GAVIN Newlands has admitted he has a mixture of emotions about the General Election – but is confident he will be victorious for a third time.

The SNP candidate for Paisley and Renfrewshire North said the fact he has had to campaign for a third time in four years is frustrating, but the election simply had to happen.

When asked by The Gazette how he viewed sending voters to the polls again, it was clear his feelings were difficult to summarise.

Mr Newlands said: “It’s frustrating but we’ve done it twice, so I don’t see why we can’t do it a third time. 

“It makes a joke of the Fixed Terms Parliament Act, that’s for sure. That was brought in to try and bring some stability but, ultimately, this is necessary because Parliament is in complete gridlock. 

“Boris has tried to get his deal through and he did win a vote there, so I’m pleased there is an election rather than the Labour party actually trying to get this deal through with Boris because you’ll have heard from many Labour backbenchers and some shadow ministers that that would’ve been the preferred option for them. 

“At least we’ve got an election this side of Brexit, so we can actually do something about it.”
Mr Newlands, who was born in Paisley and grew up in Renfrew, said his team has been busy campaigning on the streets and has detected some strong support for the party.

“Technically, this is a snap election but it has been on the cards for some time, so there has been at least some preparation for a General Election, but until you know the date of said election, you can’t prepare any real strategy until you know what the conditions are,” added the dad-of-two.

“But that all being said, it had been coming for a few weeks, so we were essentially ready to go.

“We’ve now already put out circa 37,000 leaflets, hand delivered across the constituency, which is a phenomenal effort and perhaps even better than where we were at for this stage in 2015.”

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