Their manifesto was entitled "Passport to Prosperity" and highlighted their support for the Right to Buy policy, a pledge to build new swimming baths and their support for small businesses at the newly established industrial estate in Bonnyton.

[3] Labour's campaign focused on the Thatcher government at Westminster which was unpopular in Scotland with their election literature headed "Tory Rule Not OK".

They pledged to modernise the council's housing stock, provide leisure facilities for the whole family and introduce a more creative job opportunity scheme in response to raising unemployment.

[3] The SNP campaigned on a perceived "criminal" wasting of money within local government claiming that while rents and rates had increased dramatically since the local government reforms in 1974, ratepayers were instead funding "pleasure trips" for councillors in relation to town twinning.

[7] The result reflected a "strong anti-Tory trend" across Scotland according to Conservative group leader Cllr Alan MacDougal while former SNP councillor Leslie Flannigan blamed the Thatcher government for the party's losses as they were caught "in the middle of a shift from Tory to Labour".