THERE'S something a bit familiar about this group. Something about its youth and zeal, its sense of being organised and the smattering of accents from across Britain.

Sophie and Dan are the first arrive, having walked from the west end of Glasgow's Byres Road epicentre. All checked shirts and Converse trainers, they straddle the line between hipster and post-grad student. There is a varsity hoodie amongst the early arrivals, some high-end running shoes, a rugby shirt and one or two naturally pulling off the 'nerd chic' look.

Read more: Constitution and cuts sidelined as Scots Catholic martyr become hot election topic

Watchers of election campaigns in Glasgow over the past 20 years may have wrongly recognised the bright, young Labour apparatchiks once bussed in en masse like political Jehovah's Witnesses to persuade working class Glasgow of the virtues of centrist politics and the folly of nationalism.

Only Hamish, in his drop-brim tweed hat and matching jacket, gives the game away.

Like JR Hartley, the ageing fictional author of Fly Fishing from the Yellow Pages TV campaign of the mid-1980s, but with a Union flag badge on his lapels, the veteran campaigner of every General Election since 1959 is in buoyant form.

"Scots have always agreed with the Tories on a lot of issues but haven't liked us as people. But the constitutional debate has changed all that and they're now agreeing with us on any number of issues and will now stay with us.

"The last council election I was involved in was a by-election in Shettleston in 2013. How people now relate, in such a short space of time, is totally different. It wasn't hatred. It was an issue of relevance.

"But the Union is in our DNA. I was never a Young Conservative. I was a Young Unionist."

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The plan is to blitz the Kelvindale area, a day of action on the hottest day so far of 2017. Within a few minutes in the company of the team pounding Glasgow in the hope and growing expectation of a meaningful Tory presence on the city council for the first time in generations, its clear it isn't just the SNP which has taken some of Labour's clothes. The Tories are also taking their votes.

Adjacent to the west end's 'stockbroker and celebrity belt' and just south of traditional working class Maryhill, Kelvindale's semi-detached interwar villas are amongst the most sought after family properties within the city boundaries. Even the concrete 1930s tenements would not fall into the 'affordable' bracket as the terms is used for properties just a few hundred metres away.

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Represented at Holyrood and Westminster by the SNP and on the city council by two Nationalist and two Labour members it was, however, the one-time stronghold of Bill Aitken, the Tory torch bearer from the days of Teddy Taylor and the only meaningful Conservative voice in Glasgow for a decade or two.

On streets named Manchester, Winchester, Weymouth and Penrith it seems an apt place to go in search for a Unionist vote.

Martyn McIntyre is coordinating the day. In his mid-30s and fully employed in politics, he is organising the Tory local campaign across the west of Scotland.

"We've really been working on the Glasgow campaign since last September, during which time we've been identifying new voters. But this isn't Perthshire or East Renfrewshire. It's Glasgow. It's somewhat different. But Ruth (Davidson) was an MSP here for a five years and she's been at the forefront of the campaign. And we have quite a few new people, including a young husband and wife team."

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The husband is Tony Curtis, the local candidate for Partick East and and clearly the frontman the Tories hope can make an impact in the City Chambers. Spoken of as Ruth Davidson's "golden boy" by rivals, Curtis, with shaven head and Barbour jacket and T-shirt combo, looks as much a semi-retired 1990s DJ as a political candidate for any party, let alone the Tories.

(The writer and broadcaster Muriel Gray Tweeted: "Frankly, if the Labour candidate isn't Kirk Douglas I'll be rather disappointed.")

According to the popular narrative 2014 was the political trigger for the newly emerged champions of Scottish independence who have flooded the ranks of the SNP and even become MPs.

But the referendum also switched on the Unionist light, and the 35-year-old Curtis was amongst those flocking to the frontline.

"My wife then stood as a candidate for the Scottish Parliament in 2016 and I saw how accessible politics was", he says. "I couldn't just sit by and talk about stuff."

Brought up in a working class housing scheme in Clydebank, Curtis studied sports science at Jordanhill College, moving to the west end aged 16. Now based in a comfortable suburb over the city's boundaries in South Lanarkshire, the father-of-one owns a gym in Glasgow's Merchant City.

He cites the SNP's polarising Named Person's policy coinciding with becoming a parent as a catalyst for standing for office. "It's Nationalist control of people's lives", he says.

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With such high-end ideals and crusades as the territorial integrity of the UK and personal freedoms I suggest to the cordial and articulate Curtis he might be ill-prepared for the crushingly mundane reality of local government.

"I run and own a business" he responds. "I pay business rates, have issues with what I'm paying for, be that bus lanes, broken pavements or the fact there isn't a bin in the vicinity of my premises.

"So these things matter to me. When I attempt to talk to the council it's really difficult to get any answer."

(I'm later told his wife, who is standing in Cambuslang in South Lanarkshire, is a former council official, understands how local authorities operate at a corporate level and believes councils need to be more transparent and work smarter where public finances are concerned.)

While the day's 'big push' is being directed by Martyn, Curtis is clearly the charisma of the bunch, the only one attempting to engage the odd resident pottering outside. It isn't that they are hostile but cleaning the family car or preparing the front porch for the day's weather is preferable to political engagement before the sun is over the yard arm.

One middle-aged couple politely accept the campaign literature. "Would you ever consider voting for this lot?" I ask. "Never" and "no" came the responses. "We're both Labour voters and that's unlikely to change." But maybe a second vote for the Union, a blow to Nicola Sturgeon, no to a second independence referendum?

"Our second votes will probably go to the SNP." Perhaps in some areas of the west of Scotland the Tory reputation, legacy and stereotype has more potency than a border.

