Maverick of the glen

Holyrood 2021 was supposed to be an election for the mavericks. Alex Salmond is back from the political dead with a new party promising to lead nationalists to independence where his former party has failed. George Galloway has turned his attention to Scotland and, despite his previous pronouncements on the matter, is heading up an outfit opposed to indyref2. While Salmond has had no trouble drumming up headlines, neither has made much of an impression on the polls.

That might be because their respective parties appear to be all about one man. The opposite seems to be true of Andy Wightman, who actually is one man but his campaign is tapping into a grassroots movement for more rigour, integrity and free-thinking at Holyrood. Having quit his old party during the last parliament on a point of principle, Wightman is standing as an independent in this election. Not in his old stomping ground of Lothian, either, but in the less electorally promising Highlands and Islands region, the vast length and breadth of which he is presently driving solo to introduce himself to an entirely new crop of voters.