The contests to watch to judge #LibDemFightback #1 There was an unfortunate double-consistency in the election contests I tipped as ‘ones to watch’ during the last Parliament as being potential signs of Liberal Democrat recovery. The Liberal Democrats didn’t storm to victory in them, and the recovery didn’t happen. I console myself that they were therefore at least useful predictors. So over the next few editions I will be showcasing a new round of contests to watch which will show how real, or otherwise, the Liberal Democrat recovery in this Parliament is. Absent a rusty political tidal wave generator being found in the basement of party HQ, the way back for the Liberal Democrats is via well-organised and effective grassroots campaigning, building from the bottom up as during previous revivals. But can the party really rediscover its local campaigning edge and will that be enough? A great test of that is to be found in the Scottish Parliament constituency of Edinburgh Western (previously West). The Westminster seat of Edinburgh West was a long a focus of party attention, being a targeted marginal seat that was just missed out on in 1983 (by 498 votes), in 1987 (by 1,234 votes) and 1992 (by 879 votes). However, it was then transformed into a Liberal Democrat fortress, gained in 1997 by over 7,000 votes and with a majority reaching 13,600 in 2005. Now, it has an SNP with a majority of 3,210. The Scottish Parliament seat, similarly, was safely Lib Dem from its creation in 1999 through to the SNP breakthrough to 2011, when the SNP took the seat with a majority of 2,689. Yet a strong Liberal Democrat organisation has survived the May 2015 meltdown, and has continued being active and growing over the summer and autumn. If grassroots organisation then can lead to revival, the evidence will show here in an area where the party was strong and even in defeat did not slip that far behind. The Liberal Democrat candidate is Alex Cole-Hamilton, who secured an appearance in Nick Clegg’s resignation speech thanks to his reaction to defeat in the Edinburgh Central constituency in 2011. Alex Cole-Hamilton linked his defeat with the price the party was paying for being in coalition – and the good that was also bringing:

Alex Cole-Hamilton, who is now on Twitter as @agcolehamilton, lives locally and is a former Convenor of the Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights. In 2014 took the Public Campaigner of the Year title at the Scottish Politician of the Year Awards. This was for his work to amend the Children and Young People Bill to increase the age of leaving care in Scotland from 16 to 21. Both he and the local Liberal Democrats have been taking the contest very seriously, selecting him in early 2014 and running an effective grassroots operation that contributed to the very high 67% No vote in the seat in the Scottish referendum. The 2015 general election defeat was also one of the least bad Lib Dem defeats in Scotland. The Lib Dem vote only fell by 2.8% and the actual number of votes cast for the Lib Dems was up by 1,934 on 2010. So a defeat, but also one that sets up a decent position from which to win in 2016. When I last checked, the local team, with its network of over 200 deliverers, was on its way to its eighth constituency-wide delivery since the May general election and has knocked on 12,000 doors since then too. I have yet to encounter another constituency which has been doing quite so much (email me your claims to fame if I am wrong!). The incumbent SNP MSP, Colin Keir, has been deselected by the SNP. An added bonus is that the local SNP MP, Michelle Thomson, was suspended by her party following the start of police investigations into property deals involving her portfolio of buy-to-let homes. If the Liberal Democrats are to recover, it will be candidates such as Alex Cole-Hamilton who have to start winning. Boundaries note: psephological pedants will note that I’ve skimped over the boundary changes and mismatches relevant to the Edinburgh West(ern) seats. I’ve done that for simplicity as none of them significantly alter the story.