Are we moving into the final days of Yousaf's leadership?

It was just over a year ago that I was struggling to work out how seriously to take the pronouncements of "Smitty", a commenter on Wings who seemed to be leaking inside information about the SNP leadership election, because there was no way of verifying what he was saying and there was always a chance it was an elaborate hoax.  In the end, that's what it seemed to be, because the basic thrust of his claims was that Humza Yousaf had lost.

So once again I'm not sure how seriously to take the claims by Wings himself today which are based on information from "trusted sources".  It's true that possibly the same sources turned out to be right yesterday about the scheduling of an emergency Cabinet meeting, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they'll be right about everything.  But just as a hypothetical, let's work through the potential implications of what they're saying.

Firstly, that Humza Yousaf will resign before the no confidence vote is held.  That's possible because arithmetically he seems to be in a right old pickle.  Due to the surprisingly strong stance of the Greens, 64 votes to remove him are assured as long as everyone turns up, which would mean to survive he'd need Ash Regan to actively vote for him and then the Presiding Officer to bail him out with her casting vote in line with convention.  I don't take remotely seriously the idea, being punted by Wings himself only yesterday, that Yousaf could lose the vote and carry on anyway.  So everything hinges on what Ms Regan does, and as we now know, it's a vote of no confidence in Yousaf personally rather than a collective vote of no-confidence in the government, which makes it much less unthinkable that she could vote him down if he doesn't yield to enough of her shopping list of demands.  Or she could abstain, which would probably have the same effect.

It's therefore at least semi-plausible that he could resign to avoid the humiliation of either being defeated or being seen to capitulate to Alba.  The continuity faction may have calculated that it's better to replace him with someone the Greens don't hate with a passion, and that way the government may be able to muddle through the next two years by means of ad hoc deals with the Greens rather than ad hoc deals with Alba.

The next part of the claim is that Neil Gray is the person that the continuity faction want to replace him with.  Again, that's perfectly plausible, Gray is massively overrated but he's been punted for years.  He would make the situation even worse because he appears to be even less serious about independence than Yousaf is, and has less charisma.

Where I become much more sceptical about the claim is the idea that the Forbes wing of the party will for some unspecified reason roll over and allow Gray to have an unopposed coronation.  Now, it's true that Kate Forbes has a strong mind of her own and it doesn't always tally with what people sympathetic to her think is sensible, so I can't rule out the possibility that she'll sit this one out, either for personal reasons or for what would probably be misconceived political reasons.  I hope to goodness she doesn't.  But even if she does, it doesn't follow that Gray will be unchallenged, because from what I recall of the SNP leadership rules, the threshold to stand as a candidate is not all that high.  Just a year after we saw an epochal battle between evenly matched continuity and change camps, it seems totally inconceivable that at least one person from the change camp will not put themselves forward - unless of course there's a unity candidate who everyone thinks is fab, but that candidate would not be Gray.  So I'm confident there would be a contested election if Yousaf stands down, although admittedly Gray would have a much better chance of winning it if Forbes is not his main opponent.  (Bear in mind, though, that even if the Wings source is correct about Forbes' intentions, there'll be massive pressure on her to change her mind.)

You'd think, incidentally, that journalists from The National would have SNP sources that are at least as reliable as any that Wings has, and it's interesting that Hamish Morrison is punting John Swinney rather than Gray.  But this paragraph made me laugh - 

"Kate Forbes has been touted by some, but given her views on LGBT issues and abortion proved so divisive in the SNP leadership contest, she may be a long shot."

Come on, Hamish, propaganda is one thing but you've got to at least make it sound plausible.  It remains to be seen if Kate Forbes would stand, but if she does, she will not be a "long shot", she will self-evidently be the strong favourite, having come within a whisker of winning last year in spite of the outgoing leadership chucking the kitchen sink at her, including just about every procedural dirty trick in the book.

*  *  *

It's getting close to the last-chance saloon, but there's still time to help Scot Goes Pop continue through this general election year.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE, although if you have a Paypal account, a better way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because the funds are usually transferred instantly and fees can be eliminated altogether depending on the option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Even on a non-binding vote, Yousaf's job would be on the line

OK, this is my fourth post of the day, but I'm having to do this just to keep up with the pace of events.  Two things have changed since my last post - to my surprise, it turns out the Greens will vote in favour of the motion of no confidence, leaving Alba and Ash Regan holding the balance, and the vote will be a non-binding vote of no-confidence in Yousaf as First Minister rather than a binding vote of no-confidence in the government.  Some people are interpreting the latter point as meaning that the whole process is a sham, and an indication that the Tories don't really want to bring the SNP government down, because an early election would cost the Tories themselves a lot of seats.

I don't think it's as simple as that.  A non-binding motion is easier to vote for (which may be why the Greens signed up so quickly) but it's still very hard for Yousaf to ignore if it goes against him.  In that event, there would be three possible outcomes - 

1) Yousaf respects the vote and resigns as First Minister, but does not resign as SNP leader.  This would almost certainly result in an early election, because the SNP would presumably not be willing to nominate an alternative First Minister, and no unionist government would be arithmetically viable.

2) Yousaf respects the vote and resigns as both First Minister and SNP leader.  This would be a highly desirable outcome from the point of view of the independence movement, because it would allow a more popular and credible SNP leader to become First Minister without an early election being held.  If we could be sure this is what would happen, it would make sense for Ash Regan to vote for the motion of no confidence.

3) Yousaf refuses to respect the vote and tries to stay in office.  The opposition parties wouldn't be able to leave it at that, because he would be defying the will of parliament.  A binding vote of no-confidence in the government would surely follow swiftly - even if the Tories ran away from it for self-preservation reasons, Labour and the Lib Dems would step into the breach and the Tories would look ridiculous if they abstained.  The Greens might turn the screw by saying they'll have no choice but to vote for the motion unless Yousaf stands aside to allow fresh leadership to take over - at which point he probably would.

So whichever way you look at it, the outcome of the vote next week (assuming it's held) does matter enormously.

*  *  *

It's getting close to the last-chance saloon, but there's still time to help Scot Goes Pop continue through this general election year.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE, although if you have a Paypal account, a better way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because the funds are usually transferred instantly and fees can be eliminated altogether depending on the option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Now that Alba have gained the balance of power, they'd probably be unwise to throw that enviable position away the very next week by forcing an immediate election

Since writing my previous post about Alba's enviable new position as holding the balance of power at Holyrood, I see that Stuart Campbell is trying to coax the party into voting against the SNP government when the vote of no confidence is held next week, even though "an extremely well-placed source" (very possibly meaning Alex Salmond himself) has told him that won't happen.  Mr Campbell is assuming that if he gets his way, the government will fall and an early election will be held.  I think that's a false premise - my guess is that the Greens will express their anger by abstaining on the vote, thus allowing the government to survive whatever Alba do.

But I can't be sure of that, so this is an important question, and it's taken me a little while to work out what I think about it.  I didn't even think an early election was a possibility until a few hours ago, so all of this is a completely new consideration.

I have argued repeatedly in favour of using an early election as a de facto independence referendum.  So really the question is whether forcing an early election in June (probably) would achieve that goal.  The answer is probably not.  It would depend on the SNP's own attitude, and with their famed over-caution, they would probably say "not this time, but maybe in 2026".  (Remember under the Scotland Act, an election will still take place in 2026 even if there is an early election this year.)  And they might even have a point just for once, because they would be starting so much on the back foot in a forced election right now that it wouldn't be the most promising circumstances to win independence.  A plebiscite election campaign needs at least a little bit of planning and preparation if it's going to succeed.

So if an early election in June isn't going to achieve independence, might it be a stepping stone to it by producing a breakthrough for Alba?  It's possible, but I suspect the odds are against it.  One of my internal battles within Alba, especially during my time on the NEC in 2021-22, has been to try to inject a degree of realism about where the party stands with the public, because I cannot see much evidence at all from opinion polls, or from the 2022 local elections, or from local council by-elections since 2022, that Alba have gained significant support since they fell well short of winning list seats in 2021.

Mr Campbell acknowledges that an early election might backfire for Alba by losing them their only seat, but he still argues that they have much less to lose than the SNP in 1979, who were defending 11 seats (they ended up losing 9).  But that misses the point about 1979 - the problem wasn't just the seats the SNP lost, it was also the fact that they set themselves up to take the blame for Mrs Thatcher coming to power.  If Alba are seen to be the decisive factor in forcing an election, and if an election produces a unionist majority (which on polling evidence is the most likely outcome), independence supporters might never forgive Alba for that, and the SNP won't be slow to issue constant reminders.

I suspect Alex Salmond's strategic mind will be telling him that if you gain the balance of power unexpectedly, you don't throw it away the very next week.  You keep what you've got and milk it for all it's worth for a while.  There may be a correct tactical moment to force an election before May 2026, but I doubt if it's right now.

