McLEISH: STURGEON MUST SHOW HUMILITY
LIKE others, I have watched the unedifying spectacle of the civil war between Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon with dismay. Their spat has cast a shadow over our parliament and devolution, and dragged the Crown Office, police, and our committee system into this dreadful mess.
Now is the time for humility and a kind of self-restraint that we have not seen in recent weeks from either the current, or the former, First Minister.
The truth in politics is often elusive, but in any democracy it remains central to good governance and an effective parliament.
I, of course, have some experience in this.
Like Ms Sturgeon and Mr Salmond, I have been a resident of Bute House, and have led the government of Scotland.
During my time as First Minister, I faced a situation in which I was forced to reflect on my own position and, in a completely different circumstance, had breached Westminster rules.
As a consequence, I had a difficult decision to make and decided to resign from public office in the public interest.
We await the judgment on whether Ms Sturgeon has breached the Ministerial Code, or if Mr Salmond is right in his accusations of obstructing justice and misleading the Scottish parliament.
But I will say this. In politics, there is a higher authority here than all of us, and that is the people of Scotland. I would like to see more respect given to them.
We must never take for granted the respect, trust and confidence that people want to invest in us.
If the First Minister is found to have breached the Ministerial Code, she must decide what she should do, and what would best serve the public interest.
We all have to adhere to the rules of the game.
What is important is that Scotland is able to move on, the public is able to have trust, confidence and respect in our institutions, and the Scottish Government can focus on the vital issues of the pandemic, the consequences of Brexit, the attempts of the Prime Minister to undermine devolution and, of course, a looming election.
This unedifying spat between Ms Sturgeon and her former mentor has been a huge distraction from that – and I fear it will continue to be so, unless a speedy resolution can be found, and one which the public can trust and believe in.
When allegations are being flung around, a lot of mud will stick. A lot of hurt will be caused.
There needs to be some selfrestraint. There needs to be humility and some thought about the impact on the people of Scotland and its institutions – and that appears to be in short supply.
This can only be made much worse if there is no resolution to this bitter conflict.
Whether that resolution requires the resignation of the First
Minister may become a matter for her. The UK’s Home Secretary, Priti Patel, was found to have breached the Ministerial Code and, of course, Boris Johnson was the arbiter of that outcome. He decided to brush it under the carpet.
Here, Ms Sturgeon will be both the arbiter and the person under investigation. It will ultimately be her decision and hers alone.
But any individual in this position, in any party, must be able to recognise when a situation has become so damaging that allowing it to continue is not good for government or politics.
Open warfare is a very destabilising spectacle.
At the end of the day, the individual themselves has to look around and ask, given the damage done, whether they should continue.
Of course, the First Minister now has the opportunity, under oath, to give her side of the story at the next committee meeting.
But there are also questions for Mr Salmond. Under oath, he has now made sweeping assertions, and it is hoped he has the evidence to back them up. If you make such statements in public life, you must have the evidence.
He says he has the evidence but is unable to disclose it.
That is far from satisfactory and again there are implications that the Crown Office and the Government are withholding vital information.
It’s just not good enough to make these allegations in order to vent your own anger.
These are hugely damaging allegations, which must be backed up by facts. If that does not happen, it will be a very sad situation for our institutions – and very difficult to reconcile.
This civil war has become so bloody, it may be that neither politician can walk away with their reputation intact in the eyes of the public.
But, of course, the issues now raised are far more important than two individuals and their reputations.
My main concern – regardless of the outcome of the political and personal spat between the First Minister and her former mentor – is that governments and parliaments of the future will learn some hard lessons.
We are trying to establish the truth and the veracity of the assertions by both participants – we don’t seem to have a way of resolving that to the satisfaction of the public.
It’s a young parliament – Holyrood has been around for 20 years, Westminster for more than 300 – and the debate we are having in Scotland needs to retain some perspective.
But it is a vital time for lessons to be learned, and it will require major changes.
In 1998, I chaired a constitutional steering group that set out powers and procedures of the new parliament. We assumed that the new voting system would not allow one party a majority.
As of 2007, this has not happened. One of the casualties has been a robust committee system – as evidenced by the difficulties of the harassment committee which has been investigating this mess.
We overestimated the goodwill and trust between political parties.
The committee system is not working as well as it should.
Many of our MSPs, sitting on committees, are not holding the Government to account.
The boundaries of government and parliament are blurred. We need to strengthen parliament and increase the powers of parliament.
The Scottish Government has to recognise that it is there to serve the parliament. It’s not the other way round.
We now have a one-party nation, a one-party government, a one-party parliament – and of course this creates its own problems.
That has been the significant game changer.
That is not to decry the success of the SNP, or the weakness of other parties, but in that situation you can have a blurring of the lines between government and parliament.
In Scotland now, committees remain very partisan, often tribal.
We have a Government that does not appreciate they are not the parliament, they are not one and the same thing.
The parliament should be holding the government to account, not act as an extension of it.
The government has become too controlling, too powerful, and too demanding to get its own way.
That is not what parliament is for. That is not what happens at Westminster.
We must never take for granted the respect and trust that people invest in us
The SNP is distorting the importance and relevance of the parliament
I was privileged to be on the Public Accounts Committee at Westminster.
We all worked for the common good on the issues we were dealing with – and not on party lines.
There is no doubt in my mind that the SNP Government is distorting the importance and relevance of the parliament.
We need urgent reform of the parliament’s committee system to deliver on holding the Government to account, and more impressive scrutiny by the members.
This will secure the credibility, integrity and importance of the parliament.
We cannot have a situation where the police, the Crown Office, civil servants, parliament and government are viewed with continuing suspicion.
That leads me to the view we need a written constitution on the rights and responsibilities of democratic institutions, which to my mind are being undermined right now.
I also believe we must ensure we have a government in Scotland with no overall majority.
That would require major changes to the voting system in Scotland.
So rather than part-proportional representation and part-first past the post, we would need to have a parliament wholly elected by proportional representation.
It is time to be brave and embrace change – and that change must go beyond one or two people.
Among this crisis there are opportunities – and we must seize them.