A “Kennedy moment” in Scotland

I was on a train from Glasgow to Edinburgh last Wednesday, and had just logged on to the in-train Wi-Fi, when the news broke. Nicola Sturgeon, First Minister in the Scottish parliament, and leader of the Scottish National Party, had resigned. For one reason and another there will be few Scots for whom this did not constitute a “Kennedy moment”. An older generation will find it hard to understand that I now have to explain for the younger generation what this is. John F. Kennedy was both the US president and a towering and era-defining political figure. He was assassinated on 22^nd November, 1963. This event was so shocking that it became a memory anchor for a whole generation (or two). People would discus where they were and what they were doing when they heard that Kennedy had been shot. Now, it is true that, to slightly misquote a famous vice-presidential debate, Nicola Sturgeon “is no Jack Kennedy”. But in the relatively small world of Scottish politics, and more widely in the UK, she has been a major presence for more than twenty years.

It isn't hard to find reviews of her political career from friends and foes alike. Love her or loath her, all are agreed that she was (is?) a formidable political operator. Most are also agreed that she was head and shoulders above most of her Scottish opponents and more than a few of her UK ones (she has seen off Conservative UK Prime Ministers almost beyond counting). She has been a dominant figure in Scotland, particularity since she took over from Alex Salmond, her former mentor, after the independence/separation referendum was lost (from her point of view) in 2014. Her whole purpose in politics was to break up the political union that is the United Kingdom, and see Scotland take its place as an independent and sovereign state, one of the family of European nations. Unfortunately a solid majority of her fellow Scots did not agree, and voted 55% to 45% in favour of the status quo. But this of course was merely a temporary setback. Salmond resigned, Sturgeon took over, and began agitating. With Brexit, she saw an opportunity. This she claimed was a material change in circumstances and fundamental alteration in what the opponents of independence had been offering the Scottish people back in 2014. Indeed, when the Brexit vote was broken down by UK nation, Scotland had “voted” against leaving the European Union. This quietly ignores the issue that Scotland, as Scotland, wasn't being asked; it was a UK-wide vote. Just as both Glasgow and Edinburgh were both bound by the outcome of IndyRef1 although they voted differently, so Scotland was bound by the outcome of the Brexit referendum.

In truth it made little difference. Some pretext would have been found, some excuse advanced, as to why the agreed position in 2014, that IndyRef1 was a once-in-a-generation opportunity, wasn't. What few in England seem to have ever grasped is that this single aim was Sturgeon's (and is the SNP's) over-riding aim. Given the name and aim of her political party this is an elementary error. Over-riding means exactly that. To the SNP Independence is more important than educational performance, NHS budgets, drug deaths and tax policy, all of which are highly contentious in Scotland. And this is not only the case because independence is seen as a means to an end i.e. that all of these other problems will be more fixable in an independent Scotland. Even if Scotland were to be demonstrably poorer on its own, this would not matter to a true tartan nationalist. Theirs is a principled position, not a means to and end. Independence is what truly matters and everything else is secondary. Post-Brexit, this should not be that hard to understand in the rest of the UK. A lot of folk voted to leave the EU in the full knowledge that they would be worse off. They were told often enough that this would be one of the outcomes. And so it has transpired.

At the centre of all of this was wee Nicola. But no more. Out of a bright, blueish, Edinburgh sky, came the announcement on Wednesday that she was resigning. And so I shall ever remember that I was pulling out of Easterhouse station on my way to Edinburgh Waverley. But as with trains, life moves on. US politics motored along after JFK's assassination, and political life in Scotland and the UK will do too. And Nicola Sturgeon's true significance will be assessed and reassessed as time, like a train, rolls along. Inevitably, attention has now turned to who will replace her, and what this mean for both Scottish and constitutional politics.

So far, one name seems to be at, or near, the top of the pundits' lists: that of Kate Forbes. Ms Forbes is the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy in the SNP government, and is currently on maternity leave. Kate Forbes is a Christian, and this is clearly seen as a problem by at least some of the commentariat. Some, probably out of ignorance, reach for stereotypes. My suspicion is that few of the political team on the Times know the difference between, say, the Free Church of Scotland and the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, they are both “free” and “presbyterian” after all. But differences there are. For the record Forbes is a member of the Free Church. This, in the view of one of the scribblers at the Times is sufficient to qualify her as a “strict Christian” who belongs to “an austere Christian denomination” (the Times, 18/2/23, p9!). Others see trouble ahead particularly given that currently the SNP in Edinburgh are in cahoots with the Scottish Greens.

Forbes was spared any involvement in the Gender Recognition Reform Bill debates at Holyrood by virtue of her maternity leave. But differences with her party activists over this, abortion and homosexuality (if they exist) have all been highlighted as potential flashpoints. While at Westminster such issues are treated as matters of conscience and are rarely (if ever) whipped, the same is not true in Edinburgh. Only the Conservatives allowed their members a free vote on GRR. There are echoes here of the difficulties Tim Farron got into in the 2017 general election campaign (which I discussed at the time here). He found that he could not both lead a UK political party, and live as a faithful Christian because of the tensions between his Christian beliefs and some of his party's policies which he had to represent. He has also been admirably candid that this was largely because in publicly answering a number of key questions, he had been unwise in his approach. There are undoubtedly some in the media who are already dusting down some of the very same questions to put to Kate Forbes should she stand to be leader of her party and First Minister of Scotland. Such interactions, if and when they come, will tell us more about media, culture and society, than they will reveal anything about Kate Forbes and Christianity. 

Interesting times ahead then. But some of us will always remember where we were on the afternoon of Wednesday 15th February, 2023.

