Trio throw hats in ring for December election
Three candidates for the Argyll and Bute UK constituency seat have so far been announced for the December 2019 general election.
Argyll and Bute Council’s deputy leader Councillor Gary Mulvaney is confirmed as the area’s Conservative Party candidate, while Councillor Alan Reid will stand for the Liberal Democrats and Brendan O’Hara for the SNP. The UK will go to the polls on Thursday December 12.
Councillor Mulvaney, a councillor since 2003, was the Tory candidate for the most recent UK general election in 2017, finishing second to Mr O’Hara.
At the October 31 announcement, Councillor Mulvaney said: ‘I am delighted to say I have been selected. Nobody really expected a Christmas election but here it is. We are here to campaign and we are here to win.’
Councillor Reid’s selection by the area’s Liberal Democrats was announced in April, though the date of the poll was unknown at that point.
At that time, he said: ‘The Scottish Liberal Democrats are the only party committed to keeping Scotland in both the UK and in Europe.
‘The local surveys we have been carrying out in Argyll and Bute show overwhelming support for a People’s Vote.’ Mr O’Hara, who was unanimously backed by SNP members in the constituency as their candidate in September, said at the time of his nomination: ‘When the general election comes, we in Scotland must be able to choose our own future. And that choice will be either as an independent, democratic European nation, or as part of an isolationist United Kingdom led by a right-wing Conservative government.
‘Here in Argyll and Bute, this election will be a straight fight between the SNP and Boris Johnson’s Tories. It will also be a fight for Scotland’s future.’