The political landscape in Scotland may be about to produce a new fissure

You may raise an eyebrow. Reform, after all, are seen as a quintessentially English party, with a focus on immigration, a problem which has not plagued Scottish politics in the same way as it has south of the border. But that would be to underestimate the scunnered factor.

Folk in Scotland, as much as they are elsewhere in the UK, are disaffected with politics and politicians. Time I’ve spent in Hamilton speaking to potential voters has seen the vast majority sending all politicians to hell in a handcart because “nothing ever changes” while others were indeed looking to Reform as a last gasp before they give up on democracy completely.

Scotland’s politicians are not unaware of the growing anger in them and the desperate casting around by voters for a way to send a two-finger salute through the ballot box. What better than to vote for the party that everyone in the political class says you should hate?

It’s not for nothing then that John Swinney held a civic summit to discuss how to tackle the far right - a classification he gives to Nigel Farage’s party - in the last month.

That was attended by all parties bar the Tories and, of course, Reform themselves. And it’s not for nothing that a Reform advert, which targeted Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar’s Pakistani heritage, was complained about in the most vociferous terms not just by his party, but also the Greens and indeed the SNP who described it as “race-baiting”.

Yet it’s also not for nothing that Scots have been telling pollsters that they could well vote Reform - so much so that the numbers suggest it could be the second biggest party in Holyrood after next year’s full-scale Scottish Parliament elections.

There’s been no official polling carried out in the Hamilton seat, so we have no idea if that sudden national popularity for Reform will materialise this week, but there is a lot riding on this by-election. It’s the biggest electoral test for all parties since the General Election.

Last June saw the SNP reduced to just nine MPs and Labour shoot up from two to 37.

Since then council by-elections had seen Labour on the slide, the SNP re-assert its dominance and, to the surprise of the political bubble, Reform climbing. And since the English local elections that has become ever more evident, with those in the party hoping that Thursday will prove there really is a “tartan bounce”.

The reality though is that there won’t be a political earthquake of the type Hamilton has provided in the past - it was here that Winnie Ewing won in 1967 and you could argue set the SNP on the path which led, not just to the demand for the creation of a Scottish Parliament, but to its running the show for almost two decades.

No, Reform are not likely to win this Holyrood constituency seat, but they could come second. And while history does not always remember the runners-up, this time it possibly could, as that alone could reshape Scottish politics.

For if Reform were to push Labour into third place it will likely signal just how next year’s full scale Holyrood elections will go.

That would be a disaster for Anas Sarwar. No doubt it could be written off as disaffection with the Starmer government’s decisions in Westminster - winter fuel payment is mentioned again and again on the doorsteps in this constituency where there are around 19,000 pensioners, and statistics suggest one in seven of them live in poverty. (Only 36,000 people voted in this seat in the 2021 elections - imagine the result if all those pensioners decided to hit the polling stations on Thursday).

Scottish Labour know they’ve been cut off at the knees by the WFP decision - and those made on Waspi women and keeping the two child benefit cap. To change the mood music before next May would prove near to impossible. Next year’s elections were to be Labour’s best chance of winning power again in Holyrood for two decades. This bellwether seat could tell the likelihood of that happening.

Yet despite all of that, there are those on the ground who have some hope that they could still win this seat. Their candidate, they believe, is so well-known locally, that it could swing things their way. He’s even had the backing of Alex Ferguson, should that matter at all. It feels a little desperate from a damaged party.

For the SNP a win would be a win. Something they so desperately need after the General Election. The party knows that voters are unhappy with them - the NHS waiting lists, the violence in schools, even the rows over gender reform, are all mentioned by people in Hamilton’s town centre as reasons to rethink casting a vote for John Swinney’s party, even if they have previously done so for years. But the runes suggest the SNP will manage to hold on here - even if the turnout is down and their majority is too. And part of that will be, of course, that the unionist vote - normally just divided between Labour and the Conservatives, will be divided further still with the advent of Reform.

And for Reform, well, their candidate was just initially just hoping to come ahead of the Tories. Now the party believes it can run the SNP a very close second. So confident are they of shaking things up that Nigel Farage, who did not set foot in Scotland during the General Election, is due to be in the constituency for a walk about. Last time he tried that in Scotland was on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile, where he had to take shelter in a pub after protestors got wind of his appearance.

He, and those locally in Reform, believe times have changed. Certainly the issue of immigration is being raised by more voters in Scotland than it has in the past. And even though that’s a reserved issue controlled by Westminster, it doesn’t mean it gets parked in a Holyrood vote. It’s also fair to say while I spoke to many saying they were looking at Reform, there were also those who had a more visceral and opposite reaction.

The big problem for Reform is people. They have forked out for social media and billboard ads, and indeed a lot of leaflets, but they don’t have the numbers on the ground to canvas households in the same way as Labour and the SNP - and to possibly change minds in the process. But even if they fall at the final hurdle, but still come ahead of the Tories, they will believe that they have time between now and next May to target Labour voters. It’s all in the margins.

Last ditch campaigning kicks off today. If the SNP win, then it could well point to John Swinney being back in Bute House after next year’s Scotland-wide elections. If Labour does win, it would be a huge surprise - but if they’re on the SNP’s coattails they will still believe they can do something to pull back in front nationally. Anything other than those two parties taking this constituency would once again see Hamilton delivering a political shock - one that Reform would love to deliver.

An awful lot is dependent on just how scunnered voters really are.

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