Swinney wanted election with Tory leader change. He should call one.

Breathe deep. Can you smell the Scottish exceptionalism in the air? It’s quite something.

It seems that unless the nation is subjected to the spectacle of another – this time last-minute – outbreak of factionalism within the SNP, John Swinney will receive his coronation as First Minister.

The SNP hate the word ‘coronation’, incidentally. For the nationalist base, it really gets under their skin.

Understandably so. Every time the Tories dump a leader and crown a new one without seeking a fresh mandate from voters, the SNP screams for a general election. And they’re quite right in their oft-repeated demands. 

Yet, strangely, they never seem to fancy an election when it’s they who are crowning their own Top Cat, as they’ve done for a second time in a row now that Swinney’s moment has come.

Here, for example, is Nicola Sturgeon in October 2022, back when she was First Minister herself, commenting on what should happen after the vertiginous fall of Liz Truss: “Of course there should be general election.

“The governance of any country cannot simply be a revolving door that one party gets to pick time and time again who occupies the highest office in the land. It’s preposterous, democratically.”

The Tories, she said, “can’t keep changing who occupies Number 10 without getting democratic legitimacy… Do I think that is going to happen? That the Tories are voluntarily going to concede that? No.”

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Hmm. The then Westminster leader Ian Blackford also called for a general election, as did a certain John Swinney.

At the time, Conservative Party chairman Craig Hoy cravenly insisted the party should serve out its full five-year term.

Swinney, then Sturgeon’s deputy, called on the Conservatives to “do the decent thing”. He added: “We should have a general election and I don’t think the Conservative Party should be allowed to play any more of their games… The people of this country must be given the chance to decide on the way we are governed moving forward.”

One again: hmm. This is so confusing, isn’t it? As the SNP insist there’s absolutely no need for an election now Swinney is in the chair. The excuse – obviously – is that the Scottish Parliament votes in the First Minister, not the ruling party.

Yes, well, that’s all very ‘angels dancing on pinheads’ really in terms of its merit as an argument. There’s no question of Swinney not getting voted in by the parliament thanks to the numbers commanded by the SNP, the Greens and the lonely Alba representative. The smokescreen is rather thin, to be honest.

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Yet surely there’s more to this than just sticking to parliamentary bureaucracy? Isn’t there such a thing called ‘honour'? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, right? If the SNP wanted to they could trigger an election to give Swinney a valid mandate.

Under the Scotland Act, it just takes a two-thirds majority of MSPs to vote for an election and it happens. I’m sure the opposition parties would oblige in making up the numbers.

Not that the opposition parties have anywhere to hide either. Labour in Wales just installed a new First Minister with no election, and as we know Rishi Sunak, like Liz Truss, took power with no recourse to the electorate.

Both Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss took the reins of power without a general election mandate
All these parties can, of course, hide behind parliamentary rules and structures to stop the people having a say when they change the heads of our governments, but it looks thoroughly dishonourable, cowardly, manipulative and hypocritical.

It will be interesting to see what the SNP’s position should be in the very near future if the Tories turn on Sunak and inflict another new leader on Britain without an election.

It’s entirely likely, after all. The knives are already being sharpened for the Prime Minister after the Tory Party’s dismal performance in England’s local elections and at the Blackpool by-election.

Of course, the SNP would simply fall back on the line that its Holyrood which elects the First Minister, not the ruling party as in Westminster. But that’s such a transparent fig leaf, it feels almost inappropriate.

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Swinney is now running an administration for which Sturgeon won a mandate. After she scarpered, we had Humza Yousaf. The deal with the Greens is done. Yet we are supposed to accept that nothing has changed substantively to demand a fresh mandate. It just doesn’t wash. In truth, it’s thoroughly anti-democratic.

Nobody is demanding perfection from politicians – just a little consistency and integrity. Trust in democracy is at rock bottom