List of alumni of the University of St Andrews
Government , law , and public policy -- Members of the Scottish Parliament
Table:
Name

Year/degree

Notability

Reference

Alex Salmond

M.A.

Former First minister of Scotland; former leader of the Scottish National Party

Marco Biagi

Politician and MSP for Edinburgh central

Marlyn Glen

Scottish Labour politician; Member of the Scottish Parliament for North East Scotland

George Reid

1962 M.A.

Politician; SNP Member of Parliament for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire; regional MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife; Scottish Parliament's second Presiding Officer

Jamie Stone

1977 M.A.

Scottish Liberal Democrat politician, member of the Scottish Parliament for Caithness, Sutherland, and Easter Ross

Chic Brodie

1966 BSc

Politician, MSP for South Scotland

Marlyn Glen

M.A.

Labour Party politician, MSP for North East Scotland

Gordon Jackson

Scottish Labour Party politician, lawyer, MSP for Glasgow Govan

With reference to the tabular data as well as the supporting evidence provided at the end.

Answer the following question: How many years did Marco Biagi serve as the Minister for Local Government and Community Empowerment and as SNP MSP for Edinburgh Central ? Output only the correct answer as {"answer": "YOUR ANSWER"}.

Alexander Elliot Anderson Salmond ( /ˈsæmənd/ ; born 31 December 1954 ) is a Scottish politician who served as the First Minister of Scotland from 2007 to 2014 . He was the leader of the Scottish National Party ( SNP ) for over twenty years , having served for two terms , firstly from 1990 to 2000 and subsequently from 2004 to 2014 . He was the Member of Parliament ( MP ) for Banff and Buchan between 1987 and 2010 , when he stood down to focus on his other roles , and then for Gordon from 2015 to 2017 , when he lost his seat to Scottish Conservative candidate Colin Clark . During the 2015-2017 parliament , he was the SNP International Affairs and Europe spokesperson in the House of Commons . From 1987 to 2010 , Salmond served as MP for Banff and Buchan . Following the establishment of the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999 , Salmond also served as the Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) for Banff and Buchan from 1999 to 2001 , while continuing to serve as that constituency 's MP . Salmond served as the Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) for Gordon from 2007 to 2011 , and for Aberdeenshire East from 2011 to 2016 . Salmond resigned as SNP leader in 2000 and did not seek re-election to the Scottish Parliament . He did however retain his Westminster seat in the 2001 general election . Salmond was once again elected SNP leader in 2004 and the following year held his Banff and Buchan seat in the 2005 general election . In 2006 he announced his intention to contest Gordon in the 2007 Scottish Parliament election . Salmond defeated the incumbent MSP and the SNP emerged as the largest single party .
The degree of Master of Arts ( MA ) in Scotland typically refers to an undergraduate degree ( either a three-year general degree or four-year Honours degree ) in humanities or social sciences awarded by one of the ancient universities of Scotland ( the University of St Andrews , the University of Glasgow , the University of Aberdeen , and the University of Edinburgh ) plus the University of Dundee ( as a result of its history as a constituent college of the University of St Andrews ) and Heriot-Watt University ( at honours level only ) . The first two years of the Scottish Master of Arts consist of ordinary Bachelor level courses ; however , after these , students who are accepted to pursue the Honours route will complete more advanced subjects and write a dissertation in their fourth year . Students who choose to do a general degree will complete their third year at a lower level of specialisation , and receive a Bachelor of Arts ( BA ) or MA without Honours . For the postgraduate degree referred to in other places as Master of Arts , Scottish universities usually award the degree of Master of Letters ( MLitt ) or Master of Science ( MSc ) . Generally , non-ancient universities in Scotland ( e.g . University of Strathclyde , The Robert Gordon University , Edinburgh Napier University , etc . ) , award arts degrees as Bachelor of Arts .
