SNP holds Airdrie and Shotts seat in by-election

The SNP has held one of its Westminster seats in a by-election after seeing off a challenge from Labour.

Anum Qaisar-Javed won the Airdrie and Shotts seat for the SNP with a reduced majority of 1,757 over her Labour opponent.

Her victory brings the total number of SNP MPs in the Commons back to 45.

The by-election was held after sitting MP Neil Gray resigned in order to stand in last week's Scottish Parliament election.

Ms Qaisar-Javed is a 28-year-old modern studies teacher who was a Labour activist until the independence referendum in 2014. She becomes Scotland's second-ever female Muslim MP.

Her win follows the SNP's landslide victory in last week's Scottish Parliament election - which saw the SNP's Kaukab Stewart and Pam Gosal of the Scottish Conservatives become the country's first women of colour to be elected to Holyrood.

The by-election saw Ms Qaisar-Javed receive 10,129 votes, with Labour second on 8,372 - a majority of 1,757.

The SNP's share of the vote was 46.4% - 1.4 percentage points higher than in the 2019 election - with Labour's share increasing by 6.5 percentage points to 38.4%.

The Conservatives finished third with 2,812 votes, with the Liberal Democrats fourth on 220.

Turnout was 34.3% - lower than the average of 46.5% for a by-election in the last parliament - with counting being done overnight.

Mr Gray won the seat for the SNP with a majority of 5,201 in the last general election in 2019.

He was elected as the MSP for the Airdrie and Shotts seat in the Scottish Parliament last week - with SNP rules meaning he had to quit as an MP in order to stand for Holyrood.

Ms Qaisar-Javed said she hoped to be a role model for other people from minority backgrounds - and also pledged to "fight for independence" after being elected.

She said she taught her students about why there are fewer people from minority communities in politics, adding: "We talk about reasons such as a lack of role models, and it has taken until 2021, but now we have two women of colour in the Scottish Parliament.

"But I don't just want women of colour to look at me, or people of colour, I want anyone from any minority group to be able to look at me and say 'if she can do it, so can I'."

Counting was done overnight at the Ravenscraig Regional Sports Facility

In a speech made after votes were counted at the Ravenscraig Regional Sports Facility in Motherwell, she added that the "initial priority has to be the Covid recovery".

But she said: "As we move through the pandemic and when the time is right, then yes of course we will be looking to campaign for another independence referendum, as is the right of people of Scotland.

"Whatever the result is of that referendum, so be it, but that choice is of paramount importance."

The contest was the first Westminster by-election to be held in Scotland since 2011.

This was the SNP's first ever Westminster by-election defence, and one they have handled fairly comfortably - albeit with a reduced majority.

In theory this could have been a closer contest, with Labour coming within 195 votes of regaining the seat in 2017, but it increasingly seemed like the forgotten election as polling day approached.

It was perhaps understandable that it would fly under the radar in terms of the political debate in Scotland, coming as it did one week after a crucial set of Scottish Parliament elections.

But the same was true from a Westminster angle, with the contest in Hartlepool a week earlier seeming to take on far greater significance in the eyes of Labour, particularly in the wake of their defeat.

Airdrie and Shotts was once a Labour stronghold, and a textbook example of Scotland's importance to the party's position in government. It was the base first of the Scottish Secretary, Helen Liddell, and then the Home Secretary, John Reid.

Tonight, it has once again been held by the SNP, the new dominant political force in this part of the world - while UK Labour's focus appears to be on bickering over the results of elections elsewhere.