Yousaf ’s political future in Salmond’s hands
HUMZA YOUSAF’S fate in a no confidence vote is in the hands of Alex Salmond’s Alba Party, as SNP sources said the First Minister was a “dead man walking”.
Mr Yousaf decided to scrap the SNP’S power-sharing deal with the Greens yesterday, a move which backfired spectacularly by prompting Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tory leader, to table a motion of no confidence in the First Minister. The deciding vote in the poll is set to be held by Ash Regan, the only MSP from Mr Salmond’s party.
The former first minister said yesterday that Ms Regan was now “the most powerful” member in the Scottish Parliament. Nationalist sources said Mr Yousaf ’s position was untenable regardless of whether he scraped through next week’s vote of confidence, calling him a “dead man walking”.
They argued he would either have to quit immediately if he lost the vote of no confidence or he would be so badly damaged politically if he won by a vote or two that he would have to end up resigning anyway.
Insiders said he appeared to have horribly misjudged the strength of the reaction from the Greens after he dumped them from the coalition deal.
However, Mr Yousaf ’s official spokesman denied reports that he was considering stepping down ahead of the vote.
Mr Salmond warned the First Minister he would go down in history as “Humza the Brief ” unless he responded to a series of demands made by Ms Regan. She is set to write to the First Minister today with a list of “concerns”, including over the Scottish Government’s pro-trans agenda and its lack of progress on achieving independence.
If Mr Yousaf loses the vote, which is expected on Tuesday or Wednesday next week, it is expected he will resign barely a year after he replaced Nicola Sturgeon. The Scottish Parliament would have 28 days to vote for a new first minister.
Should MSPS fail to reach an agreement, a Holyrood election would have to take place. However, this would likely be disastrous for the SNP, with the party slumping in the polls and struggling to raise funds for the forthcoming
general election campaign. Mr Salmond said “Humza’s fate will depend on the reply” to Ms Regan’s letter. Alba insiders said Ms Regan could demand Mr Yousaf implement the recommendations of the Cass review on gender identity services for children in full.
Dr Hilary Cass, one of the UK’S most eminent paediatricians, found in her report that the evidence for allowing young people and children to change gender was built on weak foundations and that there was no good evidence on the long-term outcomes of treatments such as puberty blockers that are given to children. Her findings were dismissed by the Scottish Greens.
The Alba insiders also said Ms Regan wanted Mr Yousaf to hold a Scotland-wide referendum on whether Holyrood should gain legislative powers to stage another independence vote.
Her demands marked an extraordinary reversal of fortunes after she finished a distant third to Mr Yousaf in last year’s SNP leadership contest. The First Minister said at the time of her subsequent defection to Alba that it was “no great loss”.
Mr Yousaf found himself being held political hostage by Mr Salmond’s party at the end of a dramatic day that started with him scrapping his power-sharing deal with the Greens. Green members were scheduled to vote next month on whether they should remain in the Scottish Government after it scrapped its keynote climate change target. Fewer than 48 hours after he endorsed the power-sharing arrangement, the First Minister performed an extraordinary about-turn and ripped it up.
He said he would lead a minority government instead.
Speaking at a press conference at his Bute House official residence, he repeatedly denied he was a “weak” leader who had been forced to end the coalition by senior Nationalists deeply unhappy with the arrangement.
Mr Yousaf also denied he was “heading for the exit door” and a “lame duck leader” who had been press-ganged into scrapping the deal against his own judgment.
The First Minister insisted the impending Green vote meant the deal no longer brought “stability” and it had “served its purpose.” But the furious Scottish Greens accused him of “an act of political cowardice” and argued the “weak and thoroughly hopeless way” he had acted demonstrated “he can no longer be trusted.”
Patrick Harvie, the party’s co-leader and one of the ministers ousted from government, said Mr Yousaf had “capitulated” to the “most reactionary, backward-looking forces within the SNP”.
Within hours, the Scottish Greens got their revenge by announcing their seven MSPS had unanimously decided to back the Tory motion of no confidence.
Mr Harvie said: “It’s very clear that Humza Yousaf has decided to burn his bridges with the progressive, pro-independence majority that was established in the Bute House agreement. If it’s a simple matter of confidence in the First Minister, I’m afraid, with a genuinely heavy heart, we would have to vote that we have no confidence in him.”
Labour and the Liberal Democrats also confirmed they would support the motion tabled by Mr Ross stating that “the Parliament has no confidence in the First Minister, in light of his failures in government”.
This meant it had the support of parties that together have 64 MSPS, with the 63 SNP MSPS opposed, making Ms Regan’s vote decisive.
If she supported Mr Yousaf, this could tie the vote at 64 each, giving Holyrood’s presiding officer Alison Johnstone the casting vote. Ms Johnstone is duty-bound to vote for the status quo, saving Mr Yousaf.
Mr Salmond told Times Radio: “Inadvertently... Humza Yousaf has managed to make Ash Regan, an Alba MSP, the most powerful MSP in the Scottish Parliament because she now has the swing vote in the parliament.” Predicting she would use that power “very wisely”, he said her letter to the First Minister would mention “progress towards Scottish independence, protection of the rights of women and girls, and how he’s going to set about restoring some level of competence within the Scottish administration”.
The former first minister later told the BBC: “Humza’s going to have to mend his ways and do it very quickly, otherwise he’s going to become known as Humza the Brief.”
‘I’m afraid, with a genuinely heavy heart, we would have to vote that we have no confidence in him’