Nicol Who?

Born in Aberdeen, educated at Robert Gordon's College and the University of Aberdeen, Stephen worked as a lawyer and then in finance before becoming Scotland's youngestcouncillorin1982.He won a spectacular Westminster by-election from the Tories in Kincardine and Deeside in 1991, lost it the following year and went on to become MSP for Aberdeen South in 1999.In2003hebecameministerfor transport, and in 2005 replaced the retiring Jim Wallace as leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. And that's aboutit. Biographical information on Stephen is scant, and he does little to help lift the veil of obscurity by failing to find time to grant this newspaper an interview.

He wasn't a Marxist at university; didn't go on anti-nuclear demonstrations; didn't take drugs or join drink-sodden bastions of privilege like the Bullingdon Club. No silver spoons have been near his mouth or his nose. He is very pleasant and always polite. He plays golf . The 47-year-old is not known as a workaholic, and he spends a lot of time with his wife Caris and family, of whose privacy he is intensely protective. He relaxes by reading biographies and science journals and listening to GreenDay,Pink and Led Zeppelin. Make of that what you will.

Stephen says that young people are his passion, but not in any questionable way. What gets him up in the morning, says the LibDem leader, is his ambition to make Scotland "one of the best places in the world to bring up children". Well, doesn't everyone? This must be the most platitudinous mission statement in politics. Stephen is green, but not anti-car; he wants more powers for the parliament, but less constitutional debate; and he proposes a local income tax along with lower business taxes.

People say that Stephen rose without trace; that he has got to the position he is in merely by being there. And it has to be said that he has not exactly commanded the political stage. It is hard to think of anything that could be called "Stephenism", any pet policies, memorable phrases or distinctive contributions to Scottish political culture. His promise to make Scotland 100% renewable by 2050 is bold, but very long-term, very aspirational.

His appearances at first minister's question time in the Scottish parliament have been competent but unspectacular - to the acute discomfort of the political press corps, who want a bit of blood on the carpet and have been left chewing it in frustration instead. He can be quick-witted in debate, as he demonstrated at the Holyrood Business In The Parliament event two years ago, when he responded to a revolt by small business people. But he keeps this prowess under wraps.

Like all Liberal Democrats, Nicol Stephen can be accused of opportunism, of having a highly "adaptable" approach to party policy and ideology. He claims to be deeply committed to the environment and alternative transport, and yet was responsible for approving the controversial M74 extension through Glasgow. More recently, on the eve of the election campaign, he laid to rest the decade-long party policy on road pricing, telling the BBC : "We have listened to the public. We are not going to proceed with any road toll scheme in Scotland and we will only support such a scheme across the UK if the proposal is tax-neutral."

The other parties claim to be driven to distractionbytheLiberalDemocrat's "brazen" flexibility on policy, and insist that they are cynical vote-chasers, but somehow Stephen gets away with it. Perhaps his apparentguilelessnessishisgreatest strength. He doesn't really look or sound like a politician and doesn't make ringing declarations of faith in this that or the other policy. Consequently, when he is "adapting" the message to fit the public mood, people don't regard him as a hypocrite.

That's if they regard him at all. His profile as a leader is so low it barely registers. In last Friday's Populus Poll in the Times, only 7% of Scottish voters said he would make the best first minister - even fewer than for the no-hope Tory leader, Annabel Goldie at 10%. This is actually an improvement on hisrecentperformance.Indeed,itis remarkablethatapoliticianwithsuch abysmal popularity figures actually believes he could be the next first minister. "It can happen," says Stephen, with that artless sincerity which is his trademark.

It would, of course, be quite ridiculous for the leader of the minority party in a Holyrood coalition to become leader of the country. It does occasionallyhappen in parliaments which have dozens of parties and eternally shifting coalitions - for example, Latvia or Israel. But it would be very odd in Scotland, where there are only four parties in serious contention.

But, say Liberal Democrats, suppose that the SNP is returned as the largest party but with no hope of running an administration unaided?Stephen could then go to either JackMcConnellorAlexSalmondand demand terms. He might say that the only way Scotland would trust the SNP in power is if Alex Salmond were not leader. The nationalists would have to accept Stephen's leadership, or face handing power back to a LibLab coalition.

