| Election Name: | 2017 East Ayrshire Council election |
| Type: | parliamentary |
| Ongoing: | no |
| Previous Election: | 2012 East Ayrshire Council election |
| Previous Year: | 2012 |
| Next Election: | 2022 East Ayrshire Council election |
| Next Year: | 2022 |
| Seats For Election: | All 32 seats to East Ayrshire Council |
| Majority Seats: | 17 |
| Registered: | 94,375 |
| Turnout: | 44.9% |
| Leader1: | Douglas Reid |
| Party1: | Scottish National Party |
| Leaders Seat1: | Kilmarnock West and Crosshouse |
| Seats Before1: | 15 |
| Seats1: | 14 |
| Seat Change1: | 1 |
| Popular Vote1: | 16,023 |
| Percentage1: | 38.5 |
| Swing1: | 1.0% |
| Leader2: | Maureen McKay |
| Party2: | Scottish Labour Party |
| Leaders Seat2: | Kilmarnock North |
| Seats Before2: | 14 |
| Seats2: | 9 |
| Seat Change2: | 5 |
| Popular Vote2: | 10,456 |
| Percentage2: | 25.2 |
| Swing2: | 16.2% |
| Leader3: | Tom Cook |
| Party3: | Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party |
| Leaders Seat3: | Kilmarnock West and Crosshouse |
| Seats Before3: | 2 |
| Seats3: | 6 |
| Seat Change3: | 4 |
| Popular Vote3: | 10,066 |
| Percentage3: | 24.2 |
| Swing3: | 12.9% |
| Leader4: | Sally Cogley |
| Party4: | The Rubbish Party |
| Leaders Seat4: | Irvine Valley |
| Seats Before4: | 0 |
| Seats4: | 1 |
| Seat Change4: | 1 |
| Popular Vote4: | 784 |
| Percentage4: | 1.9 |
| Swing4: | New |
| Leader5: | N/A |
| Party5: | Independent (politician) |
| Seats Before5: | 1 |
| Seats5: | 2 |
| Seat Change5: | 1 |
| Popular Vote5: | 3,347 |
| Percentage5: | 8.9 |
| Swing5: | 1.3% |
| Council Leader | |
| Before Election: | Douglas Reid (SNP) |
| Before Party: | No overall control |
| Posttitle: | Council Leader after election |
| After Election: | Douglas Reid (SNP) |
| After Party: | No overall control |
Elections to East Ayrshire Council took place on 4 May 2017 on the same day as the 31 other Scottish local government elections. As with other Scottish council elections, it was held using single transferable vote (STV) – a form of proportional representation – in which multiple candidates are elected in each ward and voters rank candidates in order of preference.
For the second consecutive election, the Scottish National Party (SNP) were returned as the largest party with 14 seats but remained shy of an overall majority. Labour lost further ground but were again returned as the second-largest party with nine seats. The Conservatives made several gains to return six councillors while The Rubbish Party – standing in their first election – won their first seat. Two independent candidates were also elected.
The SNP took over control of the council as a minority administration having previously run the council in coalition with the Conservatives following the previous election in 2012.
