By Campbell Gunn Alex Cole-Hamilton is widely tipped as next leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats (Photo: PA) As a youngster, I was the only one of my friends with any interest in politics. It must have been instilled in me at an early age, as I recall my father and my grandfather – his father – arguing politics in the run-up to various elections. My father was a committed socialist, a Labour Party supporter. My grandfather, from Caithness, argued the Liberal corner. Perhaps it was a generational thing. In my grandfather’s youth the Liberals were the real progressive, social democratic party, while my father grew up in a time of anti-fascism, pushing those opposed to Hitler and Mussolini further to the left.