Just one caveat, though: if an early election was bad for the SNP, it might be the only way of ejecting Humza Yousaf before the Westminster election, and a new leader might just save the independence movement's bacon at that Westminster election.  But sacrificing the movement at one election for an unproven chance of salvaging the movement's hopes at another election would be an incredibly risky game to play.

*  *  *

The most dangerous narrative for Humza Yousaf that is taking root today is that he "cannot be trusted".  If he needs a coalition partner after the next election, whenever it is held, the Greens are likely to laugh in his face, because they'd know that their position in government would never be secure.  Even if Yousaf says on a Wednesday that a coalition deal will be honoured, it could be scrapped without warning on the Thursday morning.  What's more, his SNP colleagues will know that the necessary trust can only be re-established with a new leader, so he's just made his own early departure even more likely.  For the life of me, I don't understand why he's made the decision unilaterally like this and taken all the blame - he could have been cannier by nudging the Greens towards voluntarily leaving government, perhaps by means of certain unpalatable ministerial appointments.  

*  *  *

There is one thing in the SNP's favour.  Unionist parties are forever telling us that a referendum would be too expensive, and is unwanted and unnecessary because "we've only just had one" (ie. a decade ago).  Well, an early election would cost money, wouldn't it?  It's unnecessary, isn't it, because we had one as recently as three years ago and there's going to be one in another two years anyway?  What's the difference, chaps?

*  *  *

It's getting close to the last-chance saloon, but there's still time to help Scot Goes Pop continue through this general election year.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE, although if you have a Paypal account, a better way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because the funds are usually transferred instantly and fees can be eliminated altogether depending on the option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Humza Yousaf has just handed Ash Regan the balance of power in the Scottish Parliament - at least some of the time

The Bute House Agreement was not signed until August 2021, which meant that for three months after the May 2021 election, the SNP continued with what was billed as a "minority government".  That was technically inaccurate language, because excluding the non-voting Presiding Officer, there were 64 SNP MSPs and 64 MSPs from all other parties combined.  It was therefore impossible to bring down the government as long as all of the SNP MSPs turned up.  A tied vote on a motion of no-confidence would simply have led to the Presiding Officer using her casting vote to defeat the motion, in line with convention.

However by breaking off the Bute House Agreement today, Yousaf is not reverting to that status quo ante, and the reason is Ash Regan's defection last autumn from the SNP to Alba.  There are now five opposition parties in the Scottish Parliament, and they outnumber the SNP by 65 seats to 63.  So in theory the government can be brought down, but in practice I struggle to imagine the Greens risking the wrath of the independence movement by "doing a 1979" by bringing about an election at such an unfavourable moment.

However, the Greens now seem to hate Yousaf's guts far more than Alba do, which would have seemed an impossible state of affairs only yesterday.  It seems almost inevitable, then, that they will find specific issues on which to vote with the unionist parties on, and the only way in which Yousaf will avoid defeat is with Ash Regan's vote.  (Remember the convention on how the Presiding Officer breaks a tie will not always work in the government's favour - it's about backing whatever is the status quo, not about automatically backing the government line.)

This is, then, kind of the arithmetical scenario Alba were looking for when they stood on the list in 2021, and it should give them some limited leverage with the government, albeit any informal deals will have to be done on the quiet given the antipathy between the SNP and Alba.  And if by any chance the Greens are crazy enough and angry enough to try to force an early election, it will be entirely up to Ash Regan and Alba to decide whether that happens.  Right now might not be the ideal moment for the early plebiscite election we all want, but that doesn't necessarily mean the ideal moment won't arrive before 2026.

Current state of the parties:

SNP 63

Conservatives 31

Labour 22

Greens 7

Liberal Democrats 4

Alba 1

Presiding Officer 1

GOVERNMENT: 63

OPPOSITION: 65

Why has the coalition been ditched, and what now?

It's difficult to blog about something I don't fully understand.  One of the things that had defined Humza Yousaf's leadership was his cast-iron commitment to coalition with the Greens, and while there was certainly internal pressure within the SNP to ditch the coalition, that came mainly from quarters that Yousaf has always cheerfully ignored until now.  It seems unlikely that the Green leadership played any role in pulling the plug, because they had been engaged in brinkmanship to try to stop their membership from voting to walk away.  Yousaf may have calculated that Green members were highly likely to do just that and thus saw an opportunity to look decisive by getting in first, but if so, there must be a risk that such a sudden and unexpected dumping will poison relations between the SNP and the Greens for years to come, which could have ramifications for the independence cause and also make it harder to avert a Labour-Green (or Labour-Lib Dem-Green) coalition in future.  So answers on a postcard, really.

We'll now see whether the theory that the Greens were a major drag on SNP support had any validity.  I suspect it was wildly exaggerated but there may have been a small grain of truth in it, and even clawing back 1% of support could make a difference in a tight election.  In other circumstances I might be worried about the Greens taking revenge by putting up lots of candidates against the SNP and splitting the Yes vote, but weirdly they had seemed hellbent on doing that anyway.

One benefit we may see is within the 'pro-indy establishment', which extends to small bits of the media and to non-party organisations.  A majority pro-independence government including the Greens but excluding other small pro-indy parties provided cover for the Greens to be given a special status by the pro-indy establishment.  But now that the Greens are an opposition pro-indy party, just like Alba, there may be a balancing-up effect.

No, Sarwar does not lead Yousaf on "best First Minister" polling - that was last month

This is a rare example of me rushing to defend Humza Yousaf, but an element of 'professional pride' kicks in whenever I see Wings deceive his readers about opinion polls - 

"Anas Sarwar is preferred by voters as the next FM (the stat that really tells you who’s going to win elections), but only by a solitary point over the hapless and beleaguered Yousaf – who’s barely enjoyed a single good day in his year-and-a-bit in charge."

That's not true.  Mr Campbell is referring to the March edition of the monthly Redfield & Wilton poll, which showed Sarwar move ahead of Yousaf on the head-to-head "best First Minister" question for the first time, but that result is now out of date.  The April poll showed Yousaf resume his lead.

At this moment, which of the following individuals do you think would be the better First Minister of Scotland? (Redfield & Wilton, 6th-7th April 2024)

Humza Yousaf 35% (+4)

Anas Sarwar 30% (-2)

Nevertheless, Yousaf's leadership is on the ropes due to the fact he represents the Continuity Sturgeon faction, which is an increasingly tarnished brand for extremely obvious reasons. Out of curiosity, I asked my Twitter followers yesterday who they want to be the next SNP leader, and the results were startling - 

Stephen Flynn 62.2%

Kate Forbes 29.4%

Angus Robertson 4.3%

Mairi McAllan 4.1%

I have to say I disagree with that.  We were all impressed by Stephen Flynn when he took on the Speaker, but I still think Kate Forbes is the most voter-friendly option the SNP have, and there's polling evidence to demonstrate that.  The idea floated in the press at the weekend of a joint ticket with Forbes as leader and Flynn as deputy might well be the way to go.  

As for the other idea floated in the press, that the continuity faction will play a slightly longer game in the hope of installing either Mairi McAllan or Jenny Gilruth, words fail me.  McAllan is not ready for the top job yet, and I'm not sure on what planet Gilruth will ever be ready for it.

The case against a small political party treating its own members as the enemy

As regular readers will remember, I was elected at the start of the year to a working group which is reviewing the Alba Party's constitution.  For confidentiality reasons I can't give a running commentary on the progress of that, but obviously having been involved in the process for a few weeks, I've become much more exposed to the main arguments against having a fully-fledged internal party democracy.  In view of that, I think it might be helpful to post an updated version of my own arguments in favour of democratisation, because ultimately it's rank-and-file members who will decide what happens.

First of all, a party which regards its own members with extreme suspicion and constantly tries to work out how to 'protect itself' from them is not in a good place.  What actually is a political party if not its members?  I suppose the alternative conception of a party is as a vehicle for a self-selecting leadership elite who may take members along for the ride but will never cede any real control to them.  That would be analagous to the way in which the powers of the House of Lords were previously used to protect the aristocracy from the voting masses.  It might be fine if the project a party represents is inspiring enough that people are willing to join simply to be part of a passive fan club, but my guess is that if Alba is to thrive, both existing members and potential new members will be looking for a lot more than that.  The problem is that Alba is mainly seeking converts from the SNP, and the obvious question is why would anyone leave a large party of power, one that denies its members much of a say, to join a much smaller party that also denies its members much of a say?  Where is the incentive?  Wouldn't you just think you might as well stick with the larger party which is actually in government?

There's also a really striking paradox in simultaneously saying that the leader should be trusted but the members should not be (because they might be a bunch of filthy infilitrators or whatever).  If you to try to protect the party from its own members (which again I think is a contradiction in terms) by substituting internal democracy with a system of patronage and leadership control, you're then putting all your eggs in one basket, because you're forgetting that the party leader himself is directly elected by precisely those awful members who you regard with such suspicion.  If the members are potential infiltrators who can't be trusted to elect the NEC or other committees, there clearly must be a fair chance that they will install an interloper as leader - and then having spurned the opportunity to introduce a democratic system of checks and balances, you'll be powerless to resist the absolute control of that one person.  That's exactly how the Sturgeon leadership of the SNP, once it had its feet under the table, was able to essentially ditch independence and replace it with an identity politics agenda.

