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In the Gothic splendour of St Matthew’s Church, politicians were singing from very different hymn sheets during Perth’s first constituency hustings.

A couple of hundred locals had braved a dreich Monday night to hear the contenders’ pearls of wisdom – but not even God could save the candidates from some real clangers.

Had Malcolm Tucker from The Thick of It been in the room, there would have been much blaspheming.

Lib Dem Peter Barrett set the tone when he accidentally promised to get rid of “breakfast” instead of Brexit.

Indeed, when the Lib Dems were in coalition with the Tories, they put an end to breakfast for many through austerity, including in nearby Letham, an area of acute deprivation.

But halting Brexit is a tougher ask.

The Brexit Party candidate, Stuart “I am not a politician” Powell, bizarrely proclaimed he didn’t even want to discuss the B question and instead would focus on “honesty, integrity and principles”.

And lo, the laughter did ring out.

But Tory Angus Forbes and incumbent Pete Wishart are the only serious runners in a two-horse race, so Powell’s heart wasn’t in it.

Wishart, the longest-serving SNP MP, won Perth and Perthshire North with a majority of just 21 in 2017, making this one of the most marginal seats in the country.

(Image: Graeme Hart)

He is well known and has served the area for 18 years – not to mention he is the former keyboard player for rock band Runrig and the first MP to appear on Top of the Pops.

Forbes, a local councillor and businessman, modestly touted himself as “the best councillor there has been”.

He has campaigned to get dog owners to pick up their pets’ poo, but he has a knack of landing himself in it.

Not least when he insulted locals by saying they were too “lazy” to recycle properly – but then he has been big on bin-related issues in the area.

To cast off the Tory Eton effect, Forbes painted himself as the man of the people at the hustings, having lived in a “rough estate” in Dundee and attended a “rough school”.

But the veneer slipped when retired charity volunteer Jim Ferguson, 74, asked a question about food banks and why there five in the area.

To some audience derision, Forbes agreed poverty was “awful” but said he had also seen food banks in the Netherlands, Prague… and near his holiday home in Spain.

When Betsy McQueen, a volunteer with Amnesty, asked about the human rights concerns of the candidates, Forbes said “political correctness” was worrying, while Powell concluded we weren’t as badly off as the Rohingya in Myanmar.

Labour candidate Angela Bretherton said that, as a trade unionist, her priority would be workers’ rights, while Barrett talked of human trafficking.

Wishart went with the right to education, healthcare, a fair wage and democracy.

(Image: Graeme Hart)

When a chap asked about the environmental impact of red meat production, Forbes didn’t seem to afford the question any gravity.

“I will eat as much red meat as I can get,” said the Tory, and passed the microphone faster than you can say “medium rare”.

There was resounding applause for independent councillor Xander McDade, who asked Forbes why he had voted to close the local Abernyte Primary School despite protests.

Rather vaguely, he replied his casting vote for closure was down to “a whole pile of educational things”.

Heavyweight Tories from Ruth Davidson to Theresa May have been campaigning in force for neighbouring candidate Kirstene Hair, that notorious Question Time performer who was met with guffaws when she insisted Boris Johnson cared about Scotland.

But Forbes has attracted less attention from Tory HQ, which may indicate he is not considered to be quite the contender he had hoped.

Audience member Greg Tosh asked the panel why Perth was being pushed into Brexit when the constituency had voted Remain.

Later he said he had asked the question because it was unacceptable that, as a Tory, Forbes, was putting the choices of Brexiteers in England before the interests of constituents in Perthshire.

Greg said: “Perthshire is a farming community historically and people are becoming wary of coming to work on the farms from the EU.

“They don’t feel welcome. Wages have dropped by 20 per cent since the start of Brexit, so they are looking to other countries.

“I don’t think the local Conservative candidate is supporting constituents.

“The fields around here used to have lots of Conservative banners but not now. I think people here are angry. For this election, I’ll be voting SNP – and Brexit has swung that for me.”

(Image: Graeme Hart)

Forbes did get a smattering of applause when he told the audience that, despite voting Remain, he would get Brexit done.

But the clouds descended again when wheelchair user Richard Kermath, 54, told him that the Tories’ welfare cuts had made life unbearable for many disabled people.

There was light relief when a mischief-maker from the audience asked each candidate the gift they would buy each other in a Secret Santa.

Forbes offered to buy the back catalogue of Runrig and gift it to Lib Dem Barrett, while Wishart suggested he would buy Powell a “nicely signed copy of the EU constitution”.

The next day, I visited a local community hub in Letham, where the charitable trust Letham4All is trying to make a difference.

The trust has taken over a former sports centre that was closed down by the Tory council and it plans to open a community fridge where residents can buy five items for £1.

The hub also has a packed diary of clubs, as well as sports facilities, to tackle social exclusion and ill mental health in an area blighted by poverty.

Suzie Burt, a volunteer at the hub, said austerity is no abstract notion in Letham, where Universal Credit has left some on their knees and where the working poor are struggling to eat.

She said although people were perhaps more politicised since the independence referendum, they felt detached from politicians.

Suzie said: “We have people who come here who have absolutely nothing, who are trying to survive with dignity.

“But we also have some amazing people who are transforming the community, who are changing things for themselves. That’s the only hope they think they have.”

And that’s the reality on the ground for those in Perthshire who can’t afford to stuff themselves with red meat in their holiday home in Spain.