Two out of the five Scottish Liberal Democrat MSPs have made it on to the shortlist for the Scottish Politician of the Year Awards as the Herald reports.

Liam McArthur is nominated for his “immersion into Orkney life.” He is up against Labour’s Jenny Marra and Jackie Baillie. The latter defied the party whip to vote for the renewal of Trident because Faslane employs so many people in her Dumbarton constituency.

In news that will surprise nobody, Alex Cole-Hamilton finds himself up in the “one to watch” category. Since his election in May, you could probably wallpaper the entire Parliament building three times over with the number of press-releases he’s put out. As the Party’s health spokesman, he is keen to keep the SNP’s attention focused on the deteriorating state of the NHS in Scotland.

He’s made some cracking speeches in the chamber. His debut speech (Holyrood has ditched the term maiden, thankfully), on the European Union was absolutely brilliant. You can watch it again here.

Alex is up against SNP social security minister Jeane Freeman, and two Tories, Ross Thomson and Adam Tomkins. I’m slightly surprised not to see Labour’s Edinburgh South MSP Daniel Johnson there.

We shall find out if Liam and Alex have won at a glittering awards ceremony in Edinburgh on 27th October. We are sure neither of them will be as poorly behaved as one of their predecessors, who had a wee bit too much to drink at the ceremony, setting fire to a pair of curtains. He ended up having to resign his seat in the end.

Good luck to both of them. We are a bit surprised not to see Willie Rennie in the running for any awards after his energetic and humour-filled election campaign.

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