David George Thompson (born 20 September 1949) is a Scottish former politician who was the leader of

Action for Independence Action for Independence (AFI) was a minor political party in Scotland. It was set up in July 2020 by former Scottish National Party (SNP) Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) Dave Thompson (Scottish politician), Dave Thompson to compete at th ...

(AFI) from 2020 to 2021. A former member of the

Scottish National Party The Scottish National Party (SNP; ) is a Scottish nationalist and social democratic party. The party holds 61 of the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament, and holds 9 out of the 57 Scottish seats in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, ...

(SNP), Thompson was a

Member of the Scottish Parliament Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP; ; ) is the title given to any one of the 129 individuals elected to serve in the Scottish Parliament. Electoral system The additional member system produces a form of proportional representation, where ...

(MSP) from 2007 to 2016. In the

2007 Scottish Parliament election The 2007 Scottish Parliament election was held on Thursday 3 May 2007 to elect members to the Scottish Parliament. It was the third general election to the devolved Scottish Parliament since it was created in 1999. 2007 Scottish local elections, ...

he became an MSP for the

Highlands and Islands The Highlands and Islands is an area of Scotland broadly covering the Scottish Highlands, plus Orkney, Shetland, and the Outer Hebrides (Western Isles). The Highlands and Islands are sometimes defined as the area to which the Crofters' Act o ...

region, and then in the

2011 Scottish Parliament election The 2011 Scottish Parliament election was held on Thursday, 5 May 2011 to elect 129 members to the Scottish Parliament. The election delivered the first majority government since the opening of Holyrood, a remarkable feat as the Additional M ...

for the

Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch is a constituency of the Scottish Parliament ( Holyrood) covering part of the Highland council area. It elects one Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) by the first past the post method of election. It is also one ...

constituency.

Early life

Thompson was born in

Lossiemouth Lossiemouth () is a town in Moray, Scotland. Originally the port belonging to Elgin, Moray, Elgin, it became an important fishing town. Although there has been over 1,000 years of settlement in the area, the present day town was formed over the ...

, Scotland. Prior to entering politics, he had a long career in local government, ending as Director of Protective Services for the

Highland Council The Highland Council (' ) is the local authority for Highland, one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. The council is based at the Highland Council Headquarters in Inverness. History The Highland area had been created as an administrative a ...

Political career

In 2007, Thompson was elected from the regional list as MSP for the Highlands and Islands. Thompson received some media attention in the aftermath of the 2007 election because he pointed out to the returning officer that the number of additional members for each party had been wrongly calculated. The initial calculation would have given Labour four additional seats and the SNP none, which would have resulted in Labour gaining a

plurality Plurality may refer to: Law and politics * Plurality decision, in a decision by a multi-member court, an opinion held by more judges than any other but not by an overall majority * Plurality (voting), when a candidate or proposition polls more ...

and winning the election. After Thompson challenged this calculation and the figures were correctly calculated, Labour were allocated three seats and the SNP two. This resulted in the SNP gaining a plurality of one seat and enabled them to form the

Scottish Government The Scottish Government (, ) is the executive arm of the devolved government of Scotland. It was formed in 1999 as the Scottish Executive following the 1997 referendum on Scottish devolution, and is headquartered at St Andrew's House in ...

. In 2011, Thompson was elected for the Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch constituency. In February 2014, he was one of seven SNP MSPs that voted against allowing same-sex marriage in Scotland. In July 2020, Thompson quit the SNP to set up the Alliance for Independence, a new pro-Scottish independence party to contest the

2021 Scottish Parliament election The 2021 Scottish Parliament election took place on 6 May 2021 under the provisions of the Scotland Act 1998. It was the sixth Scottish Parliament election since the parliament was re-established in 1999. 129 Member of the Scottish Parliament, ...

, predicting the party could win up to 24 seats, and arguing that voting SNP with both constituency and list votes would "achieve nothing." He told '' The National'' he believed the new movement could help create a "supermajority" in Holyrood at the expense of the Tories, Labour and the Lib Dems. In October, the party changed its name to

(AFI) in February 2021 after the ''Alliance for Independence'' was originally rejected by the

Electoral Commission An election commission is a body charged with overseeing the implementation of electioneering process of any country. The formal names of election commissions vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and may be styled an electoral commission, a c ...

. On 26 March 2021, Thompson stated that AFI would be standing down all of their candidates in order to support the

Alba Party The Alba Party (; ''Alba'' being the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland) is a Scottish nationalist and Scottish independence, pro-independence political party in Scotland. Founded in February 2021, it was led by former First Minister of Scotland, ...

in the 2021 election. He later joined the

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Thompson, David 1949 births Living people Scottish National Party MSPs Members of the Scottish Parliament 2007–2011 Members of the Scottish Parliament 2011–2016 People from Lossiemouth Alba Party politicians