THE Liberal Democrats have the ability to recover most if not all of the ground they lost in the 2015 General Election, Alistair Carmichael, the former Scottish Secretary, has suggested.

The party’s sole Scottish MP said that while he was not counting any chickens, he believed there were “opportunities” for the Lib Dems, who will focus their campaigning on opposing Brexit, a policy the pro-EU party has created a distinctive position on in calling for a second poll on the final withdrawal deal.

In Scotland, Mr Carmichael said there was a great opportunity to recover some of the 10 seats the party lost given what he called was the “massive unpopularity” of the Nationalists’ drive for another independence referendum and the majority support for Remain.

Two years ago, the Lib Dems experienced an electoral disaster, losing 49 seats across Britain and retaining just eight. They will now be heavily targeting resources on previously successful areas such as London, where former Cabinet ministers Sir Ed Davey and Sir Vince Cable will fight seats.

In Scotland the targets are obvious, Fife North East, Caithness, Argyll and Bute, East Dunbartonshire and Edinburgh West; all seats they previously held.

While the south west of England has previously been a Lib Dem stronghold, recovery there might not be so straightforward given places like Devon, Cornwall and Somerset all backed Brexit and will be unlikely to support Tim Farron’s pro-EU message.

Although the party is still only polling around 10 per cent, its tail is up because of its new-found cause: staunchly opposing Brexit.

In December, Sarah Olney upped to nine the Lib Dems’ Commons contingent by winning the Richmond Park by-election and there have since been council by-election wins.

Also, the Lib Dem leadership believes the student vote, which largely abandoned the party after 2010 because of the u-turn on scrapping university tuition fees, is now returning because of its heavily pro-EU stance.

Mr Farron, who will arguably be the opposition leader happiest at the prospect of a snap election, has made clear his party’s ambition is to prevent the Tories having an outright majority, which would give his party leverage over the terms of Brexit ie soft not hard.

"If you want a Britain that is open, tolerant and united, this is your chance. Only the Liberal Democrats can prevent a Conservative majority."