SNP braced for 'vicious' contests for Holyrood hopefuls

An additional challenge some SNP Holyrood hopefuls may face could be a rule brought in for the 2021 election whereby the top list ranking had to be given to a candidate who from an ethnic minority or who with a disability.

It is not clear yet if these rules intended to boost inclusivity will apply in 2026.

"No rules have been decided for 2026 Holyrood elections," an SNP spokeswoman told the Herald on Sunday.

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If the SNP performance at the Holyrood election reflects its result on July 4 - when it lost 37 seats - the party would lose constituency seats, elected on the first past the post system, across Glasgow, Edinburgh and the wider central belt to Labour.

The prospect of such a development may mean that SNP candidates have a better chance of getting elected via the regional vote where voters choose between parties rather than named individuals (except where individuals are standing as independent candidates on the regional list).

Each party standing in the eight regional ballot draws up a list of their candidates in order of the party’s preference. The names on a list are in a fixed order.

The first person on the list will take the first additional seat a party wins, the second person will take the second additional seat, and so on. A candidate can stand both in a constituency and on a regional list.

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If they succeed in a constituency, this takes priority and their name is then removed from the regional list, so they cannot be elected twice.

The process means that the party rankings on the list become crucial with those placed in top spots having a higher chance of being elected than those lower down.

"It's going to be a vicious fight for positions on lists. If we get the same sort of results in 2026 as we got on 4 July it will be the people at the top of the list [in the central belt] who will be the people in Holyrood," said one activist.

"The list will be their parachute. If you are in what is now a marginal seat, you will want to be near the top of the list, as well as having the constituency spot."

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He added: "There are relatively few people who are likely to stand down, and it's not likely that the group will get any bigger, so clearly there is an issue of finding spots for these ex MPs."

The senior member hoped the issue wouldn't arise if the party was able to get itself on a stronger footing ahead of the election in May 2026 and into a position where constituency MSPs would be comfortably re-elected via the first past the post part of the electoral system.

First Minister John Swinney said after the election that he was “committed” to healing the relationship between the SNP and the electorate as he admitted his party had "failed to convince" the people of Scotland on independence.

He said he took full responsibility for the campaign.

“The Scottish National Party needs to be healed and it needs to heal its relationship with the people of Scotland, and I am absolutely committed to doing that,” he said.

The process of ranking members has generally been decided by members in each of the eight regions with one member given one vote and asked to place candidates on a scale of one to eight (or depending on how many candidates want to stand).

A rule to broaden the representation of SNP MSPs with disabilities and from ethnic minority backgrounds was brought in by the party ahead of the 2021 poll.

However, controversy surrounding it emerged after leaked legal advice the party received from Jonathan Mitchell KC said the move was  legally “dubious” and would be open to challenge in the courts.

Last year former SNP MSP Joan McAlpine - who had been critical of the then First Minister Nicola Sturgeon's reforms around gender recognition - wrote that she believed she had been forced out because of the mechanism.

"I believe I was forced out by a highly controversial 'equalities mechanism' that some activists close to Sturgeon were keen to apply to party list rankings," wrote Ms McAlpine in the Sunday Post.

"It meant candidates selected by party members could be pushed aside by those who identified as black in some regions, or disabled in others, propelling themselves to the top of the list."

Ms McAlpine was beaten in the Dumfriesshire constituency by the Scottish Tory Oliver Mundell and missed out on a list seat to SNP MSP Emma Harper, who Ms McAlpine said had listed diabetes as her disability.

Ms McAlpine said some supporters urged her to take legal action and her solicitor advised she had a strong case.

"With hindsight, perhaps I should have taken the SNP to judicial review," she said.

While the rule only influenced who got elected in the South of Scotland and the Highlands - as they were the only regions where SNP MSPs were elected on the list - it could affect many more regions next year because of the possibility greater reliance on the regional ballot to get candidates elected.

"Every single region will be affected this time. It means that the most powerful people who would expect to be high up in the list could be affected," said another member.

"The fact they introduced it for one election and drop it for another because certain powerful people are standing would be scandalous."

A third member disagreed and thought the inclusivity rule should be removed.

However, they agreed the battle for list rankings could be intense.

"The way to avoid a controversy is to allow members to decide on the rankings," they said.

"They all have to make their pitch and they are then ranked. The last time around it was obvious many MSPs wouldn't be elected via the lists, so there wasn't too much attention given to it.

"But this time there probably are going to be more MSPs elected this way and therefore there will be a big fight for who gets to be number one and two, possibly number three on the list."

While the SNP's South of Scotland regional rankings contest sparked controversy in 2021, most of the party's high profile selection battles in recent years have focused on selections for constituency seats at Westminster and Holyrood.

Angus Robertson and Joanna Cherry were both keen to stand as the candidate for Edinburgh Central in 2021.

But ahead of the contest the party changed its rules in July 2020 - after Mr Robertson had thrown his hat into the ring - which meant Ms Cherry would have had to stand down as an MP before being selected to be a Holyrood candidate.

