Harding: quitting Tories

The Scottish Conservatives have suffered the first blow of the election campaign with the news that a frontbencher has quit the party.

Keith Harding announced that he is to defect to the centre-right Scottish People's Alliance, which was launched last week.

After 25 years as a party member, the MSP said: "I have not changed. The Conservative Party has."

The move is an embarrassing blow to Scottish Conservative leader David McLetchie, and will be a welcome boost to Scotland's newest party.

But Harding was unlikely to have been returned to Holyrood as a Conservative after the election.

He was set to contend the Labour stronghold of Central Fife and had been given the number five slot on the Tories' Mid Scotland and Fife regional list.

That effectively meant that his parliamentary career came to an end when the parliament was dissolved on Monday night.

Party leader David McLetchie dismissed Harding's defection as "a minor distraction".

"I am disappointed that Keith has chosen to turn his back on his friends and colleagues in the Scottish parliament, and in Stirling Council, who have supported him over the last 25 years," he said.

"We will move on and continue to campaign positively and purposefully, exposing the Scottish government's record of tax and waste and fighting for Conservative principles and policies throughout Scotland."

Despite the sour grapes claim, Harding said it was "one of the most difficult decisions" he had ever taken.

"I have thought long and hard about it and decided to join a party which is more in tune with my political beliefs," he told the Scotsman newspaper.

"I think it is long overdue to have a right-of-centre party offering new policies to what I regard as the disenfranchised sector of the population."

He welcomed the creation of the SPA, which he said offered a credible alternative to the Scottish Conservatives.

"I genuinely believe that the manifesto of this party is more in tune with my principles. They are offering a centre-right alternative," he said.