The men in grey kilts were long forgotten
IREMEMBER my very first SNP conference,’ gushes John Swinney, ‘ i n the Music Hall in this very city, in 1981. Well, this conference today is much bigger. Support for our party is far higher and our party is much more united.’
There is delirious applause. Everyone is too polite to remember that Mr Swinney was once SNP leader, for about ten minutes, until the men in grey kilts came for him – by which point SNP ‘unity’ put one more in mind of a shoal of angry piranhas.
These days he’s wearing a strobing purple tie, scary Alien Autopsy glasses... and, gosh, he’s thin – about two pounds above total organ failure as he drones on: ‘Devoted to securing the best future for our country. That is the enduring strength of our party...’
But we have company. Nicola Sturgeon is perched beside him, radiant in fuchsia and with the air of someone’s mum at a nativity play. So naturally Mr Swinney lays it on with a shovel: ‘That lady made us all very proud at the first general election debate. She didn’t j ust win that debate. She changed the terms of that election. She l ed us to our greatest-ever election victory…’
Miss Sturgeon cocks her head in an aw-shucks way as her deputy, sounding sort of holy just after giving the ‘Tory Press’ a hellish bashing, declares: ‘I don’t know when we will have another independence referendum. It will come only when the people of Scotland want it to happen. But I know that the Unionist parties are scared because they know the SNP can win the argument.’
There is frenzied clapping, like marbles poured along a tin bridge. But, of course, another vote is imminent, the Holyrood election...
‘The question then will not be Yes or No,’ said Miss Sturgeon’s Cabinet Secretary for Stating the Obvious. ‘The question will be who stands for Scotland. I believe this party can win that historic third term in office.’
It really is sweet how the Nats pretend the election is going to be a desperate, uphill fight, when all the polls suggest they could win every seat in the country plus a few in the Home Counties. Especially if foxes get registered.
‘The winning habit is built on hard effort,’ intones Mr Swinney, under whom in 2003 the Nats inexplicably lost a quarter of their seats, having effectively ditched Margo Macdonald – who promptly stood as an independent and won
Tby a landslide. ‘ Pounding the streets,’ he persisted. ‘Knocking on doors. We found whole streets in Labour seats where Labour hadn’t knocked on doors for decades.
‘ Labour took Scotland f or granted. And on May 7 we stopped them taking Scotland for granted for ever.’ HE SNP, he carols, can be proud of its record: ‘University tuition is free. Free bus passes for pensioners have been protected, and free prescription charges. The SNP has got rid of the bedroom tax. Household incomes have been helped by the council tax freeze. And the living wage has been introduced for firms with public sector contracts…’
You sigh. As usual he trots out lots of tractor-production statistics: ‘ Scotland has had 12 quarters of uninterrupted growth. But the Government needs to ensure that the economy remains competitive…. Infrastructure… this morning we signed the contracts to upgrade the railway from Aberdeen to Inverness… £170million… broadband… big new ferries…’
Oh, but he’s boring. Lovely man but when he walks in the room it’s like somebody just walked out.
‘I can announce we are giving powers to councils in every part of Scotland to reduce business rates. That’s the SNP in action – devolving power and promoting Scottish enterprise…’
Well, actually, it’s clawed untold powers to Edinburgh, starved local authorities of money, sent a convicted bomber home to rapturous applause in Libya, redefined marriage and wants bossy-bags strangers in charge of your kids.
‘The Fiscal Framework is meant to be the plumbing of our public services, it is not meant to be a drain,’ he glows. ‘I will only recommend it to the Scottish parliament if that set of financial rules is fair to the people of this country.’
As it’s made in England, of course they’ll insist it isn’t. But he’s stopped now, to rapturous applause as he embraces our Nicola. Gosh, she’s tiny. And he’s so thin…