The refusal to allow a debate and vote on independence strategy at the SNP conference is reprehensible, and leaves a vacuum where strategy should be

I initially assumed that the timing of the publication of a draft indyref bill was directly connected to the news having just broken that this year's SNP conference is being effectively blocked from debating independence strategy - in other words the leadership were saying to party members: "OK, we're not giving you a debate or a choice but just look at how we *are* progressing the cause of independence".   But our regular commentor "yesindyref2" pointed out that if the draft bill was to appear within the first 100 days of this latest SNP administration, it would have had to be this week - so maybe there is an element of coincidence.

The bill is welcome, but it is no substitute for open debate within the SNP on the way forward.  It might have been an adequate substitute if there had been a time limit attached to it - in other words a deadline for the UK government to agree to the transfer of powers for the bill to actually be passed, and a commitment that if the deadline wasn't met, the Scottish government would then say to voters "we have very clearly exhausted every single avenue for attempting to bring the UK government to the negotiating table, their rejection of democracy is definitive and permanent, we are therefore moving forward to using a scheduled election to seek an outright mandate for independence".  There is overwhelming opinion poll evidence that the electorate will be receptive to that message if it is presented to them correctly.

But no deadline means no credible strategy for bringing an independence mandate about in actuality, or for bringing independence itself about, and therefore a vacuum now exists that only open debate within the SNP can fill.  It shouldn't be forgotten that at last year's conference John Swinney staked a great deal of his personal authority on his ability to secure an outright SNP majority, which I always thought was practically impossible (a 1 in 200 chance was my estimate, which I'd suggest was borne out by the constituency results in May).  But he said he would do it and use it to force the UK government to agree to a referendum.  "Challenge accepted" he said in respect of the target of an overall majority, which means in brutal arithmetical terms you'd have to now say "challenge failed".

If a leader asks his party conference to give its backing to his preferred strategy on the basis that he will get it to work, and if it then fails, I don't think it's unreasonable for party members to expect that they will then get the opportunity to review what went wrong and to decide what new and more effective strategy will be put in its place.  Given the circumstances, how can the leadership even begin to justify blocking that opportunity? I recall a great deal was made last year of the fact that strategy is the exclusive domain of the party leader, and that John Swinney should be commended for voluntarily consulting conference when he didn't actually have to.  If the message is now going to be "the leader consulted conference once, but he didn't actually have to do that and he has no plans to do it again", I don't think I'll be the only person to see the parallels with the UK government saying "you'll have had your democracy in 2014".

How can SNP members make their views heard on using a scheduled election to bring about independence if the leadership are going to block all future debates and votes on the subject? Well, it's not easy, is it.  The blocking is done via the Conferences Committee, which is a predominantly elected body, but it's elected by conference delegates rather than by the wider membership. In practice that means the selectorate contains a disproportionate number of what is sometimes referred to as "the payroll vote", ie. people who inevitably hold a particular loyalty to the leadership's stance. In an ideal world that system would be reformed to put members properly in charge, but in reality that's a non-starter because any reform proposal would have to get through the same gate-keeping machinery.

Ultimately the leader is an elected position, and is elected by all party members, so in theory the next leadership contest will offer an opportunity for members to take control of the situation and introduce a credible independence strategy.  However, that big chance could be several years away, because John Swinney gives the impression of a man who is going nowhere.  And in every other sense apart from independence strategy that's a very good thing, because now that Kate Forbes has departed the stage, Mr Swinney is undoubtedly the best leader we have available.

Remember also that when he was elected leader in 2024, there was no contest at all and therefore no debate.  Considerable pressure was put on his only opponent (Graeme McCormick)  to withdraw on the grounds that an election would have been too costly - which is always the worst and most indefensible excuse for avoiding democracy and democratic debate.  The system has since been changed to make it even harder (much, much harder, in fact) for democratic leadership elections to be triggered.  I would gently suggest that both of those factors severely weaken the leadership's moral position when they now refuse to "voluntarily" permit internal votes and decisions on strategy.

The National have quoted the former MP Stewart McDonald as effectively saying "what a pity we're not going to let you have a vote, because it would have been such fun to defeat your crazy de facto referendum idea which cannot possibly lead to independence" (that's a paraphrase, let me stress).  Well, two points on that.  Firstly, there are again unfortunate parallels with unionist politicians who ludicrously say things like "in a way it's a shame we're not going to let you have a referendum, because you would undoubtedly lose again".  A good rule of thumb is that if you're confident in the popularity of your own position, you allow the vote, you don't block it.  As for the idea that a de facto referendum won't directly lead to independence?  Even if that's true, the uncomfortable truth for Mr McDonald is that would give it a great deal in common with the "let's pretty much do nothing instead" strategy that he seems to prefer.  But the obvious sense in which the de facto referendum strategy *is* superior is that it can directly lead to an outright mandate for independence coming about, which Mr McDonald's strategy cannot.  The weirdly visceral nature of the opposition to a de facto referendum in certain quarters strongly suggests to me that some people are actually frightened of living in a world in which there is an outright mandate for independence, and would actually prefer to live in a world where the 2014 mandate has not yet been overturned and is still providing the UK government with a veneer of democratic cover.  That is not a psychological phenomenon that I can easily understand or explain.

Incidentally, Mr McDonald is also in the news today because he's come out in support of BBC Scotland's utterly random attack on Radio Sputnik's Edinburgh operation - which ceased to exist several years ago!  Again, I struggle to understand those who believe that a defunct radio station that at its peak had an audience consisting of two men and a penguin is a bigger threat to Scottish democracy than the BBC itself, which pumped out blatant anti-independence propaganda and disinformation to millions of viewers and listeners in the run-up to referendum day in 2014.  But each to his own, I suppose.

As always, I do want to finish by stressing that the SNP (and to a lesser extent the Greens) remain the only game in town for delivering independence.  It may be hard to see the way forward at present, but if we are persistent enough a path will emerge.  Don't give in to frustration and start listening to the siren voices of the Stuart Campbells of this world who want you to lash out and try to destroy our only vehicle for independence.  It would be literally impossible to destroy the SNP anyway, and a civil war in our movement will just set the cause back decades.

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