Memories of Charles
Sir – Charles Kennedy joked just before our last hustings for S1 students at Lochaber High School that maybe we candidates should just swap speeches.
He thought we probably knew what each other were going to say quite well by then. I’m sure he would have delivered my Green speech much better than I did and I think would have agreed with many of the ideas it contained.
In his own speech to the students he talked about how he had been to their school himself and become interested in debating there. He said that many of the students walked past his door every day. He really connected with them and they warmed to him, yet even these young people in their mock election voted for the SNP and then Conservative candidates first; a foretaste of the crushing defeat which was to come.
During the campaign I was aware that he did not look well, yet the old spark was still there and he was a formidable debating opponent with a sound grasp of the important facts and figures.
However, despite being the only Liberal Democrat to vote against joining the coalition, he could not shake off the taint of being associated with what that government had done in office; many things which he did not support.
I am sure being associated with a government which increased the levels of inequality and led to a huge rise in the use of food banks troubled him.
Having been instrumental in setting up the Liberal Democrats as a force from the left and for social justice it must have pained him to see it propping up so much social injustice.
He was severely criticised for his poor voting record. He did try to explain at one hustings to the political idealists amongst us that if your party is in government you cannot keep voting against it and need to only do this on the things you really object to.
I think the problem was that as time went on there were more and more things he disagreed with and the only option then was for him to abstain, so it is difficult to know how much his lack of voting was due to this and how much due to his health issues which have been well publicised and the need to look after his elderly father and his disabled brother.
At the last public meeting I attended he told people: "If someone had told me five years ago that the Liberal Democrats would form a coalition with the Conservatives which would last five years I would have said ‘pigs might fly’."
He left the count with dignity having delivered his "night of the long sgian dubhs" speech. We left at the same time. I had mixed emotions, having increased the Green vote, yet witnessed the defeat of this once great man and had a sense of disbelief and dread that the UK had actually voted in another five years of Tory cuts: a bit like turkeys voting for Christmas.
I was not sure the triumphant SNP would have much power to counteract them.
We shook hands with Charles in the car park, thanked him for what he had done for the constituency and said we were sure he would find something worthwhile to do. He was clearly broken-hearted but put a brave face on it and said that he would have time to attend to his croft which had been very neglected over the years.
Sadly this was not to be. My thoughts are with the family who have lost Charles and his father so close together.
Anne Thomas,
Former Ross, Skye and Lochaber candidate
for the Scottish Green Party,
Drumsmittal Park,
Drumsmittal,
North Kessock,
Inverness.