It also does matter whether all party members are allowed to take decisions or only a tiny minority of members.  Alba's Conference Committee is an extremely powerful committee acting as a veto on issues reaching the floor of conference, which is supposed to be the body through which members exercise supreme control over the party.  In other words, members can only exercise control over the party via conference if they first have control over the Conference Committee - and they don't. The idea that party members are somehow in control of the Conference Committee because everyone on the Conference Committee is a party member is a bit like saying the system of rotten boroughs empowered the populace because the tiny number of people who could vote in them were all citizens.

Given its massive gatekeeping power, the case for the Conference Committee being directly elected by all party members is overwhelming. And any political party which uses its disciplinary machinery to suppress dissent among members must give members direct control over the composition of the committees which make the decisions on disciplinary matters.  That seems to me to be an indispensable safeguard, and without it individual members are helpless to protect themselves from arbitrary ill-treatment at the hands of an over-powerful leadership.

Last but not least, I never cease to be astounded that in the 21st Century people are still making the argument that the franchise for internal party elections should be restricted to a tiny minority of knowledgeable or experienced members, on the grounds that the wrong people will be elected otherwise.  That's essentially identical to arguing that the vast bulk of the public are too stupid or uneducated to be allowed to vote in general elections.  Nobody would ever dream of making that argument about elections to public office, so why it suddenly becomes OK in the context of the internal structures of a political party is beyond me.

On the whole, it would be a relief if the Greens withdraw from the coalition

As long-term readers may recall, I initially supported the idea of an SNP-Green coalition after the 2021 election.  The unionist establishment and media were rather implausibly arguing at the time that the SNP falling one seat short of an overall majority somehow tarnished the mandate for an independence referendum, and it seemed to me that putting together a government with a clear parliamentary majority comprised of two parties that both had commitments to independence and to a referendum in their manifestos was a powerful way of making the point that the mandate was in fact watertight.  There was also quite a bit of harmony between the SNP and Greens on non-independence matters, and although I passionately disagreed with both parties on some of those points of harmony, it seemed to me there was no harm in the independence movement benefiting from a strong basis for cooperation.

However, that logic only held true if the Scottish Government was actually going to do something about independence during this five-year parliamentary term.  Clearly they intend to instead let yet another mandate expire, in which case the underscoring of how clear the mandate is no longer has any great relevance, and all we're really left with are the downsides of the Bute House Agreement.  Fergus Ewing is probably overstating the case when he says the public will heavily punish the SNP for association with the "extremist" Greens, but it's undoubtedly the case that the agreement has left the SNP with far less flexibility than they otherwise would have had in reacting to disquiet on a whole range of policies the public have found objectionable or irritating.

It therefore ought to be something of a relief for SNP members if the Greens do the hard part for them by breaking off the agreement.  That's probably the only way it would ever happen, although it's unlikely to happen even that way given that Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater sound extremely keen to be allowed to remain in ministerial office.

The one caveat I'd add is that there is - amazingly - one key policy on which I think the Greens are completely right, and both the SNP and my own party Alba are completely wrong.  That's the Green opposition to the heavily ideological (some would say "woowoo-based") Nordic Model on prostitution law.  Although that subject is excluded from the Bute House Agreement, it's probably fair to say that Green involvement in government has helpfully put the brakes on any move towards introducing the Nordic Model in Scotland.  But that benefit perhaps isn't enough to outweigh the bigger picture.

*  *  *

It's getting close to the last-chance saloon, but there's still time to help Scot Goes Pop continue through this general election year.  Donations can be made via the fundraiser page HERE, although if you have a Paypal account, a better way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because the funds are usually transferred instantly and fees can be eliminated altogether depending on the option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

The Murrell development is no cause for celebration - but there may be a silver lining

Of all places, I was at the AGM of Alba North Lanarkshire when the news broke about Peter Murrell last night.  Understandably, a touch of schadenfreude rippled through the group, but personally I didn't feel any cause for rejoicing. As an independence movement, we need the SNP to get out of jail at the general election, and the prosecution of Murrell (especially the timing of it) makes that harder.

On the plus side, a recovery for the SNP is likely to depend on the toppling of the continuity Sturgeon faction, and that also now becomes much more likely - but the problem is that there just doesn't yet seem to be any interest in striking against Humza Yousaf before the general election, so the reckoning may come too late to avoid the worst of the damage.

There's an interesting 'levelling of the score' here, though.  Immediately after Alex Salmond stepped down as SNP leader, the perception was that he remained extremely influential as his successor's mentor.  It would have seemed unthinkable that under that successor's watch, he would come to be regarded with hostility by many SNP members.  That ultimately happened because of his prosecution, even though he was acquitted.  Logically, now that there's been a prosecution within the heart of the former Sturgeon leadership, the SNP membership will start to distance themselves psychologically and emotionally from Sturgeon, just as they did with Salmond before her, even though she had remained popular and influential immediately after her resignation.  There may then be an opportunity for the SNP to finally escape from the baggage of the Salmond-Sturgeon war, and emerge with a fresh leadership that has no special loyalty to either clan.

*  *  *

Ah, my devoted stalker from Somerset, launching his 928,745th unprovoked attack on me on Twitter.  Bless him.

Scotland's "pro-independence" politics blogs the day after the former CEO of the SNP is charged with robbing the party of a £600,000 indyref campaign fund:

1x "Westminster bad!"
2x "Please give us money!"
1x "Bradford gangs and Thames Water!" 😳🤷‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/LnS92YM8IV

— Wings Over Scotland (@WingsScotland) April 19, 2024

I know from long experience that his fan club will defend Mr Campbell almost regardless of circumstance, but I trust they won't on this occasion, because leaving aside the unprovoked nature of the attack, it's also mind-bogglingly hypocritical, nonsensical and illogical.  Let's start with the hypocritical: "please give us money!"  Seriously, Stu?  Would this be the same man who has solicited many hundreds of thousands of pounds from his readers, possibly even more than a million pounds over a ten year period, and including a five-figure sum only a few weeks ago?  I certainly don't criticise him for that, because I know as well anyone that regular, lengthy writing requires funding to be sustainable, but would it be too much to request a touch of consistency from him here?  Or is it fine when he does it, and somehow reprehensible when it's anybody else?  (And would it be unkind of me to point out that a large proportion of what he's raised disappeared into the bottomless pit of his counterproductive vanity legal action against Kezia Dugdale?  He also threatened legal action against me a few years ago - if he had proceeded with that stunt, would crowdfunded money have paid for it?)

Also hypocritical: the inverted commas around the words "pro-independence" when referring to Bella Caledonia, Wee Ginger Dug and Scot Goes Pop.  I've had my disputes with Mike Small and Paul Kavanagh, but I don't think I would ever doubt their belief in independence, especially not Paul's.  Whereas Mr Campbell has openly declared that he will vote Tory at the general election and would abstain in any independence referendum held in the foreseeable future.  I know which blog warrants the inverted commas.

The nonsensical part is criticising me for a blogpost I wrote and published several hours before the news about Peter Murrell broke.  Was I supposed to have premonitory knowledge of what was about to happen?

And the illogical part is lumping me in with Bella, John Robertson and WGD as if I'm some sort of SNP leadership loyalist blogger who is trying to hush up the news.  As previously stated, when I heard about Murrell, I was at the AGM of the Alba North Lanarkshire LACU, where I was elected the LACU's Organiser.  Is Mr Campbell similarly active in a non-SNP, pro-indy party?  No I don't suppose he is.

*  *  *

If you'd like to help Scot Goes Pop continue through this general election year, donations are welcome HERE.

Alternatively, direct donations can be made via Paypal.  My Paypal email address is: jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Scot Goes Pop 2024 Fundraiser update: it's getting close to the last chance saloon, but there's still time to help keep the site going through general election year

In many ways, Scot Goes Pop has been going from strength to strength in recent months.  The number of page views in March was higher than in any month since the Holyrood election month of May 2021.  OK, page view stats can be confounded by bots and so on, but it's a rough guide, and of course the number of comments on many recent posts has been staggeringly high, sometimes exceeding 300.

However, the general fundraiser for 2024 has so far fallen well short of its target.  You might remember that I said at some point last year that if the fundraising fell short, I would just carry on with the blog for as long as I possibly could and then stop.  I'm getting very close to reaching that point now.  Our political opponents may sneer about "grifting" but the reality is that I've been living on a shoestring for the last three years and lurching from mini-crisis to mini-crisis.  It's about just barely staying afloat, not about buying luxury yachts.

As I always say, writing Scot Goes Pop is not a full-time job and I have other sources of income (although fewer than in pre-pandemic times).  But it is the equivalent of an extremely time-consuming part-time job, and to drop everything when a new poll comes out requires time and flexibility.  I know there are some people who think it should be possible to be a prolific blogger as a sort of hobby or 'personal contribution', but all I would say is try it and see how far you get.  Eventually you'll run out of time or money or both.  I can think of at least two high-profile political bloggers who once made a virtue out of the fact that they would never accept donations but who ended up doing exactly that.  It's not about being hypocritical, it's just about learning from experience.

