The last in my post-election survey of Britain’s main political parties concludes with the Scottish National Party. Alongside the Conservatives, it was a big loser in the general election, being reduced from 48 seats to just 9. But they still control the Scottish parliament, with no election until 2026. They are down but definitely not out. But they will need to do some should searching if they are not to sink back further.
Firstly, though, I must offer a health warning. I am not Scottish, and I have few political contacts north of the border. I am not plugged into politics there in the way that I am in England. So this is very much an outsider’s view. Still outsiders’ views can have value – and Scottish politics does impact English politics through our shared nation.
The SNP’s fall over the last two years has been dramatic. Until 2023, the party was sweeping all before it in Scotland. Nicola Sturgeon, its leader, was one of the most experienced in British politics, and presented a calm, reasonable face to the party – she was a gifted political communicator. And yet behind this calm exterior, all was clearly not well. The performance of the Scottish government under SNP control was lacklustre, on such basic issues as health, education and law and order (Glasgow having an astonishingly bad record on drugs). Ms Sturgeon presented a much more credible public face during the covid pandemic than England’s Boris Johnson – but Scotland’s results were no better. The SNP seemed too interested in politics and not enough in administration. It preferred to stay close with interest groups, rather than undertake tough reforms – apart from a botched reform of Scotland’s police. The reforms that there were centralised power to the Edinburgh government. Its Green coalition partners proved highly ideological and spent little effort engaging with the public. The Scottish government then took on a reform of gender recognition laws that was aligned with the leftwing-liberal consensus, but poorly aligned with general public opinion. This was heavily promoted by the Greens, but actually drew support from across the political spectrum. Public protests and celebrity opposition (notably from Scottish author J.K. Rowling) seemed to take the Edinburgh elite by surprise. When the UK government (led by the very unpopular and chaotic conservatives) blocked the law, it won rare approval north of the border. Meanwhile the party’s goal of Scottish independence remained a long way off, as the UK government refused a second referendum.
And then the incestuous goings on in the SNP’s internal management were exposed in a police investigation into possible misuse of funds. Ms Sturgeon retired as leader just before the storm broke. The alleged abuse (using funds donated to support an independence referendum for general electioneering) was not necessarily all that serious – and its illegality has yet to be resolved. But the scandal exposed very unhealthy governance. The party’s reputation was in tatters, not helped by the selection of a hapless new leader, Hamza Youssef , who seemed to expose the party’s lack of depth in talent. Was this party really capable of running an independent country? And that led on to the collapse in SNP vote and representation in the UK parliament. Labour surged in Scotland.
But all is not lost. The goings on at the SNP have not had much impact on support for Scottish independence, which runs at about 40%. This is not enough to win a referendum, but it is weighted towards younger voters, promising a majority in future. And the SNP has no serious rival in its leadership of the independence movement. The attempt by former leader (the late) Alec Salmond to establish a rival party was a dismal failure. Meanwhile Labour’s hapless start in government has wounded its main rival for votes north of the border, while the Conservatives remain weak, and Reform UK lacks the punch it has in England or Wales.
But the party must pose deep questions to itself. Politics has changed. The Scottish political elite has converged around a social democratic consensus. A big inspiration seems to have been the social democratic governments in Scandinavia – countries which, after all, are comparable in size to Scotland. While social democrats have been in retreat in England (and Wales), they assumed Scotland was different. The country produced a Remain majority in the EU referendum after all. But the whole world is moving against the social democratic – liberal – left consensus, including in Scandinavia. Immigration has become a top political issue. Gender-critical views, rejecting the extremes represented by Scotland’s self-identification laws, are mainstream. People are becoming wary of minority identity politics. A rising dependency ratio means that people question state benefits. Tax rises are resisted. Scotland can no more escape these trends than Scandinavia, where populist parties have been doing well. And more conservative views within the SNP, represented by leadership challenger Kate Forbes, are becoming more visible. Indeed Ms Forbes is clearly the most dynamic of the party’s senior politicians.
The question for the SNP is how far it follows these trends, and adopts Ireland as its model rather than Denmark or Sweden. Low taxes and a weaker welfare state are core to politics there. So far it has managed to scoop up the anti-establishment vote, by virtue of its support for independence, alongside more mainstream supporters. This could easily fray, with the Conservatives and/or Reform picking up support.
The current leader, John Swinney, is one of the party’s elders, and looks like a stopgap before the party takes its next bold steps. He will doubtless try to pick up disillusioned Labour voters while ignoring the conservative threat. I don’t think this will work, although it could lead to a messy result at the next Scottish election, whereby no majority can be formed without either the SNP or the conservatives.
The SNP would surely be better off if Mr Swinney stepped back, and let Ms Forbes take the reins. The left is in retreat, and the SNP needs to recognise that.