Gordon Campbell: a force of nature and a genuine one-off
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He was the Dornoch Dynamo, also known as the Caithness Capercaillie, a colourful character who made his mark on the political scene in the north Highlands without ever coming close to being elected.
Gordon Campbell, who has died at the age of 82, fought six election campaigns in Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross between 1999 and 2010 (three Holyrood, three Westminster) as an independent candidate.
He had a tendency to annoy some people with his over-the-top campaigning tactics but he was also an engaging, entertaining communicator and always a star turn at eve-of-poll meetings.
I first met Gordon in 1999, ahead of the first Scottish Parliament election. Within a couple of minutes of inviting him to sit down in my office I could tell there was something about this tall, angular figure with his flashing eyes, booming voice and impassioned delivery that marked him out as different from your run-of-the-mill aspiring politician.
This was a man of vim and vigour – or, as he liked to put it, "guts and gumption".
He was to become a regular sight at subsequent elections ("impossible to avoid", some might say uncharitably). I recall a hustings in Wick in 2005 when he strode onto the stage in a striking white dinner jacket, scarlet bow tie and green rosette and proceeded to give a tour-de-force performance (that was the night of his "Messerschmitt bombing Thurso" speech). The Tory candidate, Angus Ross, was next up. Looking slightly bewildered, he told the audience: "Thank you for staying on after the number one cabaret act had finished."
It would be easy to look upon Gordon Campbell as merely a figure of fun. But let's not forget that he spent large amounts of time, energy and money on campaigning – and, as far as I could gather, he truly believed that one day he was going to win. As it turned out he lost in six out of six elections, finishing bottom of the pile three times and second-bottom in the other three. "I love canvassing," he once said, "but my God you do get kicked in the pants."
Below is the full text of an interview I did with Gordon in 2007, ahead of another Holyrood election, which I hope gives a flavour of his full-on personality and his wholehearted zeal.
I hesitated before deciding to re-publish it, in case anyone considered it disrespectful now that he has passed away. But the man himself liked it – he sent me a nice handwritten note saying so after the interview appeared in the paper. That's good enough for me.
He had a unique gift for language and wordplay, and some of his alliterative flights of fancy will always stay with me.
You could never accuse Gordon Campbell of being dull or boring or of failing to make much of an impact. He was a force of nature, a genuine one-off. Whether he was "campaigning like a hurricane" or left feeling "battered, tattered and shattered" after some temporary setback, there was never a dull moment when Gordon was around.
He passed away at his home in Dornoch last Friday. There will be a service of thanksgiving in Dornoch Cathedral on Monday, following a private interment at Creich cemetery, Bonar Bridge.
‘Politics in Scotland has been an absolute farce’
First published in the John O'Groat Journal of April 13, 2007
HE mentions the war more often than Basil Fawlty does, throwing random references to Hitler and Churchill and assorted RAF heroes into his sweeping diatribes. At an eve-of-poll meeting in Wick two years ago, wild-eyed and fired-up, he likened his canvassing tactics to “a Messerschmitt bombing Thurso”. And now Gordon Campbell is relishing the heat of battle all over again as he embarks on his fifth election campaign.
Listening to Campbell is like being strafed by the most gung-ho fighter pilot in the squadron: sometimes he hits the target, sometimes he’s crazily wide of the mark. But driving him on is a steely determination to bring down the enemy... otherwise known as the Liberal Democrats.
This is his third assault on the Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross seat in the Scottish Parliament (an institution he defines as “discredited Motherwell Labour propped up by donkeys like Jamie Stone”), having had two equally unsuccessful attempts at getting to Westminster. In 2005 he was among the also-rans as John Thurso was re-elected as MP. But this time it’s Holyrood, and Campbell has the sitting MSP firmly in his sights.
“John Thurso is a distinguished man, like myself,” he observes. “When you take on John Thurso you’re taking on Wick, you’re taking on Thurso, you’re taking on the Halkirk Gathering, you’re taking on Viscountess Thurso and, of course, Lord Maclennan. But taking on Mr Stone is a different kettle of fish altogether. ‘Together, today, let us roll away the Stone of Density tomorrow.’
“You only have to look around – the whole constituency is in disarray and decay, demolition, decommissioning... it’s a disaster. And just look at the number of closures – it’s been a chapter of closures, closures and closures.
