Exclusive:We've toppled Kate Forbes - now we're after Fergus Ewing, declares Alex Cole-Hamilton

In an exclusive interview with The Scotsman’s politics podcast The Steamie, party leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said he was talking to a number of MSPs about defections to the Lib Dems. And he said he believed Reform’s popularity in Scotland was “overstated”.

Mr Cole-Hamilton has previously said his party could win up to 15 seats in next year’s Holyrood election. The most recent polling suggests they could win up to ten seats, doubling their existing number in the Scottish Parliament.

Speaking to The Steamie, he said: “In constituencies right across the country, the Lib Dems are poised to beat the SNP.

“Right across the Highlands we’re going to see big Lib Dem gains and in Strathkelvin, Edinburgh Northern, Argyll and Bute and other parts of the country we’re very close to beating the SNP.

“This is the first election we’ve had in many years where we’re on the cusp of a massive breakthrough and I think we will be rewarded at the ballot box.”

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When asked if there were any big SNP names the Lib Dems could topple, Mr Cole-Hamilton said: “I think we’ve already toppled one big name when Kate Forbes decided she was going to step down at the end of this Parliament.

“That will be a loss in terms of her intelligence and the contribution she brings to the chamber. But I think it’s also because she was seeing that despite her having quite a significant majority, we have eaten away at her seat at the general election with [Lib Dems MP] Angus MacDonald.

“We are looking to replicate that across the Highlands. Fergus Ewing is another one in Inverness and Nairn. He is obviously standing as an independent, but we’re confident that Neil Alexander will come up the middle and take it.

“Maree Todd is also another big figure in Caithness, Sutherland and Ross. In the general election, Jamie Stone got a near 10,000 majority there, so that’s put her on notice too.

“I’m not going to put a ceiling on our ambition.”

In the 2021 Holyrood election, Mr Cole-Hamilton won the Edinburgh North seat with a majority of 9,885 votes. However, he said he would cut this majority “in half” if it meant “quadrupling” the number of Lib Dem MSPs elected in 2026 - something he said was “eminently doable”.

His party won four seats back in 2021, but now have five sitting MSPs after Jamie Greene MSP defected from the Scottish Conservatives earlier this year.

Mr Cole-Hamilton said he was still talking to other politicians about joining his ranks. He said: “Jamie is not the only one who joined the Conservatives in the days of [former party leader] Ruth Davidson.

“They adopted a progressive approach of opportunities for all and support for the most vulnerable, and have been horrified by the desertion of that ground by Douglas Ross and latterly Russell Findlay, so talks continue.”

“I am still certainly talking to other MSPs.”

Both the Lib Dems and the Scottish Conservatives are polling behind Nigel Farage’s Reform UK in the Holyrood polls. The most recent poll by Survation had Reform UK on 17 seats, with the Scottish Conservatives fourth on 11 and the Scottish Lib Dems just behind on ten.

The Lib Dems are not worried though - they believe Reform’s popularity in the polls will not play out at the ballot box in May.

“I think Reform are overpriced at the moment,” Mr Cole-Hamilton said. “They’re overstated.

“They’ve not had the cut through in Scotland that they’ve had in other parts of the UK, and they’ve certainly not had the rash of council by-election wins that we’ve had.”

He also said he hoped Reform UK would “hold themselves to a higher standard” in the upcoming election than they did during the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election in June.

During that election campaign, Reform UK and Mr Farage were criticised for what was labelled “racist” adverts targeting Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar.

These adverts wrongly claimed Mr Sarwar would prioritise the Pakistani community if he was first minister. When journalists asked Mr Farage to retract this statement and apologise, he dubbed down on the unfounded claim.

When asked if he had any concerns about this being repeated next year, Mr Cole-Hamilton said: “I recognise parties are duly elected and they have a right to take their seats, but that has to be within the confines of the law and the parameters of public decency and respect.

“I would hope they would hold themselves to a higher standard than they did in the Hamilton by-election.”

The full interview with Mr Cole-Hamilton on The Steamie politics podcast will drop on Thursday afternoon.