COLIN CAMPBELL: Inverness constituency poll campaign goes down to the wire
Conventional wisdom has it that most people bin election material they receive as junk mail without even looking at it. That may well be true. I read all of it.
As of now, I've received four doormat despatches from the Lib Dems since the election was announced and one from Labour. There's been nothing so far from the SNP or the Conservatives. Posters and leaflets may have only a slight or even negligible impact on the final outcome. But they're still worth getting out.
I also have at least some regard for those who go through the onerous task of delivering them door-to-door.
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I’ve done it once, in support of a candidate standing as an Independent in the last council elections who I admire for her stalwart community work, and volunteered to cover an area around the rolling hills of Scorguie. Three hundred seemed a very manageable number that I could knock off in a couple of hours. It took me the best part of two days.
It takes time going from house to house in some areas around here. Given the size of sprawling bungalows on the upper slopes - none of which I am an occupant - it even takes time to find the actual letterbox. In some of them the front door's at the back, the back door's at the front, and there's a front and a back door on either side. Where do you start?
Campaigners involved in the contest in the Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire constituency have made their deliveries and are now in the final countdown to polling day.
Lib Dem volunteers seem to have put a huge amount of time and effort into backing and promoting candidate Angus MacDonald. How much energy has been expended from SNP HQ I don’t know, but we can presume a very great deal. And if he's to retain his seat, Drew Hendry will have needed every ounce of it.
With so many factors involved relating to voter turnout and fluctuating support, it could be a very close run thing between Mr Hendry and Mr MacDonald, by far his most vigorous challenger.
What's been missing, regrettably, has been proper organised debates between the candidates. These "hustings" as they were known were held in front of large and animated audiences and were once a central feature of any election, but they seem to have faded out. Maybe they've been overtaken by the power of social media. But they were events which gave candidates a chance to shine or flop on a public stage and it's a pity they've gone.
What's partly taken the sting out of the election north of the border is the fact that independence seems to have been almost forgotten. The pivotal issue which used to inflame passions on both sides of the divide has barely been mentioned, here or anywhere else. If the SNP gets the drubbing some polls are predicting it'll be because after years of absolute dominance over life in Scotland more and more people have got fed up with them.
It seems inevitable that we'll end up with a Labour government for the first time in 14 years, including many new MPs from north of the border.
Sir Keir Starmer is no Maggie Thatcher when it comes to being a natural born leader - not I suppose that he'd want to be - and he's not even another Nicola Sturgeon at her best. More an insipid version of Harold Wilson, my first Labour PM. He certainly doesn't inspire. But it seems we're going to be stuck with him for quite a long time anyway.
But if the national UK result seems a rather flat foregone conclusion, the outcome in this constituency is anything but.
Unlike in recent elections this will be no cakewalk for Drew Hendry and the SNP, and many will be very eager indeed to learn the final outcome.
