David Duguid (politician)

David James Duguid (born 8 October 1970) is a Scottish Conservative politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Banff and Buchan from June 2017 to May 2024. Duguid's victory ended thirty years of Scottish National Party control of the seat.

Duguid served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland from September to October 2022. He previously served in this role from June 2020 to September 2021.

Background
He was educated at Banff Academy and Robert Gordon University, where he studied chemistry. Before entering politics, Duguid worked as an engineer for BP and as a project manager for Hitachi Consulting.

Political career
Duguid was first elected in 2017, beating the incumbent, Eilidh Whiteford by over 2,000 votes. His win saw the largest overturned majority of the election night in the UK. He was re-elected with an increased majority and over 50% of the vote in the December 2019 election.

In June 2020, Duguid accepted a position as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland and a Government whip, succeeding Douglas Ross.

Duguid left the government in September 2021 and was appointed Fisheries Envoy.

Duguid and Alister Jack were the only two Scottish Conservative MPs (out of six) who voted in support of Boris Johnson in the June 2022 confidence vote. Duguid later resigned as Trade Envoy on 6 July 2022.

He was made a Scotland Office Minister under Liz Truss, whose campaign for leadership of the Tory party he had supported, but was removed from this post after her resignation after a few weeks.

Duguid has been accused of concealing a conflict of interest by repeatedly opposing a windfall tax on fossil fuel companies when his wife is a significant shareholder in BP.

Following boundary changes, Duguid intended to contest the successor seat of Aberdeenshire North and Moray East at the 2024 United Kingdom general election. In May 2024, as the election campaign began, he announced that he had been hospitalised for some weeks to recover from a severe spinal illness, but intended to continue as the Conservative candidate. However, although he still wished to stand and felt he was recovering sufficiently, he announced on 5 June 2024 that he had been deselected by Conservative Campaign Headquarters on medical grounds nonetheless and would not be allowed to contest the seat.