SNP Leadership contest 2004

'So who cares if the SNP's a busted flush? Well, I do, actually.' Margo MacDonald, 23 rd June 2004.

Swinney successor has to see the light

By Margo MacDonald, the independent voice of independence, in the Scotsman 23 rd June 2004

POOR John Swinney, with "friends" like his, he didn't need political enemies. For weeks before the European elections, culminating in the last few bitter days since the SNP share of the vote dropped below 20 per cent, his "loyal" lieutenants told TV interviewers of their love and admiration for the SNP leader.

Then, as soon as the camera light was off, they told the same interviewers off the record that he was finished, "a dead man walking" to quote one anonymous Swinney "supporter".

So who cares if the SNP's a busted flush? Well, I do, actually. The SNP's feelings about your columnist are well-documented, and for my part, I confess to enjoying my freedom from the sneaky nastiness John Swinney experienced.

But the SNP is much more important than the sum total of quarrels and jealousies among its members.

I've never given up on believing a good dose of sovereignty would go a long way towards conquering the self-doubt that lingers about the Scottish body politic, and infects too much of our national life with mediocre aspiration and achievement.

The SNP is still the premier part of the delivery mechanism for independence, so its performance is of interest to everyone wishing to see the Scottish Parliament become an institution worthy of the name.

Party members and pundits alike agree Swinney is to blame for the lost seats and votes.

They're wrong. The rot set in almost a decade ago when Alex Salmond, Swinney's predecessor, threw his lot in with the people campaigning for devolution.

Salmond, whether because he couldn't bear to be sidelined from the publicity attaching to the devolution campaign, or whether he genuinely believed in the incremental, "gradualist" approach to winning independence, ditched the SNP's crystal-clear strategic objective... to win enough seats or votes to allow an SNP-led team to negotiate independence from Westminster.

For the public in and beyond Scotland, such a publicly acknowledged and promoted objective would have clearly marked out the SNP from the establishment unionist parties, and would have delivered the vision SNP members needed to sustain their continued efforts to raise enough money and memberships during a period of general disengagement from politics and politicians.

Those of us who said this were derided as "fundamentalists", out of touch with the new politics, and ungroovy grumps who disloyally criticised the SNP leaders.

The fact that our impersonal criticisms were of the tactics and policies (remember A Penny for Scotland?) was buried under the attacks on the "Fundies" mounted by the same Salmond/Swinney loyalists who're now bad-mouthing John Swinney.

John Swinney was handed a dubious legacy by Alex Salmond. He and Mike Russell, the chief executive, spent most of the SNP's feedstock in their doomed efforts to win votes in 1999.

Because the SNP campaign had no clarity, and no vision of where the party wanted to go, voters opted for Labour and the others.

Once into the Scottish Parliament, independence became the word that dared not speak its name, as the unionist parties cruelly reminded SNP front-benchers.

The same hack MSPs now talking up their chances of being elected to succeed Swinney confused electors and SNP members alike by failing to address the questions posed by devolution itself, the changing nature of the EU, and the global economy and balance of power.

In the Scottish Parliament, what was the role of a supposedly pro-sovereignty opposition? Was it to run a devolved administration better than Labour? Or was it to continually expose the instability and limited powers of a devolved parliament?

The self-styled "strategists" clustered first round Salmond, and then Swinney, dodged the hard questions and began to look and sound like a second-rate copy of New Labour.

That was the lacklustre legacy left to John Swinney by Alex Salmond. Unfortunately, John chose to carry on from where Alex had petered out.

Like Alex, he froze out people who challenged the steady-as-she-goes approach to winning support for independence.

That has left the SNP without a philosophical base, a strategic objective, and the belief and determination to achieve it.

The outcome is that Kenny MacAskill and Nicola Sturgeon advocate "parking" sovereignty for the time being, and learning to deliver public services better than the Labour/Lib Dem coalition.

Since it has been this cock-eyed cowardly cop-out that has increasingly confused voters as to what the SNP stands for and lost votes, seats and respect, that they should continue to peddle it as the way to win back support exposes them as being no different from, and no improvement on, John Swinney.

He's nicer, with a much better sense of person-management, so where's the electoral advantage in swapping a nice, if rather uncharismatic, leader for one who's just as lacking in the personality side, and who's not a good "people" person or vote-winner, as successive results in Glasgow Govan indicate?

Fergus Ewing also "loyally" supported John Swinney, but colleagues believe that he would be willing to answer the call. The least said about his touching selflessness, the more voters might put their trust in politicians.

The present approach leads into a blind alley. So, could the harder-nosed and intellectually heavier strategy exemplified by Alex Neil get the movement for sovereignty on to the right tracks?

Could it do any worse than John Swinney's strategy being continued by an equally cautious successor?

The SNP played safe and lost... it's time to get bold and send on the strikers.