(Incidentally, I know I didn't drop everything on Monday to blog about the Norstat poll when it came out, but that was partly because there was an extremely lengthy Alba committee meeting that required a lot of preparation.)

I recently had a bracing chat with a family member who basically told me that the game was up.  She said she admired the way I had made Scot Goes Pop work for so many years, but that the political situation had changed through no fault of my own, and I had no choice but to move on and spend my time on other things, because sufficient funding was never going to be forthcoming now.  What she was getting at was the so-called "scunnered middle" problem.  In other words, Scot Goes Pop used to attract funding from across the independence movement, but now I'm caught between two stools.  SNP leadership loyalists are annoyed at me for joining Alba three years ago, but the more radical elements don't necessarily give me any credit for joining Alba, because I don't believe the SNP should be totally destroyed or whatever.  The funding base has therefore narrowed to those in the "scunnered middle", or to those who disagree with me on some points but who value a plurality of views in the pro-indy alternative media.

I want to prove my family member wrong, but it's getting close to the last chance saloon.  The frustration is that if everybody who reads this blog over the next week donated just £2, the problem would be solved instantly, but of course the world doesn't work that way.

If you'd like to see Scot Goes Pop continue during general election year, the fundraiser page can be found HERE. 

However, if you have a Paypal account, a better way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because the payment usually comes through instantly and fees can be eliminated altogether depending on the option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

I know a small number of people prefer direct bank transfer, and if you'd like to do that please email me and I'll send you the details.  My contact email address is different from my Paypal address and can be found on my Twitter profile or in the sidebar of this blog (desktop version of the site only).

Keir Starmer reels in HORROR as Labour loses its outright lead in Scotland, according to shock new Norstat poll

Apologies to anyone who thought from the title of this post that it's a completely new poll - it was in fact published on Monday, so you may have already seen it.  I was up to my neck that day due to an Alba committee meeting and a few other things, but I thought I'd better bring the numbers to you belatedly.

Scottish voting intentions for the next UK general election:

SNP 32% (-1)

Labour 32% (-4)

Conservatives 16% (-)

Liberal Democrats 9% (+2)

Reform UK 5% (+1)

Greens 4% (n/a)

Alba 2% (n/a)

Labour going from a three point lead to level-pegging may look like possible margin of error noise, but it's worth pointing out that the Greens and Alba were not offered as options for Westminster in the previous Norstat poll (even though Reform UK were), so assuming a lot of the Alba and Green respondents would have plumped for the SNP in the previous poll, the trend may be even better than it looks.

Should Scotland be an independent country?

Yes 47% (-3)

No 53% (+3)

Scottish Parliament constituency vote:

SNP 35% (-1)

Labour 30% (-1) 

Conservatives 17% (+1)

Liberal Democrats 10% (+3)

Greens 5% (-)

Scottish Parliament regional list ballot:

SNP 28% (-2)

Labour 25% (-4)

Conservatives 19% (-)

Liberal Democrats 10% (+3)

Greens 9% (-)

Reform UK 4% (+2)

Alba 3% (-)

More on Craig Murray and dual party loyalties

It's rather timely in view of my previous post that Craig Murray has now written a blogpost setting out more details about his plans to stand for the Workers Party of Britain in Blackburn, even though he is a member of the Alba Party.  Now, as I've done before, I want to make clear that I am not in any way having a go at Craig - I think Alba should absolutely be flexible and tolerant enough to allow one of its members to stand for another party in England.  But I also want to ensure that other Alba members can expect similar levels of flexibility and tolerance in equivalent situations, and that unwritten "special rules" that benefit certain prominent individuals should apply to all, so that they can be of benefit to all.

This is the crucial part of what Craig has said -

"Secondly, I talked it over with Alex Salmond before I accepted to stand in Blackburn. I have not left the Alba Party. Alex and I mutually agreed that at this election it would be better for me not to stand for Alba in Scotland, as that would give the unionist press an opportunity to continue to muck-rake over the lawfare to which we had been subjected.

Thirdly, George Galloway has declared that he no longer will participate in the Independence debate in Scotland.

I have also seen it reported that the Workers’ Party will not stand candidates in Scotland. That will need to be worked through, but at the minimum I expect we can reach an agreement they will not stand anywhere against the Alba Party, which would render my own position impossible. As Alba is only planning to stand in up to 16 constituencies this should not be difficult."

That latter point is not sufficient according to the Alba constitution.  Annex F of the constitution is entitled "Membership Rules" and Section 6 of that annex is entitled "Membership of Other Parties and Organisations".  It reads - 

"6.1 A member who is a member of another party registered as a political party with the Electoral Commission in the Great Britain register and intending to contest elections in Scotland is regarded as being a member of a political party expected to contest elections in opposition to the Party. A member in this situation ceases to be a member."

That leaves no room for doubt - if a party intends to stand anywhere in Scotland, you can't be a member of that party at the same time as being a member of Alba.  It doesn't matter whether Craig cuts a deal with George Galloway so that the Workers Party commits itself to only stand in Scottish seats where there is no Alba candidate - their involvement in those other seats would still render them "a political party expected to contest elections in opposition to the Party" according to the Alba constitution.  It's plain from Craig's words that he does not yet have a high level of confidence that the Workers Party of Britain will defy their own name to in future become an England-and-Wales-only party - he's "seen it reported" that they will not stand candidates in Scotland, but it sounds like he hasn't heard it from the horse's mouth and doesn't fully believe it, which is unsurprising given that the Workers Party's registration on the Electoral Commission website clearly states that it stands candidates in Scotland.

People have argued in BTL comments on this blog that all of this is a moot point because Craig has not technically become a member of the Workers Party of Britain yet, although he'll have to at some point between now and the general election.  However, based on specific examples from past experience, I strongly suspect that if an Alba member (who is not Craig Murray or someone similarly prominent or well-connected) had been selected to stand as a candidate for an anti-independence party which is registered with the Electoral Commission as standing candidates in Scotland, that person would have been immediately interpreted to have "publicly resigned from the Alba Party" and would thus effectively have been banned from the party until and unless the NEC lifted that ban.

Again, to be clear, I am not arguing for that to happen to Craig and I don't think it should.  But I do want to see all Alba members benefit from the same type of tolerance, and if that means a blind eye being turned to bad rules, as is undoubtedly happening in Craig's case, so be it.

A prescription for the Alba Party

I'm sure you'll all understand why I have to be cagey about my exact reasons for feeling moved to write this short blogpost, but I am becoming increasingly concerned - bordering on distressed - about the direction of travel of the Alba Party.  Being "no worse than the SNP" just isn't going to cut it.  In fact it would render the party pointless, because people don't defect from a large party to a small one unless they can be assured of a marked improvement.  Alba does have very different policies from the SNP, but the SNP's woke, indy-lite authoritarianism is not necessarily any worse than a more radical indy authoritarianism.

This would be my prescription - 

* Alba must be, as promised at its outset, member-led.  The reality should match the words.

* Alba must be, as promised at its outset, the "best of Yes".  It should not be a curated niche fraction of Yes.

* Alba should be a party in which members are free to speak their minds on social media.

* Alba should be a party in which members are free to blog, to write articles, and to speak to the media.

* Alba should not be a secret society in which the only freedom of speech permitted is behind closed doors.

* Alba should be a party in which members are free to criticise the leadership or even poke gentle fun at it.  

And there endeth the lesson.

Poll of Polls: Support for independence stands at 49.6% so far this year

We're now over one-quarter of our way through general election year (no, I don't buy the notion that Sunak will cling on until January 2025), and the independence movement obviously finds itself in a very challenging situation because the SNP are in real danger of losing the majority they hold among Scottish seats at Westminster.  However, it's worth drawing breath and taking stock of the other side of the coin - ie. just how extraordinarily strongly the support for independence is holding up as the SNP have slipped back.

As far as I can see, there have been nine independence polls so far in 2024, and no fewer than three have shown a Yes majority.  The other six have shown only modest No leads that have never exceeded 53-47.  Crucially, the three Yes majority polls came from three different firms, so no-one can dismiss it as being a house effect from one "dodgy firm".  And, indeed, the only telephone poll of the year so far has shown Yes ahead.

The average of the nine polls works out as - 

With Don't Knows left in:

Yes 45.1%

No 45.8%

With Don't Knows stripped out:

Yes 49.6%

No 50.4%

Wow.  So by any standard we'll have something to work with if we can just somehow get out of jail at the general election.