The Scottish National Party ( SNP ; Scottish Gaelic : Pàrtaidh Nàiseanta na h-Alba , Scots : Scots National Pairtie ) is a Scottish nationalist , social-democratic political party in Scotland . The SNP supports and campaigns for Scottish independence within the European Union . It is the third-largest political party by membership in the United Kingdom , behind the Labour Party and the Conservative Party ; it is the third-largest by overall representation in the House of Commons , behind the Conservative Party and the Labour Party ; and it is the largest political party in Scotland , where it has the most seats in the Scottish Parliament and 47 out of the 59 Scottish seats in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom . The current Scottish National Party leader , Nicola Sturgeon , has served as First Minister of Scotland since November 2014 . Founded in 1934 with the amalgamation of the National Party of Scotland and the Scottish Party , the party has had continuous parliamentary representation in Westminster since Winnie Ewing won the 1967 Hamilton by-election . With the establishment of the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999 , the SNP became the second-largest party , serving two terms as the opposition . The SNP gained power at the 2007 Scottish Parliament election , forming a minority government , before going on to win the 2011 Parliament election , after which it formed Holyrood 's first majority government . It was reduced back to being a minority government at the 2016 election . The SNP is the largest political party in Scotland in terms of both seats in the Westminster and Holyrood parliaments , and membership , reaching 125,482 members as of December 2019 , 47 MPs and over 400 local councillors . The SNP is a member of the European Free Alliance ( EFA ) . The party does not have any members of the House of Lords , as it has always maintained a position of objecting to an unelected upper house .
Marco Biagi ( born 31 July 1982 ) is a Scottish politician , who formerly served as the Minister for Local Government and Community Empowerment and as SNP MSP for Edinburgh Central between 2011 and 2016 .
Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ; Scottish Gaelic : Ball Pàrlamaid na h-Alba , BPA ; Scots : Memmer o the Scots Pairliament , MSP ) is the title given to any one of the 129 individuals elected to serve in the Scottish Parliament .
Edinburgh Central is a burgh constituency of the Scottish Parliament ( Holyrood ) . It elects one Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) by the plurality ( first past the post ) method of election . Also , it is one of nine constituencies in the Lothian electoral region , which elects seven additional members , in addition to nine constituency MSPs , to produce a form of proportional representation for the region as a whole . The constituency was created with the name and boundaries of a constituency of the Edinburgh Central UK Parliament constituency . Since 1999 , the constituency MSP has been an ex officio member of the Board of Trustees of the National Library of Scotland . From 1925 until 1999 , that role had been taken by the Member of Parliament ( MP ) for the Westminster constituency . The constituency was one of the few areas to vote Yes in the 2011 UK Alternative Vote referendum held on the same day as the 2011 Scottish Parliament election .
Marlyn Glen ( born 30 September 1951 ) is a Scottish Labour Party politician , and was Member of the Scottish Parliament for the North East Scotland region from 2003 to 2011 . Glen was born in Dundee and educated at Kirkton High School . She attended the University of St Andrews and the University of Dundee , and has also completed several Open University degree courses . Prior to her election to Holyrood , she worked as a teacher in Liverpool , Ayr , Irvine and Dundee and is a member of the Educational Institute of Scotland trade union . She was also a Dundee District Council councillor . Her husband , Neil Glen , was also a councillor and died in 2004 . She was also an Honorary Vice President of English-Speaking Union Scotland . Glen is on the left of the Scottish Labour Party and remains a supporter of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament . She is also a member of Campaign for Socialism that backed John McDonnell 's then Jeremy Corbyn 's bids for the leadership of the UK Labour Party .
