Inverclyde & Renfrewshire West.

Inverclyde and Renfrewshire West is a western Scotland seat created on the 2023 boundaries, with an electorate of around 70,000 and a Census population near 90,000. Its median age of 47 sits above the national norm. The seat is unusual in straddling two local authorities: services are run by Inverclyde Council, which accounts for seven of its wards, and by Renfrewshire Council, which supplies a further two, both Scottish unitary authorities.

That divided geography is mirrored in a finely balanced politics. Across the most recent ward contests, Labour and the SNP each took ten wards, the Conservatives and independents trailing well behind, though those results date from 2022. The parliamentary picture is clearer: at the 2024 General Election, the first fought on these boundaries, Labour won on 46.9 per cent against the SNP's 31.1 per cent, a margin of roughly sixteen points. Martin McCluskey has held the seat for Labour since that contest, has shown no whipped dissent in recent months, and speaks most often on energy, the cost of living, and jobs.

On the figures available, the seat leans Labour at Westminster but rests on a ward map split evenly with the SNP, leaving its longer-term direction genuinely contested. Recent local coverage has had a broadly administrative character, dominated by council budgeting and regeneration work, with little of national reach. The 2024 result gives Labour a comfortable cushion, but the parity of the older ward contests cautions against reading it as fixed. For now the seat is best described as Labour-held and competitive rather than secure.