Saturday, October 24, 2026

Mounting evidence that the SNP leadership would be serious about using a hung parliament to get an independence referendum - but here's why that isn't sufficient as a strategy

Over the last few days, several people have been asking how I fared in the SNP internal elections.  As I explain in the video above, I'm pretty much certain that I've been elected to one of the four committees that I stood for - namely the Conduct Appeals Committee.  So that will be a successful outcome, but I don't want to tempt fate by saying anything too definite until I see the official confirmation.  I'll let you know once I'm 100% sure it's official.  In the meantime, here are some photos of my time at the conference in Aberdeen (and as you can see, I made sure I got in a little bit of touristy stuff because I don't get to Aberdeen very often).  I think we were all particularly impressed by the speech from the Deputy First Minister of Wales, Sioned Williams, and of course it was a landmark moment, because although fraternal addresses from a Plaid Cymru speaker have been a feature of SNP conferences since the year dot, this was the first with Plaid as the sole party of government in Wales.














9 comments:

  1. Very good. A 15% chance once every five years is not good enough. Particularly when we know there is a strong likelihood of being fobbed off with a vague promise of 'more devolved powers' (and the likelihood SNP politicians would find that offer attractive).

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    1. Lying? You're using that word incorrectly. You can't lie about something that isn't a fact, and none of this fact. It's a discussion about possible strategies and likely actions.
      Maybe, 'Stop offering an opinion I don't agree with, here's a counter argument'?

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  2. That is not a strategy, it is a hope, and a forlorn one. We all know what needs to be done. It speaks volumes, in my opinion, that the current leadership are unwilling to do it. It is no surprise really, as J S pushed through a policy at the last election that ensured we have no current mandate based on any form of electoral process. Depressing. I very much doubt the 500,000 are going back to voting SNP any time soon. The usual suspects can spare me their "yoon" nonsense. They are part of the problem.

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    1. I think you're right, that's not a strategy. I suspect it's only a hope in so far as John Swinney hopes it'll do as an excuse not to bother the important people with this independence nonsense. If the stars aligned and it looked like independence were to drop into his lap, he'd stand up so it could drop somewhere else.

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    2. Phone the polis. You guys are good at that. WGD can sponsor you wasters.

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  3. The current leadership don’t care about independence and as I’ve said before they dangle the carrots at every election and once elected do nothing about it.

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  4. Guess the thinking is that if they support Burnham enough to have UK negotiate our re-entry to EU, an indyref thereafter can be a return to the status quo ante of 2014, delicately spiced with most of the electorate having experienced peak British nationalism.. (albeit tempered with the knowledge that, but for Nigel Farage, we might never have gotten second bite at the cherry at all, nor realised how difficult it would be if the union played dirty, or our historic experience convinced us of same, regardless)
    Any luck it's a catch 22 for Reform, & they'll need to call the loony left's bluff with a vote for UDI next Tuesday..

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