The Scottish Labour Party ( Scottish Gaelic : Pàrtaidh Làbarach na h-Alba , Scots : Scots Labour Pairty ; branded Scottish Labour ) is the UK Labour Party 's devolved Scotland administrative subdivision . Labour currently hold 23 of 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament . Labour won the largest share of the vote in Scotland at every UK general election from 1964 until 2015 ; where they were defeated in a landslide by the Scottish National Party ; every European Parliament general election from 1979 until being defeated by the SNP in 2009 ; and in the first two elections to the Scottish Parliament in 1999 and 2003 . After these , Scottish Labour entered a coalition with the Scottish Liberal Democrats , forming a majority Scottish Executive . In one of their worst defeats ever , at the 2015 UK general election , Scottish Labour was reduced to having a single seat ( Edinburgh South ) , losing 40 of its 41 seats to the SNP . This was the first time the party had not won the largest number of seats in Scotland since 1959 . In the 2016 Scottish Parliament election , Scottish Labour lost 13 of its 37 seats , becoming the third-largest party after being surpassed by the Scottish Conservative Party . At the 2017 general election , Labour gained 6 new seats ( East Lothian , Midlothian , Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath , Coatbridge , Chryston and Bellshill , Glasgow North East and Rutherglen and Hamilton West ) in Scotland from the SNP , bringing their total seat tally to 7 and significantly improving upon its disastrous performance two years previously with a 27.1% share of the vote . This was the first time since the 1918 general election , 99 years previously , that Labour had finished in third place at any general election in Scotland . At the 2019 general election , Labour 's success from the previous election proved to be an abberation and the party returned only one MP ( Ian Murray , Edinburgh South ) , losing every single new seat gained two years earlier and finished in fourth place for the first time since 1918 ; with the national vote share falling to 18.6% - the lowest since 1910 .
North East Scotland is one of the eight electoral regions of the Scottish Parliament which were created in 1999 . Ten of the parliament 's 73 first past the post constituencies are sub-divisions of the region and it elects seven of the 56 additional-member Members of the Scottish Parliament ( MSPs ) . Thus it elects a total of 17 MSPs . The North East Scotland region shares boundaries with the Highlands and Islands and Mid Scotland and Fife regions .
Sir George Reid PC FRSE ( born 4 June 1939 ) is a Scottish politician . From February 1974 to May 1979 he served as a Scottish National Party Member of Parliament for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire . He was elected in 1999 as a Member of the newly established Scottish Parliament as a regional MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife . From 2003 to 2007 he served as member for the Ochil constituency and was appointed as the Scottish Parliament 's second Presiding Officer . He oversaw the completion of the new Parliament building at Holyrood and the move from The Mound to Holyrood in 2004 . In May 2008 , Reid was appointed as the Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland for the duration of the General Assembly 's sitting that year . In 2009 , he was appointed as Her Majesty 's Lord Lieutenant of Clackmannanshire .
Clackmannan and Eastern Stirlingshire was a parliamentary constituency in the Clackmannan area of Central Scotland . It returned one Member of Parliament ( MP ) to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom , elected by the first past the post system . The constituency was created for the 1918 general election , and abolished for the 1983 general election , when it was replaced by the new Clackmannan constituency .
Mid Scotland and Fife is one of the eight electoral regions of the Scottish Parliament which were created in 1999 . Nine of the parliament 's 73 first past the post constituencies are sub-divisions of the region and it elects seven of the 56 additional-member Members of the Scottish Parliament ( MSPs ) . Thus it elects a total of 16 MSPs . The Mid Scotland and Fife region shares boundaries with the Central Scotland , Highlands and Islands , North East Scotland and West of Scotland regions and is connected with the Lothian region by bridges across the Firth of Forth .
The Scottish Parliament ( Scottish Gaelic : Pàrlamaid na h-Alba ; Scots : Scots Pairlament ) is the unicameral legislature of Scotland . Located in the Holyrood area of the capital city , Edinburgh , it is frequently referred to by the metonym Holyrood . The Parliament is a democratically elected body comprising 129 members known as Members of the Scottish Parliament ( MSPs ) , elected for four-year terms under the additional member system : 73 MSPs represent individual geographical constituencies elected by the plurality ( first-past-the-post ) system , while a further 56 are returned from eight additional member regions , each electing seven MSPs . The most recent general election to the Parliament was held on 5 May 2016 , with the Scottish National Party winning a plurality . The original Parliament of Scotland was the national legislature