*  *  *

If you can, please help Scot Goes Pop continue with a full-fat service throughout this crucial election year.  The 2024 fundraiser has received three very generous donations recently, and a million thanks to everyone who has contributed so far.  But we're still a long way from the target figure.  Donations by card can be made via the fundraiser page HERE, but if you have a Paypal account, the preferable way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because that way the funds are usually transferred instantly and fees can be eliminated completely depending on which option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

A red letter day as Neil MacKay may not be completely wrong about absolutely everything

Here's a question I never thought I'd ask myself: is Neil MacKay actually half-right about something?  He's got a typically provocative column in the Herald about how the independence movement is tearing itself apart as the general election approaches.  But it's not, as some people automatically assumed from MacKay's track record, about "evil Cybernats" or "Alba splitters".  It's instead about divisions between the SNP and the Greens, and between different factions of the SNP.

If part of MacKay's point is simply that pro-independence parties should not be standing against each other in a first-past-the-post election, and that every pro-independence party will bear a share of the responsibility if the vote is split, that's music to my ears and is exactly what I've been saying all along.  And it really is particularly odd that the SNP and Greens, who are forever waxing lyrical about how much they get on and about the extreme importance of the Bute House Agreement, seem hellbent on knocking lumps out of each other at the general election like never before.

Yes, of course coalitions can just be businesslike affairs, born out of necessity, that have no particular relevance in elections for other tiers of government.  But this is a coalition of choice, not of necessity.  The SNP could govern perfectly well without the Greens, which means it's reasonable to infer that the two parties must really like each other.  In that case, why not do the sensible thing and form an electoral pact for the general election, even just as a one-off to get the independence movement through the current crisis?  The SNP could throw their weight behind the Greens in, say, two constituencies where the SNP have very little chance (Ian Murray's and Christine Jardine's spring to mind) and the Greens could give the SNP a free run elsewhere.  The only downside would be the challenge of getting the media to report the combined popular vote for the two parties, but winning seats really is the name of the game in this election.

And the flipside of the coin is that if the two parties don't like each other enough for an electoral pact, and don't see enough common cause, why would they persevere with a coalition of choice at Holyrood?

Of course this is Neil MacKay we're talking about here, so emphasis is very much on the half-right.  He's still reassuringly wrong about plenty, not least the usual guff about an independence referendum being very distant if Labour are going to win a thumping majority.  Most of us got the memo quite a while ago that independence will only be won when we stop kidding ourselves that the route to it is a referendum that will never be granted under any circumstances whatsoever.

MacKay also blasts Kate Forbes for supposedly being wrong in claiming that a "ban" is being imposed on wood-burning stoves, but then curiously contradicts himself by saying "only new-build properties applied for after April 2024 are prohibited from installing wood-burning stoves".  Yeah, that sounds a bit ban-like, Neil.  The clue is in the word "prohibited".

He says, probably correctly, that a big general election defeat would lead to the SNP replacing Yousaf, but then nonsensically claims that this will "compound" their "inevitable" defeat at the 2026 Holyrood election.  That's just his prejuduce against Forbes' social conservatism speaking.  No, replacing an unpopular leader with a more popular one will not make the situation worse.  It will make the situation better.  Even under Yousaf, the polling evidence suggests the SNP still have a real chance of emerging as the largest single party in 2026, so under a Forbes leadership, defeat most certainly would not be inevitable.

*  *  *

If, like me, you're a member of the Alba Party, you'll have received the weekly email today, which lauds the party's performance in the Inverness South local by-election, said to have been a "60 per cent" increase on the party's showing in the ward in 2022.  It's also said that a similar increase in the Holyrood election would see Alba win seats in the north.

Now, I'm all for positive thinking, but it's important to remain grounded in some sort of reality.  Alba's share of the vote in the by-election increased from 1.8% to 3.2%.  They're unlikely to win any seats on 3% of the vote.  I presume what they're talking about is some sort of exponential growth path, which assumes they are now on 3% across the north, and that they might come close to doubling that in the next two years, which might win them two list seats in the north (thus justifying the plural).  But exponential growth paths are rare in politics, and to put it mildly, it's a bit of a stretch to suggest that a 3% vote share in a local by-election is proof that you're on one.

As I always say, I think it's absolutely possible that Alba can win list seats in 2026, but the most important part of the battle is recognising just how hard it's going to be and that we haven't made enough progress yet.  Patting ourselves on the back and falsely telling ourselves that we're already well on our way is pretty much the worst thing we can possibly do.

*  *  *

It looks like the Blogger platform has introduced an irritating new feature which means that if a comments thread is exceptionally long, the most recent comments will only appear if you press a "Load More" link at the bottom of the page, which is quite difficult to spot on a first glance. This shouldn't be a major problem, because so far it's only seemed to happen when a thread has well over 200 comments.  But if you do post a comment on a very long thread and it doesn't show up, it'll probably be there if you press "Load More".

*  *  *

If you can, please help Scot Goes Pop continue with a full-fat service throughout this crucial election year.  The 2024 fundraiser has received three very generous donations recently, and a million thanks to everyone who has contributed so far.  But we're still a long way from the target figure.  Donations by card can be made via the fundraiser page HERE, but if you have a Paypal account, the preferable way to donate is by direct Paypal payment, because that way the funds are usually transferred instantly and fees can be eliminated completely depending on which option you select from the menu.  My Paypal email address is:  jkellysta@yahoo.co.uk

Bombshell Redfield & Wilton poll shows a clear majority for independence, but the SNP slip to second place in YouGov poll, posing the question for SNP members: is factional Humza rule REALLY worth losing the general election for?

It's been an ongoing frustration that although the monthly Redfield & Wilton polls tend to show a high Yes vote in the upper 40s, it's been a long time since they've shown an outright lead for Yes.  I had to check back to see when it last happened, and it was the autumn of 2022, so a year and a half ago.  It's finally happened again.

Should Scotland be an independent country? (Redfield & Wilton)

Yes 51% (+3)

No 49% (-3)

It may be, of course, that in a monthly poll that typically shows Yes in the high 40s, you're bound to eventually get one putting Yes in the low 50s sooner or later due to normal sampling variation.  So the breakthrough may not be real - we'll have to wait and see what next month's poll brings.  But even taking into account the standard margin of error, support for independence must at the very least be in the upper 40s, which means it's held up extraordinarily well as the SNP's own vote has slipped back.

And by goodness have the SNP slipped back.  Full-scale Scottish polls from YouGov are rarer than the monthly Redfield & Wilton polls, and so attract more interest when they pop up - and the new one is a landmark because it shows the SNP in second place in Westminster voting intentions for the first time since the independence referendum a decade ago.

Scottish voting intentions for the next UK general election (YouGov):

Labour 33% (+1)

SNP 31% (-2)

Conservatives 14% (-6)

Reform UK 7% (+5)

Liberal Democrats 7% (+2)

Greens 5% (-)

Seats projection (with changes from 2019 general election): Labour 28 (+27), SNP 18 (-30), Conservatives 6 (-), Liberal Democrats 5 (+1)

I've heard it suggested recently that at least Humza Yousaf has steadied the ship for the SNP and things haven't been getting any worse.  These numbers would perhaps suggest that isn't true.  The percentage comparisons are with the previous YouGov poll, which was conducted last October when Yousaf had already been in harness for six or seven months.  So it looks as if things have got signficantly worse since then.  The painful truth for SNP members is that it just doesn't seem to be working with Yousaf as leader, and it may well be that if defeat is to be averted, the leadership problem will have to be addressed before the general election.  Ideally that means a change of leader (bearing in mind that unlike the Tories, the SNP are blessed with a popular alternative leader), but at the very least it means putting an end to the factional rule that has been going on since the leadership election, by bringing Kate Forbes and her key allies back into the heart of government.

As I've noted before, if you're more loyal to your faction than you are to your party or your movement, that tends to imply you think you have the luxury of guaranteed power.  Those days are over, but the psychology of Humza's followers may not have caught up with that reality yet - which could prove deadly.

Although YouGov are showing a modest No lead on the independence question, they nevertheless are in agreement with Redfield & Wilton that the trend on independence support seems to be completely unaffected by the slump in the SNP vote.

Should Scotland be an independent country? (YouGov)

Yes 47% (-)

No 53% (-)

So there are still more than enough independence supporters out there to theoretically win a first-past-the-post election for the SNP, but it ought to be a statement of the obvious that this will depend on the SNP making the election about independence and actually giving Yes supporters something to vote for.  At the moment, perversely, they seem to think doing the complete opposite of that is the key to victory, and it's therefore perhaps unsurprising that YouGov are showing the SNP currently have the backing of just 56% of people who voted Yes in 2014, compared with 21% for Labour.

Now, here's a question which I'm not claiming to know the answer to.  Why do Redfield & Wilton self-fund a full-scale Scottish poll every single month even though they have no obvious Scottish connections and it must cost them a small fortune each year?  Is there a story behind the funding of these polls that we're not aware of, and could there be a partisan agenda at play?  One possible clue is in the nature of the write-ups that Redfield & Wilton provide on their website, and which as I've pointed out before seem to have a distinct unionist slant.  Month after month, they make a song and dance about the fact that independence trails behind one or two bread-and-butter issues such as health when Scottish voters are asked what is most important to them, even though that is completely normal and has been the case in pretty much every poll since time immemorial.

