The Edinburgh Reporter understands that Cllr Scott Arthur, the Labour councillor recently elected to Westminster, has now officially resigned from his elected position.
This will result in a by-election on 14 November 2024 to fill the vacancy in the three member ward of Colinton/Fairmilehead. The other councillors are Marco Biagi, a former SNP Minister, and Scottish Conservative Jason Rust at present.
The by-election has to be held within three months of the vacancy occurring, and the Returning Officer, Paul Lawrence, will choose the date. A public announcement will be made in due course.
The resignation will take effect on 16 September, when the council’s by-election machinery will begin.
Neil Cuthbert is standing as the Scottish Conservatives candidate, but other parties are yet to confirm their selections.
Dr Arthur now holds the Edinburgh South West seat, following in the footsteps of his former Labour colleague Alistair Darling who became Chancellor of the Exchequer. Scott has recently advised that he is one of the 20 successful applicants in the lottery to propose a Private Member’s Bill in parliament. Tracy Gilbert MP for Edinburgh North and Leith has also been successful in the ballot along with Wendy Chamberlain the LibDem MP for North East Fife and John Grady the Labour MP for Glasgow East.
He is one of 15 back bench MPs whose selection of legislation has a real chance of making it onto the statute books. There were 458 MPs who entered the ballot out of the 650 sitting MPs at Westminster. The choice is made by picking a number on a lottery ball and the results announced by the Clerk Assistant in the House of Commons, Sarah Davies.
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