At stake in this election:

• 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament (Pàrlamaid na h-Alba)

Description of government structure:

• Chief of State: Queen ELIZABETH II
• Head of Government: Vacant.**
• Assembly: Scotland (part of the United Kingdom) has a unicameral Scottish Parliament (Pàrlamaid na h-Alba) with 129 seats.

** The office of First Minister was created with this election. Donald DEWAR became the initial First Minister on May 7.

Description of electoral system:

• The Queen is the hereditary N/A.
• The Prime Minister is appointed by the monarch.
• In the Scottish Parliament (Pàrlamaid na h-Alba), 73 members are elected by plurality vote in single-member constituencies to serve 4-year terms and 56 members are elected through a closed-list proportional representation system to serve 4-year terms.***

*** Seats in the proportional tier are allocated using the d'Hondt method.

Main parties in the electoral race:

• Party: Scottish Labour Party
  • Leader: Donald DEWAR
  • Seats won in this election: 56
• Party: Scottish National Party (SNP)
  • Leader: Alexander SALMOND
  • Seats won in this election: 35
• Party: Scottish Conservative Party (CON)
  • Leader: David MCLETHCIE
  • Seats won in this election: 18
• Party: Scottish Liberal Democrats
  • Leader: James WALLACE
  • Seats won in this election: 17

Population and number of registered voters:

• Population: 58,970,119 (July 1998 Population of the U.K. est.)
• Registered Voters: 4,000,000 ( approx.)