But this month Redfield & Wilton have dropped all subtlety.  They've mentioned the outright lead for Yes as an afterthought at the end of their long write-up, as if it's only a little curiosity of marginal interest, whereas in fact it's self-evidently and by some distance the most newsworthy part of the whole poll.  What's going on, guys?  What's the game?

Two queries

Someone claimed on the previous thread that there was a new poll out today showing the SNP on 49 seats.  That seemed highly unlikely, and having checked I couldn't see anything.  I then made five or six attempts to respond to the comment by asking if people were just inventing numbers at this point in the hope that no-one would bother checking.  But I couldn't get my comment published.  I don't know if the bug is at my end or if it's affecting everyone.  I was going to ask people to let me know if they were having the same problem, but of course if they are, it would be difficult to tell me!  You could always email me.  And if anyone has seen this mysterious poll, please let me know about that too.

YouGov MRP poll shows SNP on course to lose almost thirty seats, piling pressure on Yousaf to go, or to end factional rule, or to change strategy on independence

I'll try to update this after I've had a chance to look at the details more, but I gather that the SNP's share of the vote in the YouGov MRP poll is very similar to their share of the vote in the Survation MRP poll, which had them on course for over 40 seats.  This underscores the point I made the other day about how there's a very narrow band of results in popular vote terms that could see the SNP winning anything between 12 and 45 seats.

YouGov MRP seats projection:

Labour 403

Conservatives 155

Liberal Democrats 49

SNP 19

Plaid Cymru 4

Greens 1

Ross Colquhoun, who as far as I know is still an SNP strategist, reacted to the much more favourable Survation numbers by trotting out the new mantra: "This shows that Labour don't need seats in Scotland to win."  As inspiring pitches go, that's right up there with "OK I know you don't fancy me anymore but at least I don't beat you up" or "I know you're sending me to the clink, your honour, but let's keep it down to a few years".  It's ultra-defensive and tacitly concedes that Scottish voters want a Labour government, which is a mindset that is going to make it very difficult to persuade people not to vote Labour.  What the SNP need to do is give people the choice of independence and convince them that independence is the change we all need, rather than a Labour government that will barely change anything at all.

The SNP could also do with a new leader who doesn't have heavily negative net approval ratings, or failing that they need Humza Yousaf to end factional rule by bringing Kate Forbes and one or two of her key supporters into senior ministerial positions.

Fresh despair for Labour as Anas Sarwar finishes third behind Humza Yousaf *and Douglas Ross* in a "who would be the best First Minister" poll

It's more than a touch ironic that the closest thing Humza Yousaf has had to a good personal showing in an opinion poll has just arrived courtesy of a poll commissioned by the Alba Party.  The reason that Alba have decided to release the numbers is presumably that they're also reasonably good for Alex Salmond.

Who would make the best First Minister? (Find Out Now / Alba Party, 18th-24th March 2024):

Humza Yousaf (SNP) 25.8%

Douglas Ross (Conservatives) 18.2%

Anas Sarwar (Labour) 17.1%

Alex Salmond (Alba) 15.4%

Lorna Slater (Greens) 8.5%

Patrick Harvie (Greens) 8.0%

Alex Cole-Hamilton (Liberal Democrats) 7.0%

These numbers aren't directly comparable to other polls we've seen over the last year.  The reason both Humza Yousaf and Alex Salmond usually have poor personal ratings is that the respondents who dislike them are subtracted from those who like them to produce a net approval rating.  But this poll has a different format that doesn't take account of negative views, it just ranks the leaders in the order of the percentage of people who view them most positively.  So it doesn't indicate that anything has changed, it's just a different way of looking at the situation.

Although Alex Salmond would have been horrified to be in fourth place if this was ten years ago, the reason this result can be regarded as encouraging for him is that his 15.4% support is more than double the percentage of list votes that would be required for Alba to win a decent number of Holyrood seats in 2026.  Conversely, although Yousaf's 25.8% puts him top of the pile, it's a lower percentage than would be needed for the SNP to have a good election result.  As many as 22% of SNP voters from 2019 think Alex Salmond would be the best First Minister, while Yousaf doesn't even quite manage double that (43.4%).

So the real comfort for the SNP in these numbers does not lie in Yousaf's showing but in Anas Sarwar's.  Labour will surely be dismayed to see their man languish behind not only Yousaf but also the hapless Douglas Ross.  And he's only just barely ahead of Alex Salmond.

*  *  *

I'm obviously not a fan of JK Rowling after her harmful intervention in the indyref. But yesterday she posted a thread about some of the most controversial trans women, and dared the police to arrest her for it when she arrives back in Scotland.  The columnist Kelly Given reacted by calling Rowling the "most boring human being in the country surely".  Well, it does seem unlikely that the most boring person in the country would have been able to dream up the Harry Potter universe, but what Rowling was actually doing was very usefully setting some boundaries for the interpretation of the Hate Crime Act.  If she dares the police to arrest her and they don't (and they're very unlikely to because of her fame), it becomes much harder for them to later arrest an ordinary member of the public in similar circumstances.  If, as the Scottish Government and its supporters claim, the Hate Crime Act is not intended as an assault on free speech, they should be grateful to Rowling for such a vivid and immediate demonstration that legitimate debate on the trans issue will be able to carry on unimpeded.

Let's get the awkwardness out of the way - I have a new title

Not everything in life makes sense, and one example is that Scottish political bloggers seem to be judged by their clerical titles, or lack thereof.  Stuart Campbell has styled himself a "Reverend" since entering the fray a decade ago, and although he's always insisted that's a genuine title, he's nevertheless been coy about how he acquired it.  A Google search suggests the answer may be the "Universal Life Church", which bills itself as "the world's leading online church" (whatever that means), and which allows anyone to be ordained as a priest within minutes simply by filling in a form.  No fee is even required.

The suggestion that Campbell's title comes from this rather dubious source was made several years ago by a well-known Brit Nat troublemaker.  But I can't find anything that contradicts it, and it has the ring of truth to it, because it's hard to think of any other religious denomination that wouldn't have cast Campbell out of the priesthood long before now due to his repeated foul-mouthed tirades.  The Universal Life Church has no standing whatever in the UK, but it does have limited recognition in the US, and there are a few US states that for some reason even recognise marriages conducted by its "Reverends".  So if you want to live in wedded bliss but only in Texas or South Carolina, Stu is your man.

Naturally I couldn't allow myself to be outdone by this, so I had a look to see if the Universal Life Church also offer titles that outrank a Reverend, such as Bishop, Cardinal or Pope.  I couldn't see any sign that they do, so I looked elsewhere.  There actually are plenty of "online churches" out there that offer an array of ranks, but most of them have no legal standing anywhere in the world.  What I was looking for was a church that allows its clergy to officiate at legally recognised weddings, even if only within a very limited jurisdiction.

As is often the case in situations like this, the answer was to be found in the South Pacific.  There is a small church, consisting of little more than a webpage, called the Pirate Mercator Communion.  It nominally worships the sea, and it seems to have a cosy financial arrangement with the government of the Cook Islands.  Anyone it ordains can indeed conduct weddings, but only in the Cook Islands.  Crucially it also allows anyone to become a Bishop for a nominal fee of 17 New Zealand dollars.

Reader, the deed is already done.  On Wednesday, I was ordained as a priest (by email) and on Thursday I was consecrated as a Bishop (by Zoom call, but it only took three minutes).  The fantastic thing is that I was able to select my own Bishopric, and although most of Scotland had already been nabbed, I was able to put together a distinctly squiggly looking and non-contiguous Bishopric consisting of Speyside, Tranent, Yetts o' Muckhart, Milngavie and approximately five-eighths of Benbecula.

I am advised that the correct form of address for a Bishop is "Your Excellency" or "Your Grace".  Suck it up, Stu.

Astounding Survation mega-poll suggests the SNP will win more than two-thirds of Scottish seats - and retain outright third place in the House of Commons

Happy Hate Crime Eve, everyone.  (And it's Easter too, apparently.)  I'll just very quickly give you the MRP seats projection from Survation's new mega-poll for the Sunday Times -

Labour 468 (+265)

Conservatives 98 (-267)

SNP 41 (-7)

Liberal Democrats 22 (+11)

Plaid Cymru 2 (-2)

That would obviously be a quite astonishing achievement for the SNP - they would have made Scotland the only place in Britain to resist the enormous Labour tide, they would hold the vast majority of their current seats, they would retain majority status among Scottish seats, they would hold off the Liberal Democrats to retain overall third place in the Commons (thus retaining Stephen Flynn's weekly questions at PMQs), and they would wipe out the Tories in Scotland.

If that sounds a bit too good to be true, it may well be.  In popular vote terms, there is a very narrow band of results that would have the SNP at 40+ seats at one end of the band, but on 15 or fewer at the other end.  When we see the data tables from this poll, it may turn out that the SNP are nestling at the favourable end of that narrow band, in which case they're still in considerable peril.  Remember also that Survation have tended to be more SNP-friendly than some other polling firms since Humza Yousaf became leader.

