Cabinet reshuffle suggests Sturgeon’s SNP brand is well beyond its sell-by date
Nicola Sturgeon’s forced reshuffle betrays the depths of the chaos within the Scottish National Party (“Six ministers go as Sturgeon wields the axe”, 27 June). Releasing this change on the same day that John Swinney’s Education Bill was dropped is just a coincidence too far. Shona Robison finally deciding to resign on the very same day stretches incredulity. Keith Brown’s well-known difference of opinion with Nicola Sturgeon over the timing of any Indyref2 was key, too.
If ever the SNP wanted to advertise just how badly it was performing, this was it. This can only be seen as an admission of defeat, no matter what spin is attempted, that so many high-profile politicians have been removed from their posts. One remains, John Swinney, who has also failed but who is either too powerful or too embarrassing to ditch.
The direction the SNP now takes over another independence referendum will be interesting and another crisis looms with the upcoming government expenditure and revenues (GERS ) figures.
There is no way to spin this as a “refreshing” of the SNP brand. It is too late for that. It is well past its “best before” date. GERALD EDWARDS Broom Road, Glasgow Tuesday 26 June 2018 may go down in Scottish political history as “The Day of the Stilettos”. With a not-so-deft cabinet reshuffle, the First Minister has created a smokescreen deflecting from the climbdown of abandoning the Education (Scotland) Bill and removed a personal threat in the form of Keith Brown. He at least appeared a competent individual with some previous real-life experience. He will be missed. Mr Swinney is lucky to survive.
The events seem to be an implicit acknowledgement by the First Minister of her government’s failings in many areas, including education, health, police and justice, to name but a few.
No doubt further smoke and mirrors will follow under the “new” regime.
One reshuffle will not clean Scotland’s political Augean Stables. FRASER MACGREGOR Liberton Drive, Edinburgh
Fraser Grant (Letters, June 27) clearly doesn’t do irony. On the day he writes imploring us to separate from the “shambolic UK” Nicola Sturgeon’s Cabinet reshuffle is front page news. The axe is not generally wielded on ministers because they have been a scintillating success and the only question to be asked is why it took Ms Sturgeon so long to admit that it is the day job which is desperately demanding her attention.
The previous day’s Scotsman reported a GP service on the verge of meltdown and an education system similarly suffering from understaffing and underfunding. Police Scotland lurches from one debacle to another and the economy is in a state of paralysis. We have a government which doesn’t seem to know whether to support a third Heathrow runway or not, or even if we have or do not have a ban on fracking!
Whether a cabinet reshuffle willmakeadifferenceremains to be seen but the new incumbents certainly have a job on their hands.
I would agree with Mr Grant that the current UK Government is not covering itself in glory. But I don’t quite see the current Scottish Government as a model of efficiency.
COLIN HAMILTON Braid Hills Avenue, Edinburgh
From the front page of yesterday’s “Scotsman”: the “economy brief will now come under the control of finance secretary Derek Mackay, who remains in place with an extended portfolio”. God help us.
DAVID K ALLAN Hopper Gardens, Edinburgh