Bookending Boris

As one layer of political dust falls out of the air and begins to settle, another cloud is kicked up by the shuffle of political feet, stinging the eyes and clogging the back of the throat. Boris is no more. Not quite true of course. Like so much else about him, what is said, and what has actually transpired do not quite tally. They might, in time; hopefully they will. But with Boris, one just never knows. I am referring of course to our current and (probably) soon to be former Prime Minister, Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson. He became PM on the 24^th July, 2019, and stepped through the Number 10 door to announce his intention to resign at 12.30pm, July 7^th, 2022. When the Conservative party has elected a new leader, Boris will tender his resignation to her Majesty, who will then invite his replacement as Conservative party leader to form a new administration.

To digress and to be clear, the people of the UK to not elect Prime Ministers. We each of us have a vote for a constituency MP. In theory, the PM is anyone who can command a majority in the House of Commons (usually, but not always, determined by a general election), and he or she then chairs a cabinet of equals to implement a manifesto and govern the country. In practice, for much of the last 200 years this has been done on a party basis, and the leader of the largest party (which usually holds an absolute majority in the Commons) is the PM. Parties and manifestos have become less important as first mass and then social media have turned politics into a personality-driven affair focusing on one person. But our system does not work well this way. The kind of checks and balances in the US presidential system (of the kind Trump tried to subvert with partial success) do not actually exist here. In a way, because our PM holds lots of executive and legislative power, the position of PM is the more powerful (and therefore dangerous) position. This is something Boris has amply demonstrated.

He has been displaced without an election, even although it took an election to (only just) dispense with Trump – at least for now. There is no great policy divide in his party. Everyone is now a brexiteer, and believes in a small state and reduced taxation. It was Boris personally, rather than politically, who had become unacceptable and had to be replaced. It was his colleagues in government who provided the mechanism, not the people at large. This is not in the least anti-democratic, provided that Boris’ Conservative successor is committed to implementing the manifest on which all Conservatives were elected back in December 2019. There’s no point huffing and puffing that the next PM is being imposed on the rest of us by a selectorate of mainly southern bluerinsers. We don’t elect the PM, and we never have. Anyway, back to Boris.

Although he has not yet departed, it is worth identifying what has done for him, because it is both troubling and heartening. His lack of attention to the requirements of governing (as opposed to campaigning), observing important rules and conventions, paying attention to detail, caused problems which afflicted his administration right from the start. But it was his complete inability to act honestly and transparently that really hurt him. Latterly, there was even an attempt to institutionalise what looked like his contempt for honesty by making none-too-subtle tweaks to the “ministerial code” – a venerable but toothless set of guidance authored by each PM, and provided to serving ministers. Boris’ problems with honestly and consistency, as evidenced by his inability to apply the code to himself and one of his friends, cost him two ethics advisors who were both serious and non-political public servants with copious experience in public life. This all began catching up with Boris when his Health Secretary and then his Chancellor resigned, to be followed by a gathering avalanche of other resignations. So the central issue was not policy; it was entirely to do with Boris’ unsuitability for the role because of his lack of personal integrity. What’s troubling is not only that all of this was predictable, but that it was predicted.

This is usefully illustrated by two columns written by Max Hastings, the first in June 2019 and the second last Thursday, (7^th July). Two bookends for Boris’ time as PM. Hastings is a distinguished (indeed Knighted) journalist and historian, and one of Boris’ previous bosses. He has observed him from afar and up close, and while never a chum, was not a natural enemy. While I suspect Hastings is a natural, small “c” conservative, he has actually voted both Conservative and Labour in the past. In 2019 he was excoriating; he is now relieved, while sounding somewhat apprehensive about the future. He is clearly a remainer, although in his more recent article he makes it clear that for the time being re-joining the EU is off the agenda (the current political consensus), even while arguing that he expects the issue to be revisited in the future. But while thinking that Brexit is folly, this is not at the centre of his critique.

Writing in 2019, Hastings quickly honed in on the character flaw that would eventually lead to Boris’ downfall: “He would not recognize the truth…if confronted by it in an identity parade”. He was unfit for national office because “…he cares for no interest save his own frame and gratification”. He then predicted that Boris’ premiership “..will almost certainly reveal a contempt for rules, precedent, order and stability”. Prescient indeed. Writing after Boris’ demise, with the evidence clear to see, Hastings wrote “[Boris] is a stranger to truth who has sooner or later betrayed every man, woman and cause with which he associates”. Nothing has changed though, Boris was “the same moral bankrupt as when the Conservative party chose him”. Of course both the Conservative party and the country connived in the Boris phenomenon. Pushing issues of personal morality aside, he was voted for to achieve what was deemed of more importance than things like truth and integrity. I understand this; I struggled with it myself at onepoint.

The heartening bit is that, having flirted with disaster, we have avoided it. The unwritten British constitution has been flexible enough to both survive and remove Boris, without mass violence. This is not something to be dismissed lightly, as events in the US demonstrated. It looks like the system there has also survived but only after mass violence that cost lives. We have apparently decided that integrity matters, even if accompanied by a dash of hypocrisy and political calculation. It may not be everything, but I’ll take it as a promising sign that all is not lost.

One other heartening aspect is that according to Sajid Javid, whose resignation got the ball rolling, it was the sermon of the Rev Les Isaac, “Serving the Common Good”, at the National Prayer Breakfast early on the 5^th July that pushed him across the line. He went straight back to his office to write his letter of resignation. The cynics will claim that this is just convenient cover for ambition and disloyalty. But it sounds to me more like Providence being kind to us (again), and doing what we could not do ourselves – focus on, and value, truth over expediency.