DEPENDING on who you speak to on the streets of Edinburgh West constituency, this is either a two-horse race between the Tories and the SNP or a three-horse race with the addition of the Liberal Democrats.

There is no sitting MP, Michelle Thomson having stood down, but it is an existing SNP seat, albeit by a majority of only 3210, with local man Tony Giugliano seen as a strong contender for them. He at least is well-known in parts of the constituency having campaigned on local issues such as the bus route to Queensferry.

According to the Unionist media, the SNP will do very well to hold on to this seat, with the Financial Times, no less, predicting a Conservative victory. Other pundits think it’s a Liberal Democrat shoo-in.

The trouble with judging Edinburgh West on a “people” basis is that none of the five candidates has stood in the Westminster constituency before, though both Giugliano and Sandy Batho of the Conservatives stood in the Edinburgh Western constituency in last year’s Scottish Parliamentary elections.

Maddeningly, the boundaries are different between the Holyrood and Westminster seats so there’s no direct comparison, but Giugliano came second behind the Liberal Democrats’ Alex Cole-Hamilton – he’s now in charge of running their Scottish campaign – with Batho a poor third with just 14.3 per cent of the vote.

There was no doubt that Cole-Hamilton benefitted hugely from tactical voting by Tory electors, and the Liberal Democrats are pinning their hopes on that happening again.

The Conservatives, meanwhile are hoping that on the back of an encouraging performance in the local elections that enough Liberal Democrat voters will be persuaded that the Tories are the best of the Unionists.

Make no mistake, as their campaign literature shows, both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats see themselves as the anti-SNP, anti-second referendum force in Edinburgh West. According to one local SNP rosette-wearer encountered in Corstorphine, that’s “fine and dandy because people around here know this is much more than a single-issue election”.

The Liberal Democrats have stated that Edinburgh West is one of their top targets and they have the experienced Christine Jardine, Scotland media adviser to the Tory-Liberal Democrat coalition Government from 2010 onwards, standing in a constituency where she came to live in 2016.

Jardine is best known for standing and losing to Alex Salmond in his Gordon constituency in the 2015 general election and she lost again in Aberdeenshire in the 2016 Holyrood election where she came third, a fact which curiously is missing from her official candidate’s profile on the party’s website.

Batho is the HR Director of Babcock International who stood in the Linlithgow and Falkirk East constituency in 2015, coming third with just 12 per cent of the vote.

The problem for the Liberal Democrat tactical voting theory is that Batho is determined to put up a fight in a constituency that was once a Tory (Unionist then Conservative) stronghold for much of its existence since the seat came into being in 1885, its boundaries varying only slightly ever since its inception.

It was only in the 1990s that the seat switched to the Liberals in the shape of the redoubtable Donald Gorrie, and he was followed by John Barrett and Mike Crockart until the SNP came from fourth to snatch the seat.

Judged on that most unscientific of opinion polls, The National streetwise vox pop, it is not looking good for Labour’s Mandy Telford, while the fifth candidate, Mark Whittet of Scotland’s Independence Referendum Party – he is its leader and treasurer – will do well to keep his deposit as none of the people we spoke to had heard of him.

There are other complicating factors in this seat. It is home to the headquarters of RBS and there are several financial institutions based there or who have offices in the constituency.

The area – as part of the City of Edinburgh – may have voted No in the 2014 referendum but there was an overwhelming vote to Remain and the Conservatives may have a difficult time over Brexit.

One person who works in banking security at the Gyle told The National: “A lot of people here who would normally vote Tory are alarmed at Theresa May’s policy on a hard Brexit. They genuinely fear for their jobs if we come out of the EU and it’s no use the LibDems going on about a second referendum because they are just not going to get in.

“Labour or the SNP? It’s not a choice these people want to make.”

Andy Balfour is a student in the city and he is adamant that the outcome in Edinburgh West, which is home to a lot of students who attend Heriot-Watt and Napier Universities, could turn on the student vote.

He said: “Students are smart enough to know that Jeremy Corbyn won’t get in, so the only party that really works for students is the SNP.

“If I was the SNP candidate I would concentrate on young people such as students and get as many of them voting as he can, using postal votes if necessary.”

Murrayfield is staunch Conservative and Unionist territory, yet close to the national rugby stadium Alistair King was happy to give his opinion to The National: “I wouldn’t vote for that bloody woman if I was paid.”

Trouble is he stomped off without saying what “bloody woman” he was talking about.

If the Unionists and their supporters in the other parties ever manage to work out which of their parties they are going to tactically support, the SNP might be in trouble in Edinburgh West.

Otherwise, Toni Giugliano could well hold on to this key battleground.

Tomorrow: Orkney and Shetland