Nicola Sturgeon’s legacy is the SNP’S albatross of failure
◆ The ‘continuity’ candidate in the shape of Humza Yousaf has done his party and the country no good, says Jackie Baillie
Do you miss her?” asked the interviewer. “Who?” replied Mhairi Black unconvincingly sounding as if she did not believe there was a ghost in the room.
In a wide-ranging interview this week the outgoing SNP MP claimed she always felt “a wee bit uncomfortable” with the party’s entire reliance on the character of Nicola Sturgeon. She added that she had not missed the former party leader since her sudden departure from the stage last spring.
There’s always expert media advice available on avoiding these “wide ranging” interviews because the message discipline quickly breaks down. Mhairi Black gave the impression of not caring what she broke on the way out the door.
But if she was trying to bury the bodies someone ought to have taken the shovel away from her.
Ms Black said it was healthy to get over the “cult of personality” around Nicola Sturgeon. Much as she and many other nationalists would like to distance herself from Nicola Sturgeon, that particular albatross of failure will hang around the SNP long after Ms Black has left the stage.
We have no idea how Operation Branchform, the police investigation into complaints about how £600,000 of donations to the SNP referendum campaign were used, will play out. But there will be no escaping the shadow of the blue forensic tent, the 30,000 missing members or the sudden exit stage-right of one of the SNP’S most formidable, though ultimately unsuccessful, leaders.
Being replaced by a “continuity” candidate in the shape of Humza Yousaf has done the SNP and the country no good. Try as he might to shovel away the most tainted policy decisions of his predecessor he cannot find the compass to give the nationalist movement any forward direction.
Other leaders are available, as Kate Forbes regularly reminds party members and the public. There is now open speculation about how much time First Minister Humza Yousaf has before or after a general election, whenever it is a called, to secure his leadership from a Forbes challenge. There is no lack of advice from the sidelines on that one either with senior figures shouting for a reshuffle of the Ministerial deck before the ship springs any more leaks.
While the SNP focus on disintegration and working out what they are actually for, this year Labour in Scotland will have a relentless focus on the general election campaign. The need to replace the Conservatives at Westminster has never been more urgent, the longer Rishi Sunak hangs on the more the clamour for change will grow. Only Labour can replace the Tories and give the country the government it needs and deserves.
I do, however, agree with Mhairi Black on one point in her exit interview, it would be unwise to write off the SNP at a general election. Many of the seats in play in Scotland this year are held by the slimmest of margins and some will undoubtedly be won by the slimmest of margins.
There is only one way to get rid of the Conservatives, that is to vote Labour, and only one way afterwards to turn almost two decades of SNP misrule into a vague memory which even Mhairi Black could convincingly say she had forgotten.