Think tank casts doubt on SNP plan
we meet in the Royal Mile between meetings.
A former telephone engineer, he became an official of the Communication Workers Union and was first elected to the Parkhead ward in the Sighthill area, but his Pentland Hills ward now encompasses many of the more affluent parts of the constituency.
He should be well aware of the March of the SNP, given that he stood in the Holyrood seat, but he continues to express puzzlement about that Ashcroft poll. “It’s going well for us. We are doing a lot of door-knocking and street stalls and the responses we are getting have been pretty good. I don’t know if surprise was the right word to use about the poll. It was more disappointment that it seemed to reflect what was coming back from polls elsewhere. It doesn’t match what we are finding locally. I’m not suggesting it was inaccurate but it might be down to the methodology of the poll because our returns are looking pretty good.”
He insists that when he cuts through the Nationalists’ argument about standing up for Scotland and points to tangible Labour policies people like what they hear. As for the effect of Alistair Darling heading Better Together and Labour working within that with the Conservatives, he says it’s raised by some political activists but not by ordinary voters.
Out at the Corn Exchange complex Gordon Lindhurst is dismissive of the Ashcroft findings and insists he is in a two horse race with Labour who, losing the high profile of someone like Alistair Darling, are vulnerable to a Tory comeback. The SNP will slip back to former General Election levels, he claims.
Lindhurst, who lives in the constituency, first stood for the Tories in Linlithgow in 1999 and contested the high profile by-election in Livingston in 2005 following the death of Robin Cook. He insists: “Conservative voters like what the Government has done and our vote is solid.”