Well here we all are. What a short, sharp election campaign it’s been. Not!

Well here we all are. What a short, sharp election campaign it’s been. Not!

For those of us who imbibe election material like a really good three course meal there will be a sense of loss come Friday. (Though, if the crystal ball gazers are right, there may be more excitements to come in the following days or even weeks.) But for others there will be a not so secret sigh of relief that they can turn on their communication device of choice and not be harangued by a bunch of earnest folk flogging their manifesto wares.

These weary non believers should only be indulged if they promise – cross their hearts and hope to die – to turn up at a polling station in the course of today.

There are fifteen hours available folks so there is nobody who can’t spare the time.

I’ve been asked to join a BBC eve of poll panel reflecting on the 2015 campaign, and I’ve been trying to piece together, as honestly as possible, some personal highlights.

The chaps will forgive me if one of the most vivid of these has been the performance of many of the women involved.

By common consent Nicola Sturgeon has had a good war, but so, in a country with currently just one Tory MP, has the Conservative’s Ruth Davidson. She’s managed to blow a lot of cobwebs from her party’s cupboard and confounded all those who derided her lack of experience.

But the same is true UK wide. One of the most arresting TV images of the assorted debates was Sturgeon having a group hug with Plaid Cymru’s Wood and the Green’s Bennett.

Politics could use a lot more hugs and a lot less hysteria.

But there was also a much less well publicised debate on Radio 4’ Woman’s Hour which had no fewer than seven senior party spokespeople including folk like Teresa May and Harriet Harman. Nobody interrupted. Not once. Nobody got fractious. Not once. Everybody got a hearing and the listeners got some decent insight into who stood where on what.

I’ m not suggesting this is an immutable law of nature. I gather there was a referendum confrontation between Nicola Sturgeon and Johann Lamont which put the average stairheid rammy well in the shade. But, so far as the general election 2015 is concerned, most of the women, most of the time, have done their party cause no harm at all.

Which brings us to our own dear hustings in the Tower Arts Centre this time last week. I won’t say that peace broke out unchecked – miracles take a little longer – but the candidates behaved with courtesy and only a modest proportion of the audience thought that serial shouting was more effective than using a microphone.

Up on the dais, the most disconcerting thing was the fact that only the front section of the audience was visible. Most of the time you were trying to deal with disembodied voices.

Which is what I’m using as an alibi for temporarily turning one young bloke into a young woman!

However the comforting thing for democracy was that the event attracted hundreds of people, and, apparently another two and a half thousand watched the live screening thanks to URTV. Must admit I preferred not to think about that.

The last thing you need while trying to keep track of a live debate and juggle audience interventions is to wonder whether you remembered to stick on some lippy in the loo.e_SClB Intro Text