The Hate Crime Act: my verdict

A few people have been asking (perhaps with a touch of mischief in mind) for my views on the Hate Crime Act, which is less than thirty hours from entering into force.  Not for the first time, I find myself somewhere in between the two extremes.  I certainly rolled my eyes to the heavens when I saw that Stuart Campbell had announced that he's temporarily shutting Wings Over Scotland down while he supposedly seeks urgent legal advice (which he's crowdfunded for, naturally) on whether it's safe to put the site back up.  This is a classic exercise in tiresome Campbell theatrics to try to make it look as if SNP-run Scotland has turned into East Germany overnight, and if anyone is gullible enough to think the outcome will be anything other than Wings Over Scotland reappearing next week, possibly as early as Monday lunchtime, then, well, I've got a bridge to sell you.  I dare say he will genuinely spend the crowdfunded cash on legal advice, incidentally, but as with his stunt legal action against Kezia Dugdale, there are plenty of other ways in which independence supporters could be getting far better value for money.  I confidently predict that the outcome of this legal advice will be exactly what Campbell already knows from common sense, ie. that of course he can continue publishing a political website, but if he wants to be on the safe side he could remove certain controversial posts and stay off certain topics in the future.  There you go, I've just saved you £12,000.

On the other extreme, though, there are people talking and writing as if support for the Hate Crime Act is somehow an extension of support for independence, simply because it was passed by the SNP and the Greens.  That's a very dangerous road to go down, because anyone passionately opposed to the law may take the cue and decide there's no place for them anymore in the independence movement.  As has been pointed out in many quarters, the problem is not that the Act does not have adequate safeguards against unjust convictions, it's that there aren't adequate safeguards against unjust arrests.  There's not much comfort in being eventually acquitted if you've already been locked up, had your possessions seized and gone through the unimaginable stress of a prosecution.

I suppose I would sum up my view as this: not only is it wrong in principle to crack down on freedom of speech, it's also incredibly annoying that the SNP government has devoted so much time and energy to a bad law that can only divide the independence movement.  If they hadn't done it, we could at last be moving on from the divisions of the trans issue, but there's not much chance of that now.

Moderation problems, and a bit more on Craig Murray

At time of writing, there are almost 200 comments on the previous thread - in one sense that's a good thing, because it demonstrates how widely-read Scot Goes Pop is.  But yesterday was a nightmare day from a moderation point of view, because there were several dozen more comments that had to be deleted.  An anonymous commenter had falsely accused me on Thursday night of posting anonymously on the thread myself, and I warned him that if he kept making that accusation, he would no longer be welcome to post here.  Needless to say, he did keep making the accusation, so I started blanket-deleting his comments, which is the only way to "ban" someone on the Blogger platform.  He then tried to take advantage of the fact that it is difficult to distinguish between different anonymous commenters, and started posing as an innocent participant who was having comments deleted for no other reason than that they were supportive of Craig Murray - which makes no sense, because if you read through the thread, there are as many comments that are supportive of Craig (indeed perhaps slightly more) than there are critical of him.

I made abundantly clear in the previous blogpost that I was not having a go at Craig, and personally I have no problem whatsoever with him standing as a Workers Party of Britain candidate in England.  The point I was making wasn't really about Craig at all, it was about the fact that Alba are clearly prepared to interpret their rules generously in his case, and my hope that "the little guy" will in future benefit from similar flexibility and tolerance in equivalent situations.  As I said, my fear is that Alba is becoming a bit too authoritarian, and it's not hard to think of instances where lesser-known members have had the book thrown at them for far, far less than what Craig has done.  The solution to that is not to throw the book at Craig, it's to be consistent and chill out a bit when dealing with rank-and-file members.  

Based on what I've seen happen in the past, my strong suspicion is that if anyone who is not a Craig Murray or a similarly prominent figure had announced an intention to stand for the Workers Party, they would have been deemed to have "publicly resigned" from Alba - in other words they would have been to all intents and purposes banned from the party, and wouldn't have been allowed to rejoin without advance permission from the NEC.  The reason for that is the Workers Party registration with the Electoral Commission, which shows it as being active in Scotland and therefore an opponent of Alba.  Interestingly, Craig implied in a couple of comments on the previous thread that he is using his candidacy as leverage with George Galloway to try to get assurances from him that the Workers Party will not stand in Scotland and will no longer campaign against independence.  But, again, I'm not sure Alba would have cut that sort of slack with a less prominent person - there would just have been a knee-jerk ruling that the rules had been broken and that would have been that.

In a nutshell, I think the blind eye that has been turned to Craig's decision is a good thing and should be the template for the treatment of rank-and-file Alba members in future.  Nobody joins a political party, particularly a fledgling small party, to be subject to military-style discipline.  Alba will not thrive as a Leninist sect that keeps its members in constant terror of stepping out of line. It needs to be an open, welcoming party that gives its members room to breathe and that is enjoyable to be part of.

But so convinced was our anonymous troll chum that I was waging some sort of anti-Murray campaign that he re-posted exactly the same comment fifteen or twenty times last night.  He seemed to be refreshing the page every two minutes to see if I had deleted it, and as soon as I did, he re-posted it yet again.  To give myself a break, I temporarily changed the settings to only allow comments from people signed in to a Google account.  Needless to say the troll was not brave enough to put a name to his comment, and he stopped for a while.  But as soon as I changed the settings back this morning, he started all over again.

Believe it or not, I do have better things to do with my Easter weekend than to moderate blog comments every few minutes.  I very much want to keep pre-moderation switched off, but that's going to require a bit of responsibility from the people leaving comments.

On Craig Murray and pluralism of party allegiance

A Scot Goes Pop reader contacted me last night to ask what I thought about Craig Murray's decision to join the Workers Party of Britain and stand as one of its general election candidates in England, even though it is an avowedly British unionist party led by George Galloway, who famously voted Tory in 2021 in an attempt to stop independence.

To be perfectly honest, this was the first I'd heard of Craig's decision, so I had to read up on it.  I suppose it's the sort of thing you can look at either way - on the one hand it compromises Craig's support for independence, but on the other hand having a prominent independence supporter as a leading candidate also compromises the Workers Party's unionist credentials.  

Craig of course has one of the most complicated and unusual histories of party allegiance of anyone I can think of.  When I first read his blog around fifteen years ago, he was a member of the Liberal Democrats, and when the Tory-Lib Dem coalition government was formed in 2010, he wrote a blogpost flatly titled "I support this government".  But he quickly became disillusioned with the Cameron-Clegg administration (unsurprising given his radical views) and defected to the SNP.  He later left the SNP and joined the Tommy Sheridan-linked Action for Independence umbrella party, which unveiled him as one of its list candidates for the 2021 Holyrood election, before withdrawing all of its candidates in Alba's favour.  Craig has subsequently been a high-profile member of Alba, and was one of my fellow candidates in the highly controversial Alba NEC elections last year.  (Indeed he was elected to the NEC but declined to take up the position.)

As regular readers will know, I was elected in January to a special working group that is reviewing the Alba constitution.  And as you can probably imagine, that's meant I've spent more time over the last few weeks reading through obscure clauses of a party constitution than is really healthy for anyone.  Craig's decision to join a new party brought to mind this section - 

"6.1 A member who is a member of another party registered as a political party with the Electoral Commission in the Great Britain register and intending to contest elections in Scotland is regarded as being a member of a political party expected to contest elections in opposition to the Party. A member in this situation ceases to be a member."

That's fairly unambiguous, so I checked the Electoral Commission website.  The Workers Party of Britain is registered in the Great Britain register, and has declared an intention to stand candidates in Scotland.  I assumed, therefore, that Craig must have reluctantly left Alba to become a Workers Party candidate, but I checked his Twitter account and in fact he said this - 

"I haven't left Alba. I checked with Alex who said what I do in a foreign country is up to me!"

Now I want to make crystal-clear that I'm not in any way having a go at Craig here, because I think Alba were extremely foolish to introduce the rule barring membership of other parties.  As what Alex Salmond initially billed as a "list-only party", there was a golden opportunity for Alba to break new ground with more relaxed rules that encouraged ties between different pro-independence parties.  OK, in practice it would still have been impossible for Alba members to also be members of the SNP and/or the Greens, because those parties would still have had the more draconian rules.  But it would have sent a really powerful signal.  I thought it was incredibly disappointing that Alba after only a few months became just like any other party, demanding exclusive loyalty to itself and sometimes taking punitive action against members who fell short of that.

(To be clear, though, this is not one of the areas of the constitution I'm actively seeking to change, because I know I'd be banging my head against a brick wall.)

So in a way it's a good thing that what I regard as a bad rule is being disregarded in Craig's case.  But there's not much doubt that it *is* being disregarded, and what I would say is that I hope such flexibility and tolerance will also be shown with the "little guy" and not just with big-hitters like Craig who Alba particularly wouldn't want to lose.  I've expressed my worry recently that Alba is becoming a touch too authoritarian, and what mustn't happen is a two-tier system whereby a select few members benefit from minimalist interpretations of the rule-book, while others are subjected to military-style discipline based on maximalist interpretations.