Several doors along Jim McNeill's response to his visitors is near instant. "It's going in the bin", the 66-year-old says when asked if he would consider Conservative.

"I was always Labour until they lost the plot and now I'm an SNP voter. But I've been through the Thatcher years and couldn't ever trust them. Look at the leaflets. It's ridiculous that they're bringing up independence in a local election."

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Further along the street one middle-aged blonde woman I initially mistake for one of the group heads to her front door clutching several leaflets. I introduce myself as a journalist and ask if she will bother to read them. "I certainly will," she responds. And would she consider voting Tory? "I'll make my mind once I've read this."

I recount my straw poll of three households to Curtis, by now several streets away. "Well, a 33 per cent hit rate isn't bad. If we can replicate that across the city it could be a very good day."

He adds: "The Tories down south are very different to those up here. Down there it's left versus right. Up here its Unionist versus Nationalist. We're centre-right and Ruth is a terrific asset."

Michael Kusznir is standing in Dennistoun in the east end of Glasgow, where the target Tory voter is an altogether different demographic from comfortable Kelvindale.

A party member since 2011, the local elections are an opportunity for electoral experience for the 24-year-old trainee solicitor.

Why Dennistoun? "It's more a case of Dennistoun chose me and if I'm elected I'll move there", he says. "Certainly within the wider area there's an element of the Orange vote but there's also the old school Unionist Labour vote which is turning to us because of (Labour Leader Jeremy) Corbyn and (Scottish Labour Leader Kezia) Dugdale.

Phillip 'Charlie' Charles believes he has an outside chance in another east end area, Ballieston. The ex-serviceman, who has lived in Scotland for 20 years, senses a change. "We're down to a three member ward and with the second preferences from a unionist Labour vote we might be through. That wouldn't have been the case 10 years ago."

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The last time Labour were out of power in Glasgow it was the Conservatives, under the stalwart John Young, who held sway between 1977 and 1979. The party at that stage still had a Westminster presence in Glasgow, with Teddy Taylor in Cathcart and Sir Thomas Galbraith, who held Hillhead for 34 years until his death in 1982. In their guise as the Progressives, essentially a municipal local brand of the Tories, they held the city before that in the late 1960s.

But for spell in the late 1990s, when looking for an elected Scots Tory to comment on anything the party had to scour the ranks of its councils.

At Holyrood, Glasgow had only ever returned a single list MSP but doubled its vote and representation in 2016 with the election of Adam Tomkins and Annie Wells, and the pair are clearly the fulcrum for the team campaigning today.

The first election after local government reorganisation in 1995 saw the city return three Tories. By 1999 it was reduced to one, in Pollokshields, the only ward to have a Conservative presence since.

Since 2007 it has been held by David Meikle, best known outside the City Chambers for his cross-party marriage to outgoing MP Natalie McGarry and the victim of a surreal campaign of social media mocking. Within the council he has a reputation as one of the most diligent ward representatives if politically neutered by his one-man band status.

Is he relishing having a gang for back up? "Certainly things are more positive since the 2016 election. People are engaging well and we've got a better opportunity than we've had for some time.

"I've been Glasgow's only Conservative councillor for a decade and that's been really difficult, impossible for putting forward motions or making amendments."

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As we stand amongst the sandstone villas on Cleveden Road ready to head off, an engagement develops which has since set the tone for the Tory campaign as much as a second referendum or Prime Minister Theresa May's subsequent announcement of a General Election.

"Excuse me, are these your leaflets?", asks a resident. "Two days ago you passed a law on tax credits which requires people to declare if they've been raped. It's had a lot of coverage. Can you tell me your position, please?"

Martyn McIntyre has the honour of being amongst the first Tories to explain his stance on the now infamous rape clause to the electorate.

"I really know I should be up on this and have heard of it but I really can't answer", he responds.

The woman, who identifies herself as Dorothy Aidulis, a doctor in life sciences at Glasgow University, is not satisfied.

"Can you find out please and put it in your leaflets. You really should know this stuff and it has as much to do with the local elections as the independence referendum on all your material. It gives me no confidence for what you can for Glasgow when you don’t know this stuff."

The five-minute encounter ends amicably but the dye was cast. Three days later I attend a husting hosted by housing charity Shelter in Maryhill.

Representing the Tories is Taylor Muir, at 21 already a veteran of two elections and standing in South Lanarkshire. "They put him forward for lots of this stuff. He's pretty level-headed and knows the social stuff, handles it well", a Labour contact tells me.

In his opening pitch the law student touches on support for increased social housing, homeless initiatives, assistance for those leaving prison and a Tory pledge to focus on 'hard-to-reach' social groups if in council power. It all seems very unTory.

As the floor is opened for questions, the first is directed at Muir. "Will you apologise for the rape clause?" asks a Labour activist.

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He shows a deft fleet of foot, expressing an empathy with those caught up, an understanding of the need for new administrative approaches and an acceptance of why people feel strongly.

But the luxury of opposition the Scottish Tories have been enjoying on domestic matters has been contaminated, the SNP and Labour seizing on the Nasty Party tag handed to it by the rape clause issue. Suddenly, pronouncements on the constitution are being met with questions on austerity. There is no longer clear blue water between the Tories at Holyrood and Westminster.

The Tories are likely to become the second party nationally within local government, Labour sources admitting their rivals for the Union vote have made major inroads into their vote share. But while the likelihood of second place in Glasgow would require the suspension of disbelief no-one is foolhardy enough to rule out Tony Curtis and his supporting cast on the city's biggest stage.