Aye right - in your dreams, say the SNP. There is no way that Alex Salmond would ever sit beside Nicol Stephen in Cabinet as his deputy. That is final. The nationalists are furious that Stephen appears to have abandoned his predecessor's line that the largest party after a Holyrood election should be represented in the coalition. The Liberal Democrats are hinting that they might join in with Labour and any other like-minded partiesinagrand"anti-independence" coalition to lock the SNP out of power if they return the largest number of seats.

Well, there is nothing in the Holyrood rules that says the largest party in an election has to be in the government. In Holyrood, it is quite simply a matter of ensuring that the coalition can command a majority in the parliament. Say the SNP wins 45 seats on May 3 to Labour's 42, the Liberal Democrats' 20 and the Greens' 10. There is nothing to stop a Labour-Liberal-Green coalition, led by Jack McConnell, from forming an administration, if it can get its act together. This, LibDems muse, might be another opportunity for Stephen to demand the first ministership - though his rejection by McConnell is likely to be as Anglo-Saxon as Salmond's.

But the Liberal Democrats are clearly thinking in minority terms. Under Nicol Stephen the party has, if anything, hardened up its Unionism. Earlyindicationsthat Stephenwasmoreopen-mindedtowardstheSNPhavebeen confounded by the party's rejection, under any circumstances, of a referendum on independence. The SNP have been told that Stephen "won't even lift the phone" unless Salmond abandons the plebiscite, pencilled in for 2010.

This constitutional rejectionism has surprised many commentators and infuriated the SNP. Initially, Nicol Stephen's rejection of the referendum on independence was seen as a negotiating ploy - something that would be dumped in any coalition horse-trading in exchange for ministerial red boxes.But in the past 10 days it has become clear that Stephen really is serious about not sitting down with the SNP unless they dump the one policy they can't.

Alex Salmond has dropped a broad hint that he might even be prepared to countenance a multi-option referendum which would include the Liberal Democrat's favoured constitutional option of federalism - involving more powers to Holyrood. At the launch of the SNP manifesto in Edinburgh 10 days ago, Salmond said that a single option referendum was only his "absolute preference". He pointedly refused to rule out any other ballot paper formula. But the Liberal Democrats are refusing to budge.

This seems very strange to anyone outside the closed world of Holyrood politics. After all, Nicol Stephen is offering a range of extensions to the powers of Holyrood that would take Scotland a long way down the road to independence. The Steel Commission Report, upon which LibDem policy is based, would see the Scottish parliament getting a full range of tax-raising powers, along with repatriated responsibility for things like broadcasting, energy, transport and marine policy. Stephen wants to set up a new cross-party constitutional convention, markingthefirstdecadeofHolyrood,which would review the powers of the parliament and examine ways MSPs could have a greater say even on issues like asylum and immigration, drugs and employment law.

This is radical stuff. You could imagine Salmond positively leaping at the prospect of extending Holyrood's powers to this degree. All he would need to do to "complete" the powers of the Scottish parliament is produce an independent defence and foreign policy. Moreover, Salmond shares Stephen's commitment to local income tax, renewable energy, opposition to nuclear power and rejection of the renewal of Trident in the Clyde. It's hard to believe that these parties could not do a deal. But they won't.

Nicol Stephen wants to sup with the devil he knows: Labour. And who can blame him? The Scottish Liberal Democrats have done very well out of the two terms of the partnership with Labour, and not just in terms of ministerial salaries. They have seen the implementation of cherished Liberal Democrat policies, such as electoral reform of local government,freepersonalcare,upfront tuition fees. They got a Borders rail link and the scrapping of Skye Bridge tolls, freedom of information and reduction in business rates, free eye and dental checks. In fact, the LibDems have done so well out of Labour that they have almost nothing left to demand.

Which may explain why their manifesto, with its call for smaller class sizes,more nurses, 100 new local health centres, 1000 communitypoliceofficersandtougher penalties on knife crime, looks very like Labour's. And that brings us back to the central paradox of Nicol Stephen. Here is a politician who doesn't want to stand out from the crowd; whose pitch to the voters is a smile and a fresh face, who doesn't do charisma and doesn't really have a lot of policies either.

Yet for all that, it remains the case that under the PR system, the LibDems are the only party which can more or less guarantee that they will be in government after May 3. Nicol Stephen is the anonymous kingmaker.