What makes the current Swinney 'independence plan' so dangerous: for the first time ever, the SNP would be seeking votes in a way that would benefit the party but harm independence. That decoupling of the SNP's interests from the cause of independence must simply never happen.

In today's YouTube commentary, I respond to an email I received a couple of days ago asking for my opinion about two completely separate proposals that have been sent to the First Minister John Swinney.  The first is about reform of the Holyrood voting system, abolishing what is described as the "constituency penalty" which awards less value to list votes for a party that has already won a lot of seats on the constituency ballot.  The second is about a change to Mr Swinney's plan for winning independence, and suggests quite an imaginative way forward after an SNP victory in next year's election.  Basically a motion would be presented to parliament demanding that Westminster pass a Section 30 order permanently transferring the power to call an independence referendum to Holyrood, but also stipulating that if the demand is not met, there would be an early dissolution and a snap election would be held as a de facto referendum on the country's constitutional future.

In the video I explain why I agree with the second proposal (with caveats) but not with the first, which would inadvertently abolish proportional representation for the Scottish Parliament and leave us with a majoritarian voting system that is almost as bad as unalloyed first-past-the-post.  I also try to find the nub of what makes Mr Swinney's independence plan as it stands so harmful, and it's this: until now, what is good for the SNP electorally and what is good for the cause of independence has always been inseparable.  If you help the SNP do well in an election, you're pretty much automatically boosting independence.  But for the first time, the Swinney plan would create a situation where the SNP would be seeking votes in a way that would genuinely benefit the party while simultaneously harming the cause of independence.  That would be a very dangerous decoupling which must never be allowed to happen, and that's why the Swinney plan must at the very least be modified at conference.  Power for the SNP is not an end in itself - the SNP must always remain a vehicle for independence or else the whole endeavour becomes pointless.  An empty shell.

You can watch the video via the embedded player below, or at the direct YouTube link.

Ian Murray: one of history's most deserved sackings

Given the extremes that Scottish politics has oscillated between over the last three decades, with repeated wipeouts or near-wipeouts of the Scottish Tories and Scottish Labour at Westminster, there have been a number of occasions when someone has found themselves as either Secretary of State for Scotland or Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland on a "last person standing" basis.  Presumably, or at least one would hope, both Peter Duncan and David Mundell had some self-awareness or insight into the fact that they only had the job for that reason, but in the case of Ian Murray we don't even need to wonder - he clearly has no insight whatsoever.  He honestly believes himself to be a political colossus, and thinks that the reason he was the only Scottish Labour MP left after the 2015 and 2019 general elections was his unique skill-set and political vision - not because of his immense fortune in being the candidate in Edinburgh South, the constituency which just happened to be most conducive to mass unionist tactical voting in favour of Labour.  He imagines that there are now 30-odd Scottish Labour MPs simply because they all followed the Murray Blueprint.  To him it makes perfect sense that he was converted from Shadow Scottish Secretary to Scottish Secretary last July, even though Starmer had just gone from having no choice to having dozens of alternatives.  But it made sense to practically no-one else.  Murray is an unlikeable character, and the most noteworthy thing about him was his previous principled stance in opposition to Trident, which he abandoned at the drop of a hat when it proved necessary to cling on to office.  You shouldn't have bothered, Ian - now you have no ministerial job, and no principles either.

The shock of dismissal doesn't seem to have jolted Murray into a more realistic appraisal of his own abilities - we're told he is "genuinely shocked" and "flabbergasted" to have been given the push.  Seriously, Ian?  You can't conceive of any of your dozens of Scottish colleagues being more able or charismatic than you are?

Still, we shouldn't underestimate Starmer - he's perfectly capable of stunning us all by appointing someone even worse.

Rayner is OUT as Deputy PM - but nature abhors a vacuum, and it's likely that an alternative soft left champion would emerge in any early leadership election

Angela Rayner has just resigned as Deputy Prime Minister, although I can't see from the initial reporting whether she has also resigned as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party (an elected rather than appointed position, of course).  The latter point could be crucial in terms of her long-term political future, although if a vacancy for the leadership were to come up in the next few months, her goose would still be pretty cooked.

