Scotland’s first minister, Humza Yousaf, has urged Scots to vote for the Scottish National Party at the upcoming 2024 General Election in order to “kick the Tories out”, as his party prepares to launch its campaign.

In a speech on Friday, Mr Yousaf asserted that Rishi Sunak is “finished” and will implore voters across Scotland to “take the opportunity to kick them out of Scotland completely” as “the damage they have caused to Scotland is unforgiveable”.

He called upon the electorate to vote for the SNP, explaining that his party is “best placed” to remove the Conservatives, as the SNP is currently second in every Tory-held seat across Scotland.

Mr Yousaf’s speech comes just days after a rival speech from the leader of Scottish Labour, Anas Sarwar, who opted for a similar message and urged supporters of Scottish independence to defect from the SNP and lend their vote to Labour in order to vote the Conservatives out, exhorting them to “unite to change the country”.

The last time Scotland saw a Conservative wipe-out was during the 1997 election, when all of the Scottish Conservative MPs lost their seats to Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the SNP.

In 2005, the Conservatives managed to claw back just one Scottish constituency when David Mundell won the seat of Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale and was made shadow secretary of state for Scotland by the then Conservative leader, David Cameron.

So low was the number of Scottish Conservatives in the early 2000s that in 2010, Mr Mundell became the butt of the infamous joke that there are “more pandas in Scotland than Scottish MPs” after Edinburgh Zoo gained two giant pandas.

Now, some are predicting that the Conservatives could suffer a similar defeat in Scotland, following their poor performance in opinion polls and the resignation of both the leader of the Scottish Tories, Douglas Ross, and the current Scottish secretary Alister Jack, both of whom are set to stand down at the end of the current parliament.

Tory leaders expected to stand down at the election – Douglas Ross and Alister Jack.

Mr Sunak has, however, strongly rebutted the suggestion that his party will see enormous losses in Scotland, and told journalists in December that he was “very confident” about his party’s prospects north of the Scottish border.

Meanwhile, the Labour Party may be quietly confident about its chances in Scotland, following the Labour gain of an SNP seat at the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election in October last year. 

Scotland is expected to be a key battleground at the next election, with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer having remarked that “the route to a Labour election win at the next general election runs through Scotland”.

But Starmer is perceived by many in Labour to be yet another middle class London-based lawyer turned politician, an image that is proving unpopular with many Scots who are perceived to be far more Left Wing and preferred to have Jeremy Corbyn in charge.

There is no prospect of a walk-over for Labour in the Old Kilpatrick and Loch Lomondside hills and glens of West Dunbartonshire and certainly not in the large swathes of deprived housing schemes of Vale of Leven, Clydeside and the main cities of Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and Aberdeen.

Dame Jackie Baillie will be backing Labour’s Douglas McAllister (centre) against the SNP’s Martin Docherty-Hughes in the West Dunbartonshire constituency.

In West Dunbartonshire, which has been traditionally Labour since the middle of last century, the SNP have taken a firm foothold and the sitting Westminster MP Martin Docherty-Hughes, who walked off with the spoils last time by thrashing a rookie Labour candidate, is popular, particularly in his home turf  of Clydebank.

Docherty-Hughes, who is gay, has the backing of Clydebank’s large Irish diaspora which is now into its fifth generation. His Donegal-burn father, Patrick, pictured left with his son, who is a kenspeckle figure in the Whitecrook area of the old shipyard and sewing machine town, celebrated his 90th birthday just the other day.

The Labour prospective candidate is solicitor Douglas McAllister, Provost of West Dunbartonshire Council, which is increasingly unpopular in the Dumbarton and Vale of Leven areas of the city because of budget cuts for public services.

Docherty-Hughes is upbeat about his prospects despite the SNP’s leadership and money troubles and  he doesn’t expect to lose his 9,000 majority.

Dame Jackie Baillie, deputy leader of the Labour Party in Scotland and the MSP for Dumbarton constituency, is extremely popular with voters and was recently made a Dame in the King’s Honours List.

Baillie will be at the forefront of Douglas McAllister’s Westminster campaign.

Baillie, who has been in the Scottish Parliament since its inception, is close to the Labour leader Anas Sarwar.

She has been involved with him in campaigning against long hospital waiting lists and poor management of the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde Health Board, which covers West Dunbartonshire.

Commenting following Humza Yousaf’s speech this afternoon,  Jackie Baillie said: “Today’s speech from Humza Yousaf was nothing more than another desperate attempt to reset the SNP’s failing political strategy.

“From talking down the influence that Scottish voters have to desperately moving the electoral goal posts, it is clear that the SNP is in trouble.  Whether the SNP and the Tories like it or not, change can come to Scotland in 2024.  Join us on that journey to deliver the change Scotland needs.”