Sturgeon backs SNP supporter to head exams review
Nicola Sturgeon says an academic who declared his support for the SNP at the last election is the “right person” to lead an independent review into Scotland’s exams fiasco.
Opposition parties warned of a “whitewash” after it emerged that Professor Mark Priestley of Stirling University said before the December vote that he was voting to “stop Boris Johnson.
“That means voting tactically,” the professor of education stated on election day on Twitter.
“In my constituency that means a vote for the SNP. Today, please vote in the interests of the country, putting aside party loyalties.”
But Ms Sturgeon defended his appointment in light of the revelations.
She said: “Mark Priestley is a respected academic and I don’t think anybody could credibly or reasonably doubt his credentials for this job, his experience, skills and aptitude.
“So, yes, I do think he’s the right person.
“This is the bit that will sound party political so I apologise and I don’t intend it to sound boastful about my party’s position.
“But on the basis of current opinion polls, more than half of all the Scottish population intend to vote SNP so there would obviously be an issue if we started to exclude people who have qualifications to do things from doing these things because they might vote SNP.
“I wouldn’t exclude somebody who was qualified because they voted for another party.”
Earlier this week, Prof Priestley was asked to conduct a review into the fiasco of 125,000 exam results being downgraded by a controversial moderation process which disproportionately hit poorer Scots pupils. It was later scrapped after a public outcry. The Government U-turn led to a vote of no confidence in Education Secretary John Swinney in the Scottish Parliament, but he survived with the support of the Scottish Greens.
Scottish Conservative education spokesman Jamie Greene said: “The much-heralded SNP plans for a so-called ‘independent review’ into the SQA exams fiasco have unravelled already.
“Less than 24 hours after the Greens saved Mr Swinney from the sack, after his second humiliating U-turn in just a few months, it looks like another scandal has engulfed the Education Secretary.
“Scottish parents and pupils demand a truly neutral and fully independent review into the exams fiasco. They will not put up with a whitewash.”