‘The moment the election got personal’published at 09:56 BST
09:56 BST
Phil Sim
Scotland political correspondent
This was the moment the election
got personal. Really very personal.
In theory this is a question of
parliamentary arithmetic; the idea being that if the SNP is short of a majority
after 7 May, opposition parties could unite to put Anas Sarwar in Bute House
instead.
But in the immediacy it’s a
question of electoral tactics.
It is in the SNP’s interests to
talk up Reform, because John Swinney likes the idea of Nigel Farage as a
bogeyman to pull his own supporters out to the polls.
He is also calculating that
framing the election as “stop Reform” could corral the tactical votes
of those who don’t like the insurgent party.
Reform, meanwhile, are just as happy
to shut Labour out of the debate, if it increases their chances of being the
anti-SNP vote.
Labour though are desperate to
make this a “stop the SNP” election where they are the main
alternative, and are ramping up their attacks on Reform to try to paint them as
an irrelevance in the race for Bute House.
In short, each party is hoping to
set this up as a two-horse race where they get to choose who the other horse
is.