Understandably, punters think her chances of replacing Starmer have just fallen off a cliff.  She had been favourite for a time, but these are the latest odds - 

Wes Streeting 6.8

Andy Burnham 8.4

Yvette Cooper 15

Darren Jones 19.5

Angela Rayner 22

Bridget Phillipson 25

Rachel Reeves 30

Ed Miliband 34

Some people will assume that Wes Streeting's chances have strengthened dramatically, but you have to look at this from the point of view of those who will ultimately make the decision - ie. Labour party members.  In this particular scenario, they are not likely to conclude that the problem is that the current leadership is not sufficiently right-wing, because Starmer has pushed the party as far to the right as it has ever been (including in the Blair years).  They are much more likely to be looking for a soft left corrective, and if Rayner can no longer provide that, they'll try to seek out an alternative champion.  Andy Burnham is the person who would most obviously fit the bill - but just one snag, he's not actually eligible because he's not an MP.  That can theoretically be overcome but not easily.

So I think the person whose chances have just improved dramatically is Ed Miliband.  That may not be showing up in the odds yet, but I think the logic for it is sound.

Neale, in all seriousness, if you honestly think the Alba Party through its appalling behaviour has not abandoned its founding principles, then I can't even imagine what you think those principles actually were, but they certainly can't have been worth having. https://t.co/QZbPaId2kT

— James Kelly (@JamesKelly) September 5, 2025

Astounding poll puts the SNP on course to win more than THREE TIMES as many seats as any other party

Today's YouTube commentary is of course about the new Scottish poll from More In Common - the first full-scale Scottish poll from any company since June.  The seats projection from the poll is pretty extraordinary, showing the SNP on 61 seats - just four short of a single-party overall majority.  However, if anyone is tempted to think that this means John Swinney's plans to make an independence referendum conditional on the SNP winning an overall majority may not be quite so misjudged after all, I'm afraid that's not the case, and I explain why in the video.  I also give my thoughts on the SNP event this morning, which doubled down on the Swinney plan.

First full-scale Holyrood poll in months puts SNP on course for handsome victory - with Labour and the Tories facing calamities of biblical proportions

Well, it's been a very long wait, but we at last have the first full-scale Holyrood poll for almost three months - and unexpectedly it comes from More In Common.

Scottish Parliament constituency ballot voting intentions:

SNP 37%

Labour 17%

Reform UK 16%

Liberal Democrats 12%

Conservatives 12%

Greens 5%

Scottish Parliament regional list ballot voting intentions:

SNP 32%

Reform UK 16%

Labour 16%

Liberal Democrats 14%

Conservatives 12%

Greens 8%

Analysis to follow shortly...

Anas Sarwar's hopes of becoming First Minister CRUMBLE TO DUST after crucial YouGov crossbreak

I said the other day that the Great Scot Goes Pop Video Experiment would recommence just as soon as I could commandeer the household webcam, but that's proving far from straightforward because for the time being our living room has been turned into a hotel room.  (For those of you who were complaining about the guddle in the background of the videos, you should see what it looks like now.)  Not to be deterred, though, I simply memorised the results of this week's YouTube subsample and took to the Great Outdoors to bring you the glad tidings.

Polanski looks the part

"Former actor Zack Polanski elected leader of the Green Party" is a bloody peculiar BBC headline, it has to be said, but at least they refrained from dropping in any of his theatre credits.  This is a moment of huge significance, in my opinion, because whereas the new co-leaders of the Scottish Green Party are unlikely to set the heather alight in terms of charisma, Polanski is the real deal, and has modern communication skills on a par with Zohran Mamdani.  He did a video during last year's general election, which I thought was one of the most effective campaigning videos I'd seen for years.  If the English & Welsh Greens under his leadership can now agree on an electoral pact with the new Corbyn / Sultana party (which is a very big if, because the new party already seems to be struggling to agree with itself) there may just be an alchemy that could lead to Labour's position as the main force of the "Left" being challenged as never before.  I wouldn't rule out a new two-party system emerging consisting of Reform UK and the Greens/Corbyn/Sultana.  In a sense that would mimic what happened in Northern Ireland two decades ago when the more radical/hardline parties replaced the old "moderate" duopoly of the UUP and the SDLP.

Green Party of England & Wales leadership result:

Zack Polanski: 20,411 votes

Adrian Ramsay and Ellie Chowns: 3,705 votes

Too Wee, Too Poor, Too Sark?

Sark is a tiny British crown dependency off the coast of northern France with a population of only 500, and yet it has more political autonomy than the nation of Scotland.  Technically it's part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, but that's almost meaningless because unanimity between the three island parliaments (Guernsey's, Alderney's and Sark's) is required for any Bailiwick-wide decisions to take effect.  So effectively Sark is in control of all its affairs apart from foreign relations and defence - something akin to what George Galloway used to call "Devo SUPER Max", although in fact it's superior to that because Sark isn't even in the UK and thus enjoys a measure of sovereignty.  I visited Sark on Tuesday, and recorded this quick video message to try to bring a new perspective to the perennial "too wee, too poor, too stupid" jibe.