Source: [1]
Note: "Votes" are the first preference votes. The net gain/loss and percentage changes relate to the result of the previous Scottish local elections on 3 May 2012. This may differ from other published sources showing gain/loss relative to seats held at dissolution of Scotland's councils.[2] [3]
| Seat | 2012 | 2017 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Member | Party | Member | ||||
| Annick | SNP | Eoghann MacColl | SNP | Gordon Jenkins | |||
| Ward increased from 3 to 4 | Conservative | John McFadzean | |||||
| Kilmarnock North | SNP | Elaine Cowan | Conservative | Ian Grant | |||
| Kilmarnock East and Hurlford | Labour | Gordon Cree | Labour | Barry Douglas | |||
| Labour | Drew McIntyre | Conservative | Jon Herd | ||||
| Kilmarnock South | SNP | Hugh Ross | SNP | Claire Maitland | |||
| Irvine Valey | Conservative | John McFadzean | The Rubbish Party | Sally Cogley | |||
| SNP | Bobby McDill | Ward decreased from 4 to 3 | |||||
| Ballochmyle | SNP | Stephanie Primrose | SNP | Claire Leitch | |||
| Labour | David Shaw | Conservative | Alyson Simmons | ||||
| Cumnock and New Cumnock | Labour | William Menzies | SNP | Jim McMahon | |||
| Labour | Eric Ross | Conservative | Walter Young | ||||
| SNP | Kathy Morrice | SNP | Jacqui Todd | ||||
| Doon Valley | Labour | Moira Pirie | Independent | Drew Filson | |||
|- class="unsortable" align="centre"!rowspan="2" style="text-align:left;"|Ward!%!Cllrs!%!Cllrs!%!Cllrs!%!Cllrs!%!Cllrs!%!Cllrs!%!Cllrs!rowspan=2|Total
Cllrs|- class="unsortable" style="text-align:center;"!colspan=2|SNP!colspan=2|Labour!colspan=2|Conservative!colspan=2|Rubbish!colspan=2|Green!colspan=2|Libertarian!colspan=2|Independents|-|align="left"|Annick|32.32|1|13.51|1|bgcolor="lightblue"|36.77|bgcolor="lightblue"|1|colspan=2 |4.42|0|0.11|0|12.83|1|4|-|align="left"|Kilmarnock North|bgcolor="#efe146"|49.79|bgcolor="#efe146"|1|23.13|1|25.96|1|colspan=2 |colspan=2 |1.09|0|colspan=2 |3|-|align="left"|Kilmarnock West and Crosshouse|bgcolor="#efe146"|40.59|bgcolor="#efe146"|2|23.49|1|31.27|1|colspan=2 |3.84|0|1.09|0|colspan=2 |4|-|align="left"|Kilmarnock East and Hurlford|bgcolor="#efe146"|45.14|bgcolor="#efe146"|2|26.35|1|21.6|1|colspan=2 |colspan=2 |0.78|0|6.1|0|4|-|align="left"|Kilmarnock South|bgcolor="#efe146"|54.65|bgcolor="#efe146"|2|32.89|1|11.71|0|colspan=2 |colspan=2 |0.73|0|colspan=2 |3|-|align="left"|Irvine Valley|bgcolor="#efe146"|36.29|bgcolor="#efe146"|1|16.75|1|19.88|0|16.94|1|colspan=2 |0.3|0|9.8|0|3|-|align="left"|Ballochmyle|bgcolor="#efe146"|30.96|bgcolor="#efe146"|2|28.87|1|20.1|1|colspan=2 |colspan=2 |0.32|0|13.22|0|4|-|align="left"|Cumnock and New Cumnock|30.74|2|bgcolor="#eea2ad"|35.27|bgcolor="#eea2ad"|1|22.21|1|colspan=2 |2.84|0|0.6|0|8.31|0|4|-|align="left"|Doon Valley|25.16|1|bgcolor="#eea2ad"|34.06|bgcolor="#eea2ad"|1|18.33|0|colspan=2 |1.39|0|0.1|0|20.92|1|3|- class="unsortable"!align="left"|Total!38.54!14!25.15!9!18.75!6!1.88!1!1.62!0!0.52!0!8.95!2!32|}
Following the Fifth Statutory Review of Electoral Arrangements, Annick was increased from a three-member ward to a four-member ward.[4] The SNP, Labour and independent candidate Ellen Freel retained the seats they had won at the previous election while the Conservatives won the extra seat.
Labour retained their only seat while the SNP retained one of their two seats and the Conservatives gained one seat from the SNP.
The SNP (2), Labour and the Conservatives retained the seats they had won at the previous election.
The SNP retained both the seats they had won at the previous election while Labour retained one of their two seats and the Conservatives gained one seat from Labour.
The SNP (2) and Labour retained the seats they had won at the previous election.
Following the Fifth Statutory Reviews of Electoral Arrangements, Irvine Valley was reduced in size from a four-member ward to a three-member ward.[4] The SNP retained one of the two seats they had won at the previous election while Labour retained their only seat. The Conservatives lost their only seat and the Rubbish Party won a council seat for the first time.
The SNP retained both the seats they had won at the previous election while Labour retained one of their two seats and the Conservatives gained one seat from Labour.
Labour retained one of the three seats they won at the previous election while the SNP retained their only seat and both the SNP and the Conservatives gained one seat from Labour.
The SNP retained their only seat while Labour retained one of their two seats and independent candidate Drew Filson gained a seat from Labour.