You know it, we know it, votes for Labour or the Greens in West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine on July 4th won’t count for anything.

Neither party has any local councillors, which is a reasonable measure of support on the ground. Neither have ever won this seat, or come close.

Under first past the post, every vote for a candidate who doesn’t win in a constituency is wasted. Votes for the winner over and above what is needed to win are also wasted – a seat won by thousands of votes and a seat won by 2 votes both still send just one MP to Westminster. In the General Election in 2019, 71% of votes were wasted.

Parties with a broad base of support can end up with more votes and fewer seats than those with a regional focus. For example, in 2019, the Liberal Democrats got three times the number of votes of the SNP, but the SNP got four times as many seats. The Social Democratic and Labour Party got 118,737 votes and two seats, the Green Party got 865,697 votes and one seat.

The upshot of this is parliament can be vastly unrepresentative of the UK population. Liberal Democrats want to reform the voting system, so all votes matter. Even parties with policies the antithesis of ours (like Reform) would get a voice in Westminster if they got enough votes. Proportional representation would mean no more ‘safe’ seats, no need for tactical voting, would encourage more people to actually turn up and vote, and more accurately reflect the political makeup of the British people.

A vote for Labour or Green in this area probably won’t matter, but the Lib Dems want it to.

This is the bit where I ask for your support in this general election – hopefully for the very last time.

You’ll have had multiple leaflets through your door in the past few weeks. The Tory and SNP ones highlight the 2019 election result, as it’s in their interest for you to believe that there’s only a choice of two parties this time. The Lib Dem ones highlight our strong historical record here – 18 years straight. To be quite honest, this is the first election since we lost this seat in 2015 that we’ve had a proper candidate with a proper campaign. Michael Turvey was selected last year, and has been out knocking on doors and sending out newsletters ever since. Labour (sorry Kate!) are relying on a ‘North-East’ opinion poll.

We want you to lend us your vote, join the folk turning away from the toxic Tories and backing us instead. Join with those voters who won’t lend their vote to the SNP (now that they’ve announced that they consider a vote for the SNP to be a vote for independence), and are coming back to the Liberal Democrats. Have a look at our manifesto, and you’ll see policies to improve the lives of working people and the most vulnerable in our society, as well as a strong environmental focus.

Vote for us this time, so that you never feel you have to vote for us again! (Though of course, we’d love it if you did 😉)

If at this point, two weeks before polling day, you’re still considering voting Conservative, I don’t think a list of facts and figures is going to sway you.

As a child, my favourite Star Trek character was Spock, and I thought the world would be a better place if folk would think a bit more logically. So for me, the facts and figures of inflation, living standards, government money lost to fraud, the damage Brexit has done to the economy, lying to the Queen, partying in Downing Street during lockdown and so on and so forth, make voting Conservative inconceivable.

So, why might someone still be a ‘true blue Tory’?

• Habit? A sense of loyalty – that these are your people no matter what they’ve done?

• You actually like what’s happened over the past nine years.

• You believe the promises made that this next five years will be so much better.

• You loathe the SNP (or whichever party is the main competition in your area) and want them beaten at any cost.

Let’s take loyalty first. I get it. Even when the people you love and respect do bad things, you can still love and respect them. It doesn’t mean that there should be no consequences though. Has the government in Westminster really embodied the traditional values of the Conservative party? Do you not think that a bit of ‘time out’ would do the party some good? Remember, your vote is private, so you don’t ever have to admit to voting for someone else!

You like the way the country’s gone. Not much I can say to this. Even if your personal wellbeing has improved, that’s not true for so many.

You believe the promises in the manifesto. Oh, you optimistic and trusting person you! Firstly, there’s a whole list of broken or ignored pledges from the 2019 manifesto. Levelling up – just over 10% of promised funds actually spent and making a difference on the ground (Public Accounts Committee report March 2024). ‘Get Brexit Done’ was the main slogan, but it’s still not ‘done’ for Northern Ireland. An Irish sea border now threatens the unity of Stormont and weakens the Union. The triple lock for pensions was abandoned, net migration has about tripled, the tax burden is at a 70 year high. There’s more, but you get the gist. Secondly, what could the Conservative party promise to do in the next five years, that they couldn’t have gotten on with in the last nine?

Anyone but *insert here*. You dislike the thought of a particular party winning so much, you’ll hold your nose and vote Conservative. This may be true for you, but polling has shown a steady trend of decreased support for the Tories. In addition to the folk who have decided to switch their vote, there are also those who will just stay home on July 4th. The popularity of both the Conservative Party and the SNP has dropped and is dropping further, whereas the Liberal Democrats have the most popular policy proposals (yougov) and a proven track record of taking out the Tory vote at by-elections. Your best bet might just be to vote Lib Dem.

Warning – cheesy slogan coming up! Vote with hope, not hate. You don’t need to pick the lesser of two evils, you can choose something decent.

I suppose another reason to continue to vote Conservative would be loyalty to a particular candidate. Fair enough. I would just advise you to look at their voting record though (TheyWorkForYou is a helpful website). There’s no point electing someone on a personal basis because ‘they’re a good egg’, when they vote as their party tell them, even if it goes against their personal judgement. Case in point – the Owen Paterson paid lobbying scandal, when all but a handful of Tory MPs voted to put aside Paterson’s suspension and review the standards system.

So, are you REALLY going to vote Conservative?

I know, that sounds a bit harsh, but hear me out.

I’m sure the SNP response would be something along the lines of ‘to stand up for their constituents and the people of Scotland’.

That’s all well and good, but what about everyone else? If your reply is ‘what ABOUT everyone else?’ with the attitude that it’s perfectly ok for Scottish MPs to not give a fig about anyone who lives south of the border… there’s really no point you reading on.

In preparation for this (earlier than expected) General Election, I started looking at the voting record of our most recent MP, and from there started looking at the records of nearby SNP MPs. I found something I hadn’t actually realised about the SNP before – if they think an issue doesn’t directly affect people living in Scotland, they won’t vote on it.

Let’s take the hot-button topic of sewage discharges. The SNP government in Holyrood have their own struggles with this – just 4% of sewage overflows have reporting requirements, so it’s impossible to know exactly how much sewage is discharged into our Scottish waterways.

For England though, the picture is much clearer (well, in a brown and sludgy manner). In 2023, 16,706 storm overflows spilled sewage for a total of 4,608,318 hours. These includes spills into the Solway Firth, the River Tweed and the North Sea. (See www.theriverstrust.org for more information.)

Untreated sewage being discharged into our seas, rivers and even National Parks like the Lake District, that’s bad, right? I mean, surely no-one actually thinks it’s a good thing? So, requiring water companies (water and waste was privatised south of the border by Thatcher in 1989) to improve their sewage systems and reduce the harm caused by untreated sewage discharges… that should be a no-brainer. Water companies take billions from customers and give it to their shareholders. Bringing sewers and treatment up to a decent standard doesn’t seem like an unreasonable requirement. Well, in October 2021, the Conservative government said that it was unreasonable. 265 (all Conservative) voted against the requirements, 202 voted for, including all the Liberal Democrats. Every single SNP MP declined to show up and vote.

This isn’t an isolated incident. From votes on preventing the use of bee-killing pesticides, to meeting World Health Organisation guidelines for air quality, the SNP have taken the ‘principled’ stand of not voting.

The SNP became the third largest party at Westminster in 2019. They might not have wanted to be there, they might not want to be a part of the UK at all, but the role of the opposition parties is to effectively scrutinise and challenge the government of the day. If they’re not willing to do that fully, then I ask again, what is the point of the SNP at Westminster?