Will Russell Findlay be a ‘fighter’?

Russell Findlay has launched his bid to be the next Scottish Tory leader as the party descends into a civil war over the propriety of the electoral process. The UK Conservative leadership race has thus far been a pretty staid affair. Not so the Scottish party, which is on the hunt for a new figurehead now that Douglas Ross is returning to the backbenches. 

That’s not soon enough for some of his colleagues. He was already in the dog house after Aberdeenshire North and Moray East MP David Duguid was deselected by party HQ and his candidacy given to Ross. What’s worse, Duguid, a gentlemanly champion of oil workers and the fishing industry, was in hospital recovering from illness at the time. They don’t approve of that sort of thing up that way and enough local Tories revolted to see Ross lose on election night. 

Now there are reports that he tried the same thing last summer in the neighbouring seat of Moray West, Nairn and Strathspey.