There are many and varied reasons for Labour’s surprisingly comfortable victory in the Glasgow North East by-election. But let’s be clear: Gordon Brown had little or nothing to do with it.

The Prime Minister hardly featured in the party’s campaign, apart from a visit to a local college a week ago for which the adjective “fleeting” could have been invented. Labour made little mention of Mr Brown in campaign literature. Until he paid tribute to him in his victory speech, Willie Bain, the Labour candidate, practically ignored the Prime Minister.

It is a strange approach by a governing party but one that can work in Scotland because of devolution. With the SNP in power in Edinburgh, as Professor John Curtice, of Strathclyde University, has pointed out, Labour can portray itself as the opposition north of the Border and pretend that the UK Government’s performance is not the issue. It worked in Glenrothes last year and it has worked again in Glasgow North East.

In this by-election the SNP played into Labour’s hands. The campaign lacked focus and there was no concerted attempt to keep issues such as Gordon Brown’s role in Britain’s economic crisis or Afghanistan at the forefront of voters’ minds.Labour has learnt from its campaign last year in neighbouring Glasgow East, when it lost to the SNP. Glasgow North East has witnessed a meticulous, well-resourced Labour effort which succeeded in getting a sufficient number of core Labour voters to the polling booths.

Of course, Labour won’t be able to do that in the context of a General Election when its resources will be stretched to the limit. Neither will it be able to get away with its “Don’t Mention the Prime Minister” tactic, when voters will be pondering who they should put into Number 10 next year.

As for the Nationalists, the less said about their campaign and their candidate the better. Both were simply not up to the job. Some argue that in the context of the Holyrood election in 2011, there is much comfort in this result for Labour, since it shows that the Nationalists have stalled and are vulnerable to a Labour attack.

Scottish voters in 2011 will be selecting a national leader and First Minister, and Iain Gray still shows little sign of being a convincing alternative to Alex Salmond.

There was much relief that the BNP had not stolen third place from the Conservatives. Such an outcome would have been hugely embarrassing for Scotland and the Tories. It was the lowest ever turnout (33 per cent) for any Westminster by-election in modern times, and even lower than that for the pre-Christmas by-election in Falkirk West (36.2) in 2000, also contested by David Kerr.

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