BREAKING: Controversial "Stew" blogger dramatically fails to deny reports that his friend Chris McEleny is planning to use his position as Nominating Officer to mount a coup in Alba - a party he has ALREADY BEEN EXPELLED FROM

Stew on Twitter: ("UPDATE: I’ve been told of this passing mention in a hilarious paranoid fantasy in which I’m planning a coup to take over Alba or something. Official statement: I have no plans to take over, or even become a member of, Alba.)" pic.twitter.com/Pby4VEnrWE

— Wings Over Scotland (@WingsScotland) May 21, 2025

As ever, what matters here is not what Stew has said but what he hasn't said.  All he's doing is knocking down a straw man, because I never at any point alleged that Stew himself was planning a coup within Alba.  What I did say is that it appears that Chris McEleny is refusing to voluntarily relinquish his role as Alba's Nominating Officer with the Electoral Commission, which he cannot be removed from in any other way.  It's a statement of the obvious that there's likely to be a reason why he has refused to step down, and one very obvious possibility is that he wants to retain control over the candidates Alba can put forward at the 2026 election, ie. even after his expulsion he intends to put forward his own slate of Alba candidates and to prevent the leadership's chosen candidates from being adopted, unless he personally approves of them.  That would, indeed, amount to a coup, and the only way out for the leadership would be to either cut a deal with McEleny or to nominally set up a new party with a new name.

We know with a high level of confidence that Stew is close to McEleny and speaks to him in private regularly, so it's highly probable that Stew already knows the reason for McEleny choosing to retain the Nominating Officer position.  It's therefore fascinating that Stew spurned the opportunity to mock me for suggesting that McEleny is planning a coup, and instead carefully set up the straw man about himself.

Hmmm.

Meanwhile, I know I wasn't the only person shocked to see Stew last night defend the police for emptying a full can of pepper spray into the face of a 92-year-old pensioner with only one leg, and then immediately afterwards discharging a taser at him, causing excruciating pain (he died only three weeks later).  What an insight these words give into Stew's perverted worldview: "They spray him. They try everything reasonably possible."  

This of course is in keeping with Stew's repugnant views on the Hillsborough tragedy - he was so keen to absolve the police of any blame that he insisted Liverpool fans were somehow responsible for their fate.  It's hard to escape the conclusion that every instinct in Stew's body would lead to any Stew state being a police state. 

To very slightly adapt James Maxton's words when he publicly debated with the fascist leader Oswald Mosley in the mid-1930s:

"And woe betide anyone who wishes to disagree with the Great Leader.  What will be our rights?  Stew will decide them.  What is truth?  Stew will decide.  We throw our freedoms away at our peril.  And once they are gone we may never get them back.  Dictatorship allows no opposition."

It really is no surprise at all that Stew is now a Reform man.