“In Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross we’ve got no jobs, we're in a hell of a mess. And it’s because the Lib Dems are not delivering – the total lack of delivery. They’ve got no fire, they’ve got no vision, they’ve got no energy, and of course particularly they’ve got no leadership.”
I’m a proper European, not a flip-flap, silly, wet, woolly, wishy-washy European like the Lib Dems.
This gives Campbell an opening to pour scorn on Sir Menzies Campbell (no relation), the leader of the Lib Dems. “Ming gets up every week in parliament, 'Guantanamo, Guantanamo, Guantanamo,’ and he thinks he’s good on foreign policy. He knows nothing about foreign policy and he’s absolutely hopeless on domestic policy.
“I spent 40 years in Germany and I know all about Europe – I’m a proper European, not a flip-flap, silly, wet, woolly, wishy-washy European like the Lib Dems. I’ve given my life to Europe.”
Campbell, now happily settled in Sutherland, does like to offer frequent reminders of the four decades he spent working as a teacher and translator in Stuttgart. He moved to Ospisdale in 1942 as an evacuee from the London area, and from then on always returned to the north. He joined the air force at 18 and served as a pilot officer; he graduated from both Oxford and Cambridge universities; and, in addition to his time working in Germany (“reconciliation, reconciliation, reconciliation”), he spent several years in Australia. “I used to play tennis with bounce-along Evonne Goolagong, born near a billabong not far from Wagga Wagga,” Campbell announces. "I just adore Australia, and of course the best part of Australia is Tasmania, and I’m a Tasmaniac.”
Campbell, a church-going, golf-loving bachelor who is “married to Dornoch”, will celebrate his 70th birthday on May 12, less than a fortnight after the election. “I’m going to have a coronation victory,” he declares, proud of the fact that he entered the world on the day George VI was crowned as king.
In order for Campbell to achieve his own crowning glory of a seat in parliament, though, he has to convince the people of the far north – from the larger towns to the scattered communities of what he likes to call “the bush” – that behind the maverick exterior there lurks a genuinely electable politician. Not an easy task.
He says: “I’ve been campaigning like a hurricane, like a whirlwind, like a typhoon, or what we call in Australia a willy-willy. Gordon’s a willy-willy when he’s out in the bush.
“I have raised my game – nobody takes campaigning more seriously than I do. I think it’s very important to canvass. I canvass, canvass, canvass. I canvass in the bush, and in the big cities like Thurso and Wick, and Tain, Invergordon, Alness and Evanton... they all know me, because I canvass very vigorously indeed.”
Sometimes, indeed, too vigorously. To put it mildly, Campbell’s hurricane-force zeal isn’t always appreciated as he goes from place to place seeking to win the hearts and minds of the voting public. Matters came to a head in 2005 when he was found guilty of having committed a breach of the peace by ranting and swearing at members and staff of Skibo Castle’s exclusive Carnegie golf club during the run-up to that year’s election. Campbell faced the ignominy of being fined £250 at Dornoch Sheriff Court, and he says the publicity surrounding the case “wrecked my reputation”. Indeed, he told reporters at the time that his reputation had been “battered, tattered and shattered”.
That doesn’t stop him seeing the lighter side of such run-ins, though. “If you get chucked out of Skibo and Tesco on the same day then you’ve got a couple of very good campaign medals,” he says cheerfully. “I don’t mind being chucked out – I get chucked out everywhere, and I enjoy it, of course I do!”
For all the eccentricities, Campbell is perfectly serious about his manifesto pledges, bewilderingly diverse though they are. His priorities range from promoting nuclear power and pushing for more investment in schools to cutting divorce rates and ridding society of crime, gambling and euthanasia. Yes, euthanasia. He also perceives grave threats to this country’s Christian heritage and indeed to the English language. It’s certainly an agenda that no other aspiring MSP can match.
“I am an independent candidate, I’m not a party hack – Edinburgh is absolutely packed with party hacks,” Campbell maintains. “The Edinburgh parliament has been a farce, a flop and a fiasco from the word go... Fifty per cent of the Scots don’t vote and fifty per cent of them are drunk, and as a result we’re lumbered with a load of nincompoops and no-hopers, lollipops and snowdrops.
