Who stands up for Scotland? Certainly not an SNP that has failed our children

EDUCATION is crucial to Scottish identity. The nation that pioneered universal education centuries ago has been defined by it. An appreciation of learning and erudition, available to all, so that what defines you is not your background but your ability and desire to improve yourself.

Yet in this era of identity politics, those who claim to champion the Scottish identity more than any other party are destroying it.

There can be no greater indictment of the Scottish Government than the shocking disclosures about the state of our schools revealed in the PISA figures prepared by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Reading standards – down. Science – down. Maths – down. Where Scotland once led we now don’t even follow. Our international attainment gap with other countries is growing as other nations forge upwards and we slip ever backwards.

Scottish education has been in decline for more than a decade and the SNP has presided over most of it.

This goes beyond the performance of one administration at Holyrood. It is separate even from the question of independence. This is about who we are as a nation – and the truth is the SNP is undermining it.

Record

Yesterday on our television screens the air of the undertaker that habitually hangs about Education Secretary John Swinney was more funereal than ever.

He came not to praise Scottish education – how could he? – nor to explain how he and his chums have almost buried it.

The man who as Finance Secretary cut the budgets of the three stooges who preceded him has pledged to clear up the mess at education. He won’t and he knows it. And everyone will be aware that First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has asked the nation to judge her on her record on education. The mood in Bute House is apparently more bunker-like every day.

This is an administration which delights in being in office but doesn’t wish to govern. It doesn’t take tough decisions. If it was a household it would be one which puts the bills in a drawer unopened. Well, now the bailiffs are at the door and generations of failed young Scots will not forgive them for misspending their futures.

There is a political problem at the heart of the SNP project that stops it from being able to be a reforming government. Most governments rely on a coalition of voters they try to please to gain, say, the 40 per cent of votes you need to form an administration on most occasions.

But the Nationalist coalition has to be broader if it is going to win a referendum. It is aiming at gaining the backing of 60 per cent of the electorate – and the broader the coalition, the more compromises that have to be made to build it.

The Nationalists have succeeded for nearly ten years in buying off opponents, threatening others into silence and procuring new pals.

The one thing they couldn’t do was to bring about genuine reform to any aspect of Scottish life because that inevitably creates opposition and cracks coalitions.

People tend not to like being told to do things differently. That they are failing. That they need to do more for less. They complain and often leave the party.

For the SNP, keeping the pro-independence coalition together will always come before reforming Scotland for the better.

Mr Swinney himself has form on this one. As Finance Secretary he commissioned two reports – one from Crawford Beveridge and the other from the late Campbell Christie – on the future of Scottish public spending. While one was from a businessman and the other from a trade unionist, the conclusions were the same.

Scottish public finances and our services desperately need reform. That was many years ago. What did the Scottish Government do with those reports? Nothing. Facing up to awkward truths might cost votes, so let’s just move along now – nothing to see here.

Yet crises are made by reforms delayed, as Swinney is now finding out. How remarkable it is to hear an Education Secretary, who has argued all his life that Scotland would best be run by Scots who made decisions for Scotland in Scotland, claim that after eight years in government the SNP only realised things were going wrong with our schools when the OECD came to call.

Having withdrawn from two other international education surveys it appears the OECD is the one health visitor the Nationalists can’t stop from getting over the door to see how they are treating the kids.

The Beveridge and Christie Reports now gather dust on the shelf of his protégé and successor as Finance Secretary Derek Mackay. This week he will deliver his first budget armed with sweeping new tax powers. Will he use them to reform Scotland and boost our economy? Not a prospect.

Forecasts

Growth forecasts are down, consumer spending is slumping, the tax take is likely to be lower than expected but we will get little more from Mr Mackay than the familiar mantra that it is all down to Westminster’s failings.

For decades the primary question for the Scottish electorate has been who ‘stands up for Scotland?’

In the 1980s and 1990s the Labour Party claimed that prize. Since 2007 it has been the SNP. Now someone else must claim it. The SNP does not set the standard any more, which is why Scottish Labour’s pledge for more powers and a ‘people’s convention’ is flawed.

Apart from anything it relies on English regions deciding they want federalism and Jeremy Corbyn winning a general election. I will have enough hair to get a perm before that happens.

Instead, we need a new story for Scotland. One that builds on our greatest traditions – like education – and offers a vision for the future.

That is the opportunity that the SNP’s failures presents to opposition parties.

A sense of community and a belief in the freedom great education brings is what I believe marks Scotland out.

Ten years after first winning an election, the SNP presides over a deeply divided nation. Our schools are little better than average and going backwards. Mr Swinney does not have the time to turn our schools around before the next election, even if he had the ideas or the courage.

If people want a party that best stands up for Scottish values the SNP can no longer claim to be that.

Time for someone else to protect Scottish identity.