of the independent Kingdom of Scotland , and existed from the early 13th century until the Kingdom of Scotland merged with the Kingdom of England under the Acts of Union 1707 to form the Kingdom of Great Britain . As a consequence , both the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of England ceased to exist , and the Parliament of Great Britain , which sat at Westminster in London was formed . Following a referendum in 1997 , in which the Scottish electorate voted for devolution , the powers of the devolved legislature were specified by the Scotland Act 1998 . The Act delineates the legislative competence of the Parliament - the areas in which it can make laws - by explicitly specifying powers that are reserved to the Parliament of the United Kingdom . The Scottish Parliament has the power to legislate in all areas that are not explicitly reserved to Westminster . The British Parliament retains the ability to amend the terms of reference of the Scottish Parliament , and can extend or reduce the areas in which it can make laws . The first meeting of the new Parliament took place on 12 May 1999 . The competence of the Scottish Parliament has been amended numerous times since then , most notably by the Scotland Act 2012 and Scotland Act 2016 , with some of the most significant changes being the expansion of the Parliament 's powers , especially over taxation and welfare .
The Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament ( Scottish Gaelic : Oifigear-Riaghlaidh , Scots : Preses o the Scots Pairlament ) is the President of the Scottish Parliament . They are Member of the Scottish Parliament elected by the Scottish Parliament by means of an exhaustive ballot , and is ex officio the head of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body . He is considered a figurehead of the Scottish Parliament and holds an office in Queensberry House .
James Hume Walter Miéville Stone ( born 16 June 1954 ) is a Scottish Liberal Democrat politician . He was elected to the House of Commons at the 2017 snap general election to represent the constituency of Caithness , Sutherland and Easter Ross , which is the northernmost mainland British constituency and one of the largest by area He was a Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) for the constituency of Caithness , Sutherland , and Easter Ross . He held the seat from the opening of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 , until he stood down in 2011 .
The Scottish Liberal Democrats are a liberal , unionist political party in Scotland , part of the London-based federal Liberal Democrats . The party currently holds 5 of the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament and 4 of the 59 Scottish seats in the UK House of Commons .
Caithness , Sutherland and Easter Ross was a constituency of the Scottish Parliament ( Holyrood ) , in use between 1999 and 2011 . It elected one Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) by the first past the post method of election . Also , however , it was one of eight constituencies in the Highlands and Islands electoral region , which elects seven additional members , in addition to eight constituency MSPs , to produce a form of proportional representation for the region as a whole . For the Scottish Parliament election , 2011 , Caithness , Sutherland and Easter Ross was redrawn and included as part of Caithness , Sutherland and Ross , along with part of Ross , Skye and Inverness West .
Charles Chic Gilchrist Brodie ( born 8 May 1944 ) is a Scottish politician , who was a SNP Member of the Scottish Parliament for the South Scotland region from 2011 until 2016 . Brodie previously stood as a Liberal Democrat candidate at the 1992 , 1997 and 2001 UK general elections , and as a Liberal at the general elections of October 1974 , 1979 , 1983 and 1987 .
Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ; Scottish Gaelic : Ball Pàrlamaid na h-Alba , BPA ; Scots : Memmer o the Scots Pairliament , MSP ) is the title given to any one of the 129 individuals elected to serve in the Scottish Parliament .
South Scotland is one of the eight electoral regions of the Scottish Parliament . Nine of the parliament 's 73 first past the post constituencies are sub-divisions of the region and it elects seven of the 56 additional-member Members of the Scottish Parliament ( MSPs ) . Thus it elects a total of 16 MSPs . The South Scotland region was created as a result of the First Periodic Review of Scottish Parliament Boundaries and largely replaced the South of Scotland region .