Ms Cherry described the rule change as "unreasonable" and withdrew from the contest.

She said: "It is unprecedented in our party's history of dual mandates to demand that a parliamentarian make themselves and their constituency staff unemployed in order to be eligible to be a candidate.

"It is particularly unreasonable to demand this in the middle of a pandemic. I am not prepared to do it and so unless circumstances change, I won't be seeking nomination for Holyrood in this election."

Mr Robertson went on to be elected as SNP MSP for Edinburgh Central and was later appointed to the Cabinet as external affairs secretary, a position he continues to hold.

Recent selection battles to become constituency candidates include one between former SNP MPs Alison Thewliss and David Linden, and another between former SNP Lisa Cameron and Grant Costello.

Ms Thewliss, former MP for Glasgow Central, and Mr Linden, former MP for Glasgow East.

The two senior politicians went head-to-head as Ms Thewliss' Glasgow Central seat was split into five by the boundary review.

The seat was held by Mr Linden, who was the party's social justice spokesperson and one of Stephen Flynn's closest allies.

He won the party's ballot to be the candidate. However he was defeated at the general election by Labour's John Grady.

Ms Thewliss had also put her name forward in Glasgow North where she was selected.

However, she was defeated by Labour's Martin Rhodes as Sir Keir Starmer's party took a clean sweep of seats in Scotland's largest city.

The SNP's Westminster selection contest in East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow also hit the headlines when party staffer Grant Costello challenged sitting MP Lisa Cameron.

Ms Cameron defected to the Tories before the result became public. She had been expected to lose the contest.

Mr Costello was beaten on July 4 by Labour's Joani Reid, the granddaughter of the late trade unionist and politician Jimmy Reid.

Former SNP MPs being discussed as possible party candidates for Holyrood include Ms Cherry, Stewart McDonald, who represented Glasgow South, Tommy Sheppard, who represented Edinburgh North and Leith, and Alyn Smith who represented Stirling.

Ms Thewliss and Mr Linden are also reported to be considering their options. Other potential Holyrood candidates could include Owen Thompson, the former chief whip in Westminster, Stuart McDonald, who remains SNP treasurer, and Anum Qaisar, the former MP for Airdrie & Shotts.

They all lost their seats to Labour on at the election.

Ian Blackford, the SNP's former leader at Westminster and Mhairi Black, the party's former deputy leader, have also been discussed as politicians who may be interested in standing for the Scottish Parliament. Mr Blackford and Ms Black stood down from Westminster before the election.

One senior source told the Herald on Sunday that there is a view the quality of SNP MSPs could be enhanced with former MPs joining the group.

"Many hold the view that the calibre of SNP MSPs in Holyrood could be much better and it seems likely that some of those who lost their seats will  be eyeing up Holyrood," they said.

"I would welcome that - and any SNP MSP who feels threatened by this should be working really hard to be recognised as the best for their constituency.

"The days of a seat based on patronage are over - that cannot be a bad thing in my opinion."

Asked who they would like to see in Holyrood, the source replied: "Joanna Cherry and Stewart McDonald."

Mr Blackford told The Times earlier this month he was weighing up a Holyrood run and argued that an injection of capable MPs would enhance the SNP group in Edinburgh.

“Those who have been at Westminster would bring a wealth of experience to Holyrood to add to the talent pool that is there already,” he said.

Allan Faulds, who runs Ballot Box Scotland, a website that provides in depth-analysis of polling and elections in Scotland, told the Herald on Sunday there was "a real potential for things to get quite messy" in the SNP selection contests if both sitting MSPs and former MPs want to become candidates.

"Whatever else happens, at this point we can be pretty certain the SNP are not going to do things like win all nine constituencies in each of the Glasgow and Central regions as they did in both 2016 and 2021," he said.

"A best case scenario for them is if the constituencies end up relatively split between Labour and the SNP, which would allow maybe six or seven SNP MSPs in each of those two regions on a better day for the party.

"If Labour sweep every constituency [in these areas] like they did at Westminster though, that's what constrains the SNP to four or five MSPs. Either way, it's a lot fewer seats, even if PR is...going to prevent the kind of near wipeout they experienced last month."

However, Mr Faulds also cautioned from extrapolating the general election results to the Holyrood vote pointing out Scots can vote differently at Westminster and Scottish Parliament elections.

"Voting patterns at Holyrood are always different to those at Westminster (and indeed between constituency and list at Holyrood)," he said.

"For example, the consistent trend throughout the devolution era has been for the Conservatives and Lib Dems to do worse in Holyrood (list) share than at Westminster, and for the Greens to do better."

He added: "On the big Labour versus SNP scrap, the obvious difference between Westminster and Holyrood will be that Labour won't be able to win the significant majority of seats that they did under first past the post, or a majority at all.

"Even if Labour do sweep central belt constituencies, the SNP will still win four or five MSPs in most Central Belt regions, and Labour are unlikely to be able to make up the difference for a majority in historically weaker regions like Highlands and Islands and the North East."