More than 4.2 million registered to vote in Scottish Parliament election

More than 4.2 million people are registered to vote in the Scottish Parliament election in May, according to official figures.

Newly-released data from National Records Scotland (NRS) shows that, as of December last year, 4,266,700 people living in Scotland were on the voters' roll - which was down by 0.4% on the previous year.

The number of 16 and 17-year-olds registered to vote in Scottish Parliamentary and local government elections also fell slightly to 74,100 (60% of the population in that age group).

However, NRS said the totals generally increase in the run-up to a parliamentary election so the numbers are likely to have gone up since the start of the year.

Meanwhile, the number of foreign nationals on the voting register for the Holyrood election reached a record high of 198,100 in December (4.6% of the total electorate).

The Scottish Parliament election will take place on Thursday 7 May.

A total of 129 MSPs will be elected to Holyrood.

The deadline to register to vote is midnight on Monday 20 April and voters can apply online at gov.uk/register-to-vote.

Currently, about one in five electors are registered to vote by post.

Anyone who lives in Scotland and is registered to vote is eligible, as long as they are 16 or over on the day of the poll and have not been legally excluded from voting (for example, because they are serving a prison sentence of longer than 12 months).

They must also be a British or Irish citizen, or a citizen of another country living in Scotland who has permission to enter or stay in the UK, or who does not need permission.