Moray West, Nairn & Strathspey.

Moray West, Nairn and Strathspey stretches across the northern edge of the Scottish Highlands, a large and largely rural seat of some 98,659 residents with a median age of 47, older than the national figure. No single town dominates: Elgin anchors the eastern end, with Forres and Nairn strung along the coastal plain and Badenoch and Strathspey reaching south into the Cairngorms. It is a network of small towns and scattered villages rather than an urban centre. Two authorities run local services here, both Scottish council authorities -- Moray Council, which holds five of the seat's wards, and Highland Council, which holds two -- making this a cross-council seat by construction.

That divided local geography is reflected in a fragmented party picture. Across the 25 most recent ward contests, the Conservatives took nine and the SNP seven, with independents winning six and Labour and the Greens trailing -- though those results date to 2022 and predate the current parliamentary boundary. At Westminster the seat was first contested on these lines in 2024, when the SNP's Graham Leadbitter won on 32.1 per cent, ahead of the Conservatives on 30.0 -- a margin of barely two points. Leadbitter has registered no whipped dissent in the past 90 days, and his recorded contributions have leaned toward the economy, energy and defence.

On the figures available the seat looks genuinely contested rather than settled: a two-point parliamentary margin sits atop a ward map split between two parties and a substantial independent presence. Recent local coverage has had a service-and-infrastructure character, tending toward questions of housing, schools and the retreat of high-street banking rather than partisan drama. Council direction-of-travel is hard to read cleanly given the cross-authority arrangement and the age of the ward results, but neither the local nor the parliamentary picture points to a comfortable hold for any single party. The standing implication is a seat in flux, where a narrow 2024 result and a divided council base leave the next contest open.