“Why are we losing all our jobs? Dounreay is in disarray and of course Gordon Campbell states forcefully that nuclear power is green energy. I am the green candidate at this election.
There is no doubt that tidal power is a great future energy source.
“Today, 10 countries in the world have nuclear weapons. In 10 years’ time, 25 countries in the world will have nuclear weapons. I believe passionately we should retain our nuclear deterrent. I am nuclear green, I am Dounreay green. There is no way ahead to ensure security of our power supplies without nuclear power. Even the Germans are getting back to nuclear power now. They realise they don’t need to be dependent on Russian gas and Middle Eastern oil.”
He also acknowledges the potential of “Pentland power”, pointing out: “There is no doubt that tidal power is a great future energy source.”
On educational matters, this self-proclaimed modern European believes there is a desperate need for a revival of foreign-language teaching in our schools. He wants to see his beloved Dornoch playing host to “the number one golf college in the world”. And he is adamant that Caithness requires a third high school – located at Halkirk – to allow for more manageable classroom sizes in Wick and Thurso.
“The central issue in my campaign is to build a new secondary school in Halkirk – education, education, education,” he proclaims. “The apprenticeship training in Britain is a complete shambles, an absolute disaster.
“One of the sad things as I wander round Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross is that one third of our children at 14 years of age can’t read and write and talk. In Sutherland we’ve got four outstanding secondary schools. In Caithness we’ve got two good [secondary] schools, but small schools are always better than big schools.”
He emphasises the importance of the tourist industry, stating: “Tourism is the future for this constituency.” However, Campbell reckons there's much room for improvement in how visitors from the US are treated. “I’m just appalled at the anti-Americanism – it’s horrific. We don’t give a warm enough welcome to our American visitors.”
Looking at the bigger picture, he claims: “We’re very much in danger of losing our Christian heritage, we’re very much in danger of losing the Queen, we’re very much in danger of losing cricket – I’m a life member of the MCC and I’m very proud of it. We’re very likely to lose our English language.
“For tyranny to succeed, all it takes is good men to do nothing. Where I live, a lot of people just sit on their bums and criticise and laugh. A gentleman today said, ‘Go to Belsen.’ Well, I mean, that’s not the way to treat people who have got the guts and gumption and the courage and the humility and the charisma... I’m Irish, I’m Welsh, I’m Scottish, I’m English, a British liquorice allsort and very proud of it.
“How on earth did Hitler take over Germany? And how on earth... Belsen and Treblinka... We’re not very far from that situation in Great Britain. And the reasons for that are abortion, gambling, crime, fraud, corruption. When I woke up one day in June last year I said, Gordon, your campaign is A, B, C, D, E – abortion, betting, crime, drugs and euthanasia.”
There’s no doubting Campbell’s commitment – after all, at the last count he had spent £250,000 contesting elections – but to what extent will his message appeal to the voters of the far north? Yes, he insists he has raised his game, but in three of his four previous campaigns he finished fifth out of sixth candidates, and he came last in the other. He amassed a best-ever 953 votes at the 2003 Holyrood election, dropping to 848 in the Westminster campaign two years later.
People like me and people like Tony Blair get vilified and denigrated and crucified every day.
Realistically, the party candidates in this constituency will not be quaking in their boots at the prospect of taking on Gordon Campbell at the ballot box. But the man himself remains ever optimistic.
“The great thing that people forget is that if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again,” he says. “I’m resilient. I’ve got a little thing called passion. I’ve spent a quarter of a million pounds of my own money and I feel very passionately that politics is important. The point I would like to stress very forcibly is that politics in Scotland has been an absolute farce... We've filled up that Edinburgh parliament with a lot of dingoes and drop-outs and no-hopers. What an absolute shambles it has been.
“People like me and people like Tony Blair get vilified and denigrated and crucified every day, but I’ve got the guts and the gumption to stand and this time, funnily enough, I’m going to win, and win well.
“The Liberal Democrats, they believe in doing nothing – sit on your bum, watch and wait and do nothing. But Campbell believes in action, action, fire, action! And action this day, not waiting until tomorrow.
“I’ve got experience, I’ve got fire, I’ve got vision, I’ve got energy, but the central thing I offer is leadership, leadership, leadership. I feel very strongly I’ve got a huge amount to offer.”