It's Wednesday, so the Express must be lying about Scottish opinion polling again

A query on the previous thread - 

"Rob here, seen on another site best not named, 'New poll suggests the SNP will only win 18 seats and lose 30.'

Actual "new poll"?"

Well, the only mention I could find of it on a news site was at the Express, so that probably answers the question.  The Express have such an extreme track record of inaccuracies and distortions in their reporting of Scottish opinion polling that I actually achieved the impossible last year by getting a complaint upheld against them by the sham "press regulator" IPSO.  On that occasion, they had been trawling Twitter in the desperate hope of finding anything they could use for an anti-independence article, and it looks like the same thing has happened again this time.  When I searched for some of the details of the supposed "poll" on Twitter, I traced it back to a single tweet from some random bloke who had taken the numbers of a GB-wide YouGov poll and on his own initiative punched them into the Electoral Calculus model.  In other words, the entire Express article appears to have been based on a small Scottish subsample with an enormous margin of error, not on a full poll. But needless to say that is never really made clear.

That's probably misleading enough to warrant a complaint to IPSO, as is the fact that the subsample is wrongly described by the Express as an "Electoral Calculus poll".  Having been royally mucked around by IPSO on multiple occasions, though, I'll need to have a think about whether I can face yet another round.  If anyone else fancies taking it on, let me know.

The Express piece is weirdly meandering - for no apparent reason it suddenly jumps halfway through to the subject of a completely unrelated poll from four months ago, and dredges up an ancient quote from Professor Robert Ford about that other poll.  I doubt if 99.9% of people who read the piece will have had a scooby what it was all about.

Alba and the road-map to independence

On Saturday night, I started replying to a commenter on the previous thread who was on the wind-up about the Alba Party.  He said he was "just trying to introduce some realism" about Alba by calling it a "role-playing" outfit.  My reply began with "oh get over yourself", but it kind of sprouted wings from there, and it went on for so long that I fell asleep and lost the whole thing.  So I thought if I was going to have a second go, I'd probably better turn it into a full-blown blogpost.

So yeah, let's introduce some realism.  The SNP leadership in its current form is not interested in delivering independence, they want to get on with enjoying their careers as masters of a devolved country (although paradoxically by shelving independence they may be putting their own power at risk).  This creates a dilemma for genuine independence supporters who want to get the cause back on track.  Do they work to change the SNP from within, or do they try to pressurise the SNP into changing direction by applying electoral pressure from outside?

The problem with trying to change the SNP from inside is that the party's internal democratic structures have been hollowed out.  The most vivid example of that was the ultimate failure of what initially appeared to be a quiet revolution in the SNP in the autumn of 2020, when the old guard like Fiona Robertson were swept away by modernisers who wanted to increase transparency and accountability, and to protect women's rights.  But almost immediately, many of the people who had been voted off the NEC were back on it by unelected means.  Fiona Robertson no longer had the title of Equalities Convener, but effectively carried on with the actual role of Equalities Convener while her successor looked on bemused.  An election defeat barely proved to be even a minor inconvenience for her.

No, it's the leadership faction that controls the SNP, not the other way around.  But the one exception to that is during leadership elections, where members do still just about have the power to depose the ruling faction altogether - and of course they almost did that exactly one year ago.  The dice will always be loaded in favour of the handpicked continuity candidate, but nevertheless as far as we know the actual election results are not falsified, so there's an argument that if independence supporters just bide their time as members of the SNP, they'll be eligible to vote in the next leadership election whenever it comes up.  At that point they can pounce and reclaim their party.  In the meantime, though, there's a hell of a lot of powerless thumb-twiddling going on, so it's a bit daft to pretend not to understand the motivations of those of us who have chosen the alternative path of trying to bring about change from outside the SNP.

The troll suggested that I must agree with him that the SNP is the only possible vehicle for independence, given the number of articles I've written about the need for a change of SNP leadership, and the supposed lack of articles I've written about a road-map to independence that actually involves Alba.  I'll have to gently point out that our troll seems to be guilty of a selective memory, because I've written plenty of blogposts about the two possible routes by which I think Alba can play a key role.

The first is indirect.  It involves taking just enough pro-independence votes away from the SNP that the SNP leadership start to panic and become more like Alba (in other words more serious about independence) to get their winning coalition of support back.  That would be analogous to how Labour reacted to losing masses of votes to the SDP in the early 1980s.  It moved sharply to the centre ground that the SDP already occupied, and eventually took power in 1997 as a party Shirley Williams described as "very like the SDP, but a bit further to the right".  So although the SDP never won, it still achieved a lot of its objectives by forcing Labour to become the SDP.

The second route is direct.  It involves winning perhaps 5-8 list seats in 2026, holding the balance of power, and offering informal support for an SNP-led government in return for a credible strategy on independence.

So Alba could well have a decisive role to play, but I'll reiterate again that Alba will need to put its own house in order first.  I'm in a vantage point where I can see as clearly as anyone that Alba is increasingly replicating the SNP as a top-down party, and that is not the way it's going to win new recruits.  

If Sunak falls, who will replace him?

I said in the last post that if the opinion polls spook Tory MPs enough to install a fourth Prime Minister in a single parliament, the replacement would presumably be Penny Mordaunt, Tom Tugendhat or perhaps Kemi Badenoch.  But at least according to the betting that's wrong, with Tugendhat still rated as having less of a chance of being the next Tory leader than Nigel Farage - even though Farage is currently a member of another party and might even be about to become the leader of that party.

Next Conservative leader betting:

Kemi Badenoch 4.5

Penny Mordaunt 5.7

Suella Braverman 9.6

James Cleverly 10.5

Priti Patel 15

David Cameron 20

Nigel Farage 27

Boris Johnson 28

Tom Tugendhat 34

Remember this is the betting for the next Tory leader regardless of whether the vacancy occurs before or after the election, so for that reason it may make sense that Badenoch is clinging on to her position as favourite.  The big advantage Mordaunt and Tugendhat would have in a pre-election contest is that Tory MPs would be in survival mode, and would be looking for the stop-gap leader who is most likely to connect with the public and limit the damage.  But after the election, that advantage would disappear, and with years of opposition facing them, the Tories might well revert to ideological type.  

As far as I know, the leadership rules remain unchanged, so it's not hard to imagine Suella Braverman winning a post-election contest.  If she could somehow sneak into the top two in the MPs' ballot, she would probably storm to victory among the members on a populist pitch.

Tories on the brink of being pushed into third place by Reform UK, says bombshell YouGov poll

Apologies for the radio silence over the last few days, but rest assured I haven't been completely idle - I was working on my iScot column for next month, and there was also Alba committee stuff going on.  Today brings word of an extraordinary opinion poll that must make the Tories wonder why they even bothered to replace Liz Truss...

GB-wide voting intentions (YouGov / The Times, 19th-20th March 2024):

Labour 44% (-)

Conservatives 19% (-1)

Reform UK 15% (+1)

Liberal Democrats 9% (-)

Greens 8% (+1)

SNP 3% (-)

Plaid Cymru 1% (-)

Scottish subsample: SNP 35%, Labour 33%, Conservatives 16%, Greens 6%, Liberal Democrats 6%, Reform UK 4%

In other circumstances we might look at these numbers and think it's still fanciful that Reform UK could overtake the Tories - much more likely, we would think, that the more traditional party will re-establish itself when polling day comes into view.  But what makes this situation different is the chance of a Nigel Farage comeback.  If Reform UK are only four points behind the Tories without him as leader, where will they be if and when he's back in harness? This is a man, remember, who has led two different political parties to outright first place in two successive European elections, and also took UKIP to third place in the popular vote in the 2015 general election.

But whether second place in the popular vote for Reform UK would make the election more interesting or less interesting is difficult to say, because first-past-the-post ensures that the threshold for the party to win more than a tiny handful of seats is extremely high.  So in terms of seats, the election could simply be turned into an even more boring triumphal procession for Starmer.

And there's essentially no chance of Reform UK using second place in the polls (if they get there) as a springboard for greater things.  We know from the pre-Brexit period that their natural ceiling of support is somewhere in the mid-20s - that was enough to get them into the outright lead in a handful of polls in 2019, but only because the division of support between other parties was so unusual at the time (incredibly, the Liberal Democrats were in second place in some of those polls).  25% in the polls right now would still leave them light-years behind Labour.  

An achievement they might notch up, though, is to become the indirect cause of Rishi Sunak's demise. Tory MPs who are worried about making themselves look ridiculous by installing a fourth Prime Minister within a single parliament (presumably it would be Penny Mordaunt, Tom Tugendhat or perhaps Kemi Badenoch) would start to think they have nothing left to lose if third place is staring them in the face.

There's only limited comfort for the SNP in their narrow lead in the Scottish subsample, because Labour have led other recent YouGov subsamples and thus an average of the last few would show the SNP trailing.