STURGEON HAILS SNP SEAT GAINS
But 50pc of voters gave their first preference to pro-Union parties
NICOLA Sturgeon has vowed to press on with plans for another independence referendum – hailing growing support for nationalist parties.
The SNP and Scottish Greens both increased their share of first preference votes and total number of councillors.
The First Minister said the result was ‘good in terms of the standing of independence supporting parties’.
But the full breakdown of results showed that 50 per cent of voters gave their first preference vote to the pro-Union parties – Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives – compared with 40 per cent who backed the SNP or Greens.
Miss Sturgeon also extended an olive branch to Labour with an offer to form a ‘progressive alliance to lock the Tories out’ of Downing Street after the next General Election.
However, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar blasted the SNP’s obsession with dividing the country and breaking up the United Kingdom, as he insisted that his resurgent party was now targeting SNP seats.
Minutes after the final result was declared in Glasgow, Miss Sturgeon insisted that she has a mandate for an independence vote, despite acknowledging that it was not on the ballot paper in the local elections.
She said: ‘We don’t need that because we’ve already got that mandate.
‘But the SNP has increased its share of the vote and the Greens have increased the share of the vote so is that good in terms of the standing of independent-supporting parties? Yes, I think it is.
‘But it doesn’t change the overall position in terms of the independence referendum mandate – the preparations for that continue.’
The SNP secured 34.1 per cent of first preference votes, which was 1.5 percentage points higher than the 2017 local elections, but still lower than the 47.7 per cent the party secured on the constituency vote and 40.3 per cent on the regional list in last year’s Scottish parliament elections.
Criticising the focus on independence amid a cost-of-living crisis, Mr Sarwar told the Scottish Daily Mail: ‘The SNP will reduce everything to a constitutional argument and I’m not going to. This country now has a choice between a divisive, out-of-touch, arrogant SNP against a future-looking, unifying Labour Party and it’s a choice we will be taking across the country.’
He added: ‘I hope that the SNP will stop pretending that they are in opposition and recognise they are in government in Scotland and actually take action to help get people through the biggest fall in living standards since rationing.’
Reflecting on the SNP’s perform ance, Miss Sturgeon told reporters: ‘This is a stupendous result for the SNP Scotland-wide.
‘We’ve won this election comfortably and I think we’re going to end up something like 12 to 13 percentage points ahead of our nearest rival 15 years into government.’
Her party only narrowly edged out Scottish Labour in Glasgow by one seat, losing two councillors from 2017 while Labour gained three.
In Scotland’s biggest cities, the party has threatened to hit drivers with a workplace parking levy, as well as a commuter charge for vehicles entering Edinburgh and possible toll roads in Glasgow.
Miss Sturgeon said the collapse in support for the Conservatives was a reflection of the ‘general disgust’ over Partygate and the cost-of-living crisis.
She suggested Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross had ‘shot himself in both feet and destroyed his credibility’ by reversing his position on whether Boris Johnson should resign for breaking his own lockdown laws.
Insisting the SNP would always be ‘standing ready to be part of a
‘Constitutional argument’
progressive alliance to lock the Tories out’, she added: ‘If Labour – after everything that’s happened to the Tories in the last few months – can’t get into a commanding position on their own, they are going to have to think long and hard about how much they actually want to govern.’
Miss Sturgeon said she had been ‘in tears’ as former refugee Roza Salih, who fled Kurdistan in 2007 at the age of 12, was elected an SNP councillor for the Greater Pollok ward of Glasgow City Council.
She said: ‘Scotland’s got challenges with racism and discrimination like any country does and this doesn’t magic it away but, my goodness, what a lovely story that is.’
Asked about the Alba Party’s failure to win a single council seat, Miss Sturgeon said: ‘I wasn’t in tears at that.’