Leader who transformed Scots Tories

Ruth Davidson took her first steps towards a life in politics when she joined the Tories in 2009, having previously worked as a journalist.

The 2011 Scottish Parliament elections saw her take a seat from the Glasgow region list. Two months later, party leader Annabel Goldie announced she would quit the post and Ms Davidson stood for the position.

The self-proclaimed “tough old bird” won the election and became party leader in November that year, gaining 2,278 first preference votes out of the 5,676 cast.

Since then, she has widely been credited with changing the party’s image to being more socially liberal, supporting LGBT rights and favouring extending samesex marriage equality to Northern Ireland.

Ms Davidson was at the helm during the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. The 2016 Holyrood elections saw the Scottish Conservative Party position itself as the main Unionist party, in which it gained the second-highest number of seats. She had switched to the Edinburgh Central constituency for that vote. During the campaign she rode a buffalo, played ice hockey, pulled pints and drove a crane.

In the 2016 Brexit referendum, she supported remaining in the EU, but after the result she called for a soft withdrawal.

The former Territorial Army signaller has also received praise for overseeing the Scottish Conservatives going from one MP to 13 in the 2017 general election.

Her 2018 memoirs revealed she struggled with her mental health as a teenager, citing that as a reason she would not stand to be UK Conservative Party leader.

In October last year, she gave birth to a baby boy with her partner Jen Wilson.

Ms Davidson supported Jeremy Hunt to succeed Theresa May as party leader in July 2019. She said she would judge Boris Johnson on his time in office as Prime Minister, but admitted the two had clashed on issues such as Brexit.