The Labour Party is a centre-left political party in the United Kingdom that has been described as an alliance of social democrats , democratic socialists and trade unionists . In all general elections since 1922 , Labour has either been the governing party or the Official Opposition . The Labour Party was founded in 1900 , having grown out of the trade union movement and socialist parties of the 19th century . It overtook the Liberal Party to become the main opposition to the Conservative Party in the early 1920s , forming two minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in the 1920s and early 1930s . Labour served in the wartime coalition of 1940-1945 , after which Clement Attlee 's Labour government established the National Health Service and expanded the welfare state from 1945 to 1951 . Under Harold Wilson and James Callaghan , Labour again governed from 1964 to 1970 and 1974 to 1979 . In the 1990s , Tony Blair took Labour to the centre as part of his New Labour project , which governed the UK under Blair and then Gordon Brown from 1997 to 2010 . Labour is currently the Official Opposition in the Parliament of the United Kingdom , having won the second-largest number of seats in the 2017 and 2019 general elections . The Labour Party is currently the largest party in the Welsh Assembly , forming the main party in the current Welsh government . The party is the third-largest in the Scottish Parliament . Labour is a member of the Party of European Socialists and Progressive Alliance , and holds observer status in Socialist International . The party includes semi-autonomous Scottish and Welsh branches , and supports the Social Democratic and Labour Party in Northern Ireland , although it still organises there .
Prior to its uniform adoption of proportional representation in 1999 , the United Kingdom used first-past-the-post for the European elections in England , Scotland and Wales . The European Parliament constituencies used under that system were smaller than the later regional constituencies and only had one Member of the European Parliament each . The constituency of North East Scotland was one of them .
( William ) Gordon Jackson , QC ( born 5 August 1948 ) is a Scottish Labour Party politician and lawyer . He was the Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) for Glasgow Govan from 1999 to 2007 .
The Scottish Labour Party ( Scottish Gaelic : Pàrtaidh Làbarach na h-Alba , Scots : Scots Labour Pairty ; branded Scottish Labour ) is the UK Labour Party 's devolved Scotland administrative subdivision . Labour currently hold 23 of 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament . Labour won the largest share of the vote in Scotland at every UK general election from 1964 until 2015 ; where they were defeated in a landslide by the Scottish National Party ; every European Parliament general election from 1979 until being defeated by the SNP in 2009 ; and in the first two elections to the Scottish Parliament in 1999 and 2003 . After these , Scottish Labour entered a coalition with the Scottish Liberal Democrats , forming a majority Scottish Executive . In one of their worst defeats ever , at the 2015 UK general election , Scottish Labour was reduced to having a single seat ( Edinburgh South ) , losing 40 of its 41 seats to the SNP . This was the first time the party had not won the largest number of seats in Scotland since 1959 . In the 2016 Scottish Parliament election , Scottish Labour lost 13 of its 37 seats , becoming the third-largest party after being surpassed by the Scottish Conservative Party . At the 2017 general election , Labour gained 6 new seats ( East Lothian , Midlothian , Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath , Coatbridge , Chryston and Bellshill , Glasgow North East and Rutherglen and Hamilton West ) in Scotland from the SNP , bringing their total seat tally to 7 and significantly improving upon its disastrous performance two years previously with a 27.1% share of the vote . This was the first time since the 1918 general election , 99 years previously , that Labour had finished in third place at any general election in Scotland . At the 2019 general election , Labour 's success from the previous election proved to be an abberation and the party returned only one MP ( Ian Murray , Edinburgh South ) , losing every single new seat gained two years earlier and finished in fourth place for the first time since 1918 ; with the national vote share falling to 18.6% - the lowest since 1910 .
Glasgow Govan was a constituency of the Scottish Parliament ( Holyrood ) . It elected one Member of the Scottish Parliament ( MSP ) by the plurality ( first past the post ) method of election . For the 2011 election , the constituency was abolished . The Govan electoral ward was divided between Glasgow Pollok and Glasgow Southside .