Lib Dems Dreaming

I think Tavish Scott, leader of the Scottish Democrats, is going to be a wee bit disappointed come election night. Despite opinion polls saying that the Lib Dems might be onto a bit of a hiding, Scott is claiming that they will win a quarter of the Scottish seats at Westminster.
He must be drinking the same tonic as Alex Salmond, who recently set the SNP an unlikely target of 20 MPs.

But looking closer at Tavish’s claim, he says they will retain all of their current seats whilst gaining Edinburgh North and Leith, Edinburgh South, South Aberdeen and North Glasgow.

There are some seats they currently hold that are dead certs. In that category you would include Charles Kennedy in Ross, Skye and Lochaber, Alistair Carmichael in Orkney and Shetland, Menzies Campbell in Fife North East, Malcolm Bruce in Gordon and John Thurso in Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross.

Then there are others that they will probably hold like Michael Moore in Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk, Alan Reid in Argyll and Bute and Robert Smith in West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine.

But then we come onto some interesting seats. In Edinburgh West, John Barrett holds a massive lead over the Tories of 30%. However, Barrett is stepping down at the election, being replaced by Michael Crockart. I would still expect the Lib Dems to easily hold this.

Then it is on to Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey. I think the name of the constituency may have been shorter if they had simply named everyone living in the constituency! Danny Alexander wrestled this seat from Labour in 2005 with a quite sizeable majority. But will he be able to hold onto it?

Similarly, Jo Swinson came from nowhere to take East Dunbartonshire from the Labour Party in 2005. Will she be able to convince people to give her another term in Westmnister?

Finally we have Dunfermline and West Fife. The Lib Dems were trounced by Labour here in the previous elections. However following the death of Rachael Squire, the Lib Dems overturned a 27% deficit to take the seat with a slender majority in the by-election. This seat will therefore be under severe pressure come election time.

Onto the seats he thinks he might win:

Edinburgh North and Leith – Labour currently hold a small 5% lead over the Lib Dems. However in the previous elections, Labour had a majority of 25%. The question therefore is, did the Lib Dems vote peak in this seat in 2005?

Edinburgh South – There is less than a 1% difference between Labour and the Lib Dems in this one, so this is probably their best chance in Scotland of gaining a seat.


Aberdeen South – Given the Lib Dems are involved in running the council and all the associated aggro that goes with this, do they really expect to trump Labour? The lead may only be 3%, but it might as well be 100%.

Finally in North Glasgow – Labour won 60% of the vote here in 2001. Need I say anymore?

The reality is, people in Scotland are going to look at the situation and see the prospect of a Tory government at Westminster. Poll tax and other horrific memories of the previous Tory administration come flooding back and therefore the Scottish people will vote tactically to ensure as few Tory MPs get elected in Scotland as possible. This may mean some people voting for a Labour candidate to ensure they give the Tories a good run for their money (or Lord Ashcroft’s money!). As a consequence, other parties share of the vote is going to be squeezed and talk of Lib Dems winning 16 seats or the SNP winning 20 is talk that should be reserved for fantasy land.