Lib Dems choose their candidate for General Election

Jul 1 2009 by Douglas Dickie, Rutherglen Reformer

THE Liberal Democrats have selected the candidate who they hope can wrestle the Rutherglen and Hamilton West seat away from Labour at the next General election.

Ian Robertson will again stand for the party, having previously taken second place behind Tommy McAvoy MP in 2005. With an election due next year, the Lib Dems have moved to install a candidate to tough it out.

A maths teacher by profession, Mr Robertson was a former President of Strathclyde University Students’ Association. He is also a board member of the Glasgow Council on Alcohol.

In 2005, Mr Robertson presided over a 6.7 per cent swing from Labour for the party but they struggled in the Holyrood election, limping home in third place behind the SNP in the Glasgow Rutherglen seat. He also fought the 2008 Glasgow East by-election.

He said this week: “It’s clear that local people have been let down by successive Labour Governments and the empty pledges of the SNP.

“The Labour Party are in disarray and do not know what they stand for anymore. They have a lame duck leader and an economy in chaos.

“Only the Liberal Democrats offer a real alternative in this constituency.

“After a flurry of broken promises - over free swimming for local school children, the eradication of student debt, lower class sizes and better teacher numbers - we all now know that we cannot trust the SNP, the party who will promise anything just to get elected.

“Liberal Democrats were the only party who saw this current recession coming and are the only party with a proper strategy to get us through, putting the financial and economic systems on a sustainable basis, cutting Government waste and increasing the Income Tax Personal Allowance to help lower earners.

“Recently, people have lost faith in politics and politicians but the point has to be made that the Liberal Democrats are the only party who have been consistently calling for a transparent and transformed system at Westminster for years. I am sick and tired with the inertia at the heart of our political system and it is time for it to change.

“This election is about the UK Government and how its decisions impact upon us locally. As a member of the local Liberal Democrats for many years, and having fought for people in Rutherglen and Hamilton West before, I am the only candidate who can offer an experienced, yet fresh, alternative voice for local people in Westminster.”

Speaking at a meeting of the local branch at the King’s Park Hotel, MSP Robert Brown said: “Ian is a superb candidate who will make a great MP. It is high time for a change in this constituency and the collapse of the Labour vote gives us a tremendous opportunity, whenever Gordon Brown eventually calls the election.”