Historically a safeLabour seat, in 2015 it was gained by the Scottish National Party when they won a record 56 of the 59 Scottish seats at Westminster, ending 51 years of Labour Party dominance at UK general elections in Scotland. Two years later, at the 2017 general election, the Conservatives surged into second place, only 266 votes behind sitting MP Angela Crawley, followed by Labour in third place, just 96 votes behind the Conservative candidate, making the seat Britain's tightest three-way marginal. The result also made it the tightest three-way marginal since 1945.
The seat covered most of Hamilton and the rural area around Lanark. Electoral Calculus described the seat as "Traditional", characterised by working class people with lower levels of income and formal education.[2]