It’s rare for a party conference to be defined by the speech of a lowly delegate rather than by a leader or front bencher. But at the SNP’s annual gathering in Aberdeen yesterday, that’s what happened. And it happened in a peculiarly Scottish fashion. Graeme McCormick spoke for the whole nation when he described his […]
Labour has had very little to celebrate in the last decade when it comes to Scotland, so it is entirely forgivable that they’ve got a bit ahead of themselves this morning. The result in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election proves that Keir Starmer can win a swathe of Scottish seats and so make his […]
Political culture in Britain will be much improved by the departure of Mhairi Black from the Commons at the next election. If you doubt this, check out her latest unhinged and childish attack on everyone who disagrees with her views on gender. As if the national debate about trans rights wasn’t already toxic enough, the […]
News of the arrest of Nicola Sturgeon by Police Scotland broke upon the Scottish political arena like a much-delayed thunder storm upon a parched summer landscape. Like those Scots unused to temperatures over 20 degrees who repeatedly refresh their BBC Weather app to find out if today will be the day when we finally get […]
The tweet from a prominent Scottish journalist said it all: “Yousaf: I don’t believe the SNP is a criminal operation.” Well, that’s reassuring. The party’s next conference slogan, perhaps? The First Minister’s considered view was reached after the rozzers made their second-highest profile arrest so far in their investigation into the SNP’s finances, this time […]
Just over a week since the new SNP leader was elected, and it’s fair to say he seems to be avoiding a honeymoon period. His inaugural session of First Minister’s Questions was repeatedly disrupted by protesters, and the latest polling suggests bigger SNP losses even than those suffered by his party at the 2017 general […]
It’s not the fact that Nicola Sturgeon has handed in her notice as First Minister of Scotland or that her husband has belatedly resigned as the SNP’s chief executive that is surprising. It’s the swiftness of recent events that bedazzles, it is the total collapse of the SNP’s façade of seriousness, discipline and unity in […]
The gloves are off… Pulling no punches… throw in the towel… Boxing metaphors are peculiarly appropriate to this SNP leadership contest. Because by the end of it, the party risks looking as if its leaders are punch drunk. This has already been a surprisingly ferocious contest, partly because the timetable drawn up to find a […]
Groundhog Day, before the 1993 movie came along, was no more than a North American tradition in which the weather for the next six weeks could be predicted according to whether the rodent of the title perceived his own shadow when emerging from its burrow. In this respect, Scottish politics can be analogous both to […]
Whatever you think about the SNP, they’ve always been pretty good at campaign slogans. Who can forget Alex Salmond’s hubristic ‘Free by ’93’? Or Nicola Sturgeon’s rather more effective ‘Stronger For Scotland’? Most famous, of course, was the 1970s clarion call to independence supporters: ‘It’s Scotland’s Oil’, which was best enunciated in an angry voice […]
The statement by Scottish Labour leader, Anas Sarwar after today’s Supreme Court ruling on whether the Scottish Government can legislate for a rerun referendum on independence, warrants some attention. ‘It was right for the Scottish Government to seek legal clarity on this question. The Supreme Court’s answer was clear and I thank them for their […]
It’s been a busy few weeks for TV’s Nicola Sturgeon. The showbiz personality and Festival Fringe favourite has been interviewed numerous times on Edinburgh’s stages in the last month, sharing her opinions with the likes of Iain Dale and Brian Cox (not the one who lives here; the other one). But, ever the trooper, she […]
Keir Starmer is facing what appears to be a no-win situation, a Kobayashi Maru, for Star Trek fans out there. Unlike his immediate predecessor as Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, Starmer understands that general elections are won in the political centre ground, by making an appeal to those who voted for the Tories last time. This […]
The Scottish Government’s policy of mandating a minimum unit price (MUP) of alcohol went through a peculiar political journey before it was ultimately proved, like so many SNP policies, to have caused more harm than good. The fact is that when it was first mooted, back in 2011, it was welcomed by a range of […]
I doubt Nicola Sturgeon wakes up in the middle of the night desperately missing the guidance of her former friend/mentor/nemesis, Alex Salmond. Nevertheless, there must be times when she wishes she, or the people around her, had the same effortless ability possessed by the former First Minister to control the media agenda, or at least […]
The wait is over. True, as publishing sensations go, the arrival of Keir Starmer’s Fabian Society pamphlet wasn’t accompanied by the excitement that greets a new JK Rowling book. But in its own terms it was an important event. Context is all, and the content of The Road Ahead is less important than the reasons […]
I am only too eager to lambast the latest iteration of our so-called culture wars, and I invariably come down on the side of those who might broadly be described as sane. I’m usually against the social justice warriors who see offence in every aspect of our lives and history and want to cancel or […]
Here’s some breaking news that will shock absolutely no one: an overwhelming number of Scottish workers support cutting the number of days a week that they have to work, with no loss of pay. Also: a large majority of voters are in favour of winning the lottery. We’ll bring you more as it develops. The […]
Yesterday was a very special day in Scotland’s political calendar. GERSday comes but once a year but when it does, the air is filled with much excitement – and an equal degree of disappointment. Before considering the various political reactions to the Scottish Government’s annual analysis of what’s been spent and raised in Scotland, we […]
While it is true that the result of the EU referendum in 2016 changed the political argument in Scotland, it is equally true to say that it made no difference at all. Conventional wisdom suggests that having been taken out of the EU “against its will” (62% of Scots voted Remain), the case for “independence […]
