FM ‘obsessed’ with SNP staying in power

Nicola Sturgeon has said she is “obsessed” with keeping the SNP in power and not ending up in an “existential crisis” like Scottish Labour.

The first minister said watching Labour go from being “impregnable” in Scotland to their current position as the third-largest party in the Parliament has profoundly influenced her leadership.

Speaking to political comedian Matt Forde at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Ms Sturgeon reflected on a time when she would joke about weighing rather than counting Labour’s votes at elections.

She said: “I’ve seen Labour go from way up there – a seemingly impregnable position – to where they are right now, in single figures at elections and in an existential crisis.

“It’s kind of hardwired into me, it’s in my DNA, to avoid making the mistakes I saw them make at every turn.”

“I’m obsessed,” she said, revealing she is “constantly assessing and reassessing what we are doing”.

Ms Sturgeon, who in 2015 led the SNP as they won 56 out of 59 Scottish constituencies, described the feat as “an unprecedented and probably unrepeatable record historic performance” but warned “you can become a victim of your own success”.

Labour’s “completely disjointed and really acrimonious relationship” between the party’s MSPs and MPs was a factor in their decline in Scotland, Ms Sturgeon argued, although there were sometimes “tensions” between the SNP at Holyrood and Westminster.

She said: “I’ve got a very close relationship with Ian Blackford, our leader down there.”

Nicola Sturgeon interviewed by Matt Forde. PA.