Blogger denies former SNP leader’s involvement in party plans
A controversial political blogger, who has raised the possibility of starting a pro-independence party, has denied that Alex Salmond is involved in its planning.
Stuart Campbell, the founder of the Wings over Scotland website, claimed that a Nationalist movement separate from the SNP could win votes via the Holyrood list system at the next Scottish parliamentary elections in 2021, helping to deliver a pro-independence majority.
Speculation has since mounted that Mr Salmond, who resigned as first minister after the No vote at the 2014 referendum, could be involved in behind-the-scenes planning of any new party.
But that was denied by Mr Campbell yesterday.
Asked if the former SNP leader had any involvement in the planning, he told The Scotsman: “Absolutely none whatsoever.” Commenting on the speculation, a SNP source said: “The party is united behind the campaign for independence.
“Peripheral issues are coming to the surface that some members are unhappy about. But that does not mean they are not supportive of the party.”
In a blog post yesterday, Mr Campbell said any new proindependence party would not contest any constituency seats but focus solely on the list vote at any future Holyrood elections.
He believes SNP list votes were wasted at the 2016 and 2011 elections, given the nature of the voting system.
“The advantage of doing that is that you’re ten times more likely to get a regional Wings Party MSP than a regional SNP one from the same number of votes,” he said. “That’s because the SNP currently hold all nine of the local seats in the Glasgow region.”
He added: “The difficulty, of course, is in persuading SNP voters to make the quite counter-intuitive step of voting for two different parties in the same election.”