standardised questions across a range of issues including campaigning and political views, but also collected data on age, disability, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation. Response rates to the surveys were 32% for Scottish Parliament candidates and 34% for local government candidates, so while valuable data was gathered, it is not known how representative the diversity data is of the national picture.

It should also be noted that the Welsh Government undertook a similar exercise to this survey with their own local government candidate survey at the time of the 2017 elections, achieving a response rate of 18%^[3].

Further background information providing a summary of demographic data that is currently available on local government candidates in Scotland can be found in the proposal document for this survey: Supporting documents - Diversity in political representation in Scotland: data improvement project proposal - gov.scot (www.gov.scot).