ODDLY, the most recent General Election is the one of which I have fewest recollections.

The whole campaign, from what I recall, plodded along rather predictably. The only visual “moment” from the national campaign I can think of was of Tony Blair giving Gordon an ice cream cone. Hardly the Prescott punch or Sharron Storer moment.

In Glasgow, I was fighting for the new seat of Glasgow South, Cathcart having been consigned to history by the recent boundary review (although the Holyrood seat retains the name). There was a good, rather than excited, atmosphere in the campaign rooms – a former café on Clarkston Road, directly opposite my constituency offices. Every day we would arrive early, push up the metal shutters and wait for the inevitable trickle of constituents – both supportive and hostile – to begin. And every day I would print off a new number and display it in the shop window: the countdown to polling day. This was as much a reminder to activists as voters as to how long we had to complete the tasks of labelling, postering and canvassing we had set ourselves. (And I’ve just remembered that 2005 was the last General Election when candidates in Glasgow could attach posters to lamposts; the council have since banned it, to a mixed response from party activists.)

Despite expectations that Iraq would feature heavily in the campaign, I don’t remember that being the case at grassroots level. It was certainly raised on the doorstep, many times. But most voters for whom Iraq was a barrier to voting Labour were, for the most part, unfailingly polite. And when I asked them how they had previously voted, many of them turned out not to be Labour voters in the first place.

It’s a fact that time goes at a fraction of normal speed during election campaigns – well, if you’re a candidate, anyway. So it took about just under two years from the start of the campaign for polling day to arrive. That was hectic, as usual. I was picked up first thing by my campaign manager and taken to the polling station at the end of my road to cast my vote (and no, I’m not telling you who I voted for – it’s a secret ballot). The previous election, when I was first elected, Carolyn came with me to vote and a press photographer captured the moment for posterity. This time round, however, Carolyn was having to balance work and motherhood, so I voted alone.

Over the long day (about 52 hours, give or take) I tried to visit every polling place in the constituency and exchanged a few words with the tellers and the activists (of all parties) standing outside. There’s always a sense of tense calm on polling day itself, an awareness that the arguments are done and dusted, there’s nothing more to be done except await the voters’ verdict. So there’s little point in falling out with your opponents by then.

It was obvious that the LibDems were making a big effort among the substantial Muslim electorate in Glasgow South, exploiting their highly principled* position on Iraq. And I wasn’t surprised to discover later, at the count, that they had leapfrogged the nationalists to come second.

On BBC1 at ten o’clock, David Dimbleby revealed the exit poll prediction: a Labour majority of just 66 seats. I raised an eyebrow; lower than I had expected. But maybe our majority was being underestimated? It turned out not. At eleven, Carolyn and I left the house and met my election team at Queen’s Park Football Club and a small fleet of vehicles headed to the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre for the count.

Ah, yes – the count… In 2001, Cathcart had been counted last of the nine Glasgow seats and Carolyn and I had been very, very late to bed. And so it proved omce more four years later. It was after three in the morning before the Returning Officer called all the candidates together to show us the spoiled ballot papers and to read us the result. I was relieved that my majority had held above the 10,000 mark, although in per centage term it was slightly down on 2001. The LibDem candidate was actually the first person I met that night who told me, quite authoritatively, that I had won.

All I remember about the actual announcement of my result was being accosted by three or four reporters as I walked down from the platform immediately afterwards and asked whether or not I thought Tony Blair should resign. Well, of course he should! After all, he surely had to be punished for leading Labour to a third election victory in a row! The b*****d…

I had always believed that Tony’s announcement in 2004 that he would lead the party into one more Genereal Election and then serve a full term before stepping down was a mistake; the frenzied media speculation which began at 10.00 pm on polling day was entirely predictable.

Tired to the point of exhaustion, Carolyn and I headed back to the social club at Queen’s Park where we were just in time to see Galloway’s victory over Oona King in Bethnal Green. Then, a moron from a neighbouring Constituency Labour Party who, shall we say, had faced some difficulty in reconciling his own views on Iraq with the government’s, called me a fascist. Comradeship, eh? But I was too tired to make a big deal of it. Instead, after one drink, we headed home.

As we got ready for bed, I noticed I had received a voicemail from Jim Knight, who was defending a majority of 153 in South Dorset. He was calling with the happy news that, against the odds, he had increased that to 1812. That was a nice note on which finally to go to sleep.

* yeah, right…

Next instalment: 1983