If politics had a heart there would be no by-election in Hamilton this week
IN a decent world, there would be no by-election in Hamilton this week.
The parties would have got together, reflected on why there was a vacancy for an MSP and agreed that this was no time for squabbling on the campaign trail.
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SNP MSP Christina McKelvie died aged 57 after a long illness
Credit: Alamy
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Reform leader Nigel Farage visits Scotland ahead of this week's by-election
Credit: Getty
But this isn't a decent world — at least, not where politics is concerned.
So out they stomp on to the streets and into their photo ops, leaving each other without a name, each jibe more demeaning and derisive than the last.
Every day further desecrating the memory of the woman whose death brought them here in the first place.
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Christina McKelvie was diagnosed with breast cancer in February 2021.
For the next three years, while undergoing treatment, she not only carried on with her constituency duties but combined them with two separate ministerial roles.
On March 12 this year, she announced her decision to stand down at the next Holyrood elections to concentrate on fighting the disease.
Fifteen days later, she was gone. She was just 57.
Six days after that, the First Minister led a Motion of Condolence for an SNP colleague, who genuinely appeared to be admired by all parties, someone John Swinney himself described as 'one of the generous people I have ever met'.
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Barb and snipe
Yet how do he and his rivals then honour her memory?
By tearing each other a new one as they scramble to claim her seat like rats fighting in a sack.
Farage goads 'terrified' Starmer & says Tories are 'finished'
In that decent world of which I fancifully write, there would be no such scramble.
If politics had a heart, Labour, the Tories, the Greens, Reform, Lib Dems and the rest would have got together, agreed to stand aside and let the Nats nominate a successor.
Instead? Well, we can all see it. We're all hearing it.
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Swinney labelling Nigel Farage 'repugnant' and a racist.
Farage calling Swinney 'anti-English' then accusing Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar of sectarianism and being prejudiced against white people.
Sarwar reacting by branding Farage 'a clown'.
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Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar and candidate Davy Wilson
Credit: Getty
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First Minister and SNP leader John Swinney addresses party activists in Hamilton
Credit: PA
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It's hideous; every barb and every snipe and every sneer of it. They are a cast of walking insults to democracy.
An insult to the intelligence of the people whose votes they chase like drunk men trying to catch a balloon.
Most of all, an insult to the bravery and dignity of Christina McKelvie.
I didn't know her. To be honest, she held a lot of beliefs that I didn't share.
But there's no doubt she was a great example of the kind of proper, honest, hardworking representative that our system is supposed to be about.
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The fact that women from all parties joined her on a fundraising Moonwalk for breast cancer research speaks volumes for who and what she was.
Stop pretending you're just some poor, misunderstood Ordinary Joe when you're one of the richest men in politics.
That in an era where so many see personal tragedy as a means of courting publicity, she never used her illness as currency, is testament to her character.
If only Swinney, Sarwar and Farage had a shred of this character as they trample around the country, playing their stupid boo-yah games in the name of cheap-as-chips soundbites.
In his interview with this paper yesterday, Farage described this as Reform's 'growing-up moment.'
Well, grow up, you Marge-Simpson-faced muppet.
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Act like the mature human being you want us to believe you are.
Stop playing to the gallery, stop pretending you're just some poor, misunderstood Ordinary Joe when you're one of the richest men in politics.
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Our columnist Bill Leckie has his say on the upcoming by-election
Credit: John Kirkby - The Sun Glasgow
Having said which, we really could offer the same advice to any of them. And it would be met with exactly the same rubber ear.
Why? Because this gutter-level back-biting is all they know, at least when they're wearing their political hats.
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Maybe in a previous life they were more open, more consiliatory, more willing to listen to the views of others and learn from them. But here, in the grubby sumo ring they've chosen to inhabit, all they understand is how to trip the other guy up.
And let's never forget that Swinney, Sarwar and Farage are supposedly the best of the bunch, the ones the rank and file have elected to run the show.
They're the ones we're expected to accept are fit to be in charge of health and schools and roads and taxes.
Yet this is how they behave, with a disrespect for each other that makes you weep with shame for this parliament so many fought so long and hard to call our own.
It's never been a nice game, politics, we all know that. But there are moments when you'd hope against hope that colours and rivalry and ideologies would be put aside long enough for goodness and common sense and — that word again — decency would shine through.
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The death of a woman as loved and respected as Christina McKelvie should surely be the catalyst for one of these rarest of moments.
But no. If anything, this campaign has been less palatable and more stomach-churning than any in recent memory.
Chances are, that's down to the fear Farage imbues in Swinney and Sarwar, but it's still no excuse.
In a decent world, there would be no such slurs as those that have soiled the streets of Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse in the run-up to this vote.
And you know what? In a decent world, the people of those towns would stay home on Thursday and make sure none of them win.
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