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The Scotsman Bulletin Wednesday May 01 2024 #SNP #Politics
The Scotsman
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01/05/2024
Scotsman deputy editor Alan Young speaks to deputy political editor David Bol about the day ahead in the Scottish Parliament
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00:00
[MUSIC]
00:10
Hello, welcome to the Scotsman's Daily Bulletin for Wednesday. I'm Alan Young,
00:13
I'm Deputy Editor of The Scotsman. I'm joined today by our Deputy Political Editor, David
00:18
Bull, to talk through some of the main headlines. Well, let's face it, one headline you're going to
00:23
be talking about, David. How's it going? Yeah, morning Alan, not bad, thanks.
00:27
Good. Let's have a look at the front page first. And yes, we lead with continuing coverage of the
00:35
SNP and the not quite a leadership race, but there are two front runners, as we know. Kate Forbes,
00:44
pictured there on the front page yesterday at Scottish Parliament, former Finance Secretary,
00:51
is considering running. And our line on the story there is that she would be more popular with the
00:57
Scottish public as a whole. However, the other contender who has emerged is John Swinney,
01:04
former Deputy First Minister, and he is favoured by SNP members. That's according to that snap
01:10
poll yesterday. Also pictured on the front there, we've got the King out and about his visits to a
01:18
cancer centre yesterday, his first official public engagement. So, David, who's going to be next
01:26
First Minister? That's a very good question. We still haven't got any candidates, so it could be
01:32
anyone, but it does look like a two-horse race between these two, Kate Forbes and John Swinney.
01:38
There's sort of speculation Kate Forbes might announce a bid today, but we don't know. We don't
01:44
know what's being weighed up, whether they're waiting to see if the other one is a bit of a
01:47
game of chess at the moment, it seems like. There's sort of speculation this morning that Kate Forbes
01:53
is developing some policy proposals ahead of launching a bid, but again, we'll just have to
01:58
wait to see what happens. Indeed, before that, or before we might discover or have some clarity
02:07
in the SNP leadership contest or not, there is still, incredibly, a vote of confidence in the
02:16
government. Yeah, Labour are still determined to push this vote of no confidence in the government.
02:21
It does seem a bit, just basically a bit of political theatre from Labour, maybe feeling a
02:25
bit left out that the Tories pushed the motion that eventually saw Hamza Yousaf resign, the Greens
02:32
obviously being very heavily involved. Yeah, it's not going to pass. The Greens have kind of made
02:39
clear that now Hamza Yousaf has decided he's going to leave, that they're satisfied that an SNP
02:44
minority government is kind of the only way forward. But obviously, there'll be lots of talk
02:48
and I imagine it's one for Labour leaflets coming up to the election more than anything else.
02:54
Indeed, and I know it's impossible to say how things are going to go, as you point out,
03:00
no one's actually declared yet in this contest to replace Hamza Yousaf. There is, though, a feeling
03:10
that the party would like to get on with it and there certainly seems to be key senior figures
03:18
behind John Swinney lining up a coronation. There's also been a bit of pushback from Kate Forbes'
03:25
side of the party to that idea. Yeah, I think the last thing the SNP would want right now is a
03:31
leadership contest. If you look back to last year, it was horrendous for them. It did no one any
03:36
favours. It was just mudslinging and Hamza Yousaf went into that job with a lot of baggage and a lot
03:42
of criticism from his allies that were just pointed out on a daily basis. So the last thing they want
03:48
is that. And you're right, a lot of senior figures, a lot of cabinet ministers have come out and said,
03:53
"Oh, if John wants to stand, we're fully behind him. He's the best man for it." There's a bit of
04:00
talk that he maybe doesn't want a leadership contest. So this is probably why we're seeing
04:04
a lot of this push early on. Hopefully that no one will stand against him and he can just kind of
04:10
be coronated, as you said. But obviously, Kate Forbes' team and people who think maybe John
04:15
Swinney isn't the best for the SNP at this stage, he's maybe had his time, would like a contest.
04:21
And Kate Forbes would very much like a contest to be kind of put to members, given she did
04:26
quite well in last year's leadership contest. She wasn't far behind Hamza Yousaf. Obviously,
04:31
that poll this morning and yesterday shows that Swinney is kind of more popular with the members,
04:37
who's the first sort of people she's got to convince. But maybe members will look at the
04:42
fact that she's more popular with the public and think, well, maybe that's what we need and
04:45
are more likely to kind of back her. Indeed. Fascinating times. And we've also got our eye
04:54
on Westminster, of course, because it's the local elections in England tomorrow. And that
05:00
could have a very real impact on when a general election is called. I mean, yeah, we could be
05:06
in a position where that is looking like it could go very badly for us. I mean, it's pretty bad
05:13
already. This could just be a final kind of nail in the coffin from a lot of his MPs who just may
05:19
be sort of on manoeuvres. This could be a good sort of reason to sort of put that pressure on
05:23
him to call that election or to set aside even the still speculation that might happen. So it
05:28
could all explode at Westminster as well as Holyrood this week. Fascinating times. Thanks,
05:33
David. I'll let you get back to it. Please keep an eye on Scotsman.com where we'll be trying to
05:38
make sense of everything throughout the day. If you can do subscribe to the site, then you'll be
05:44
able to read absolutely everything. And if you're out and about today on the 1st of May, please do
05:51
pick up a copy of the paper for me and from David. Bye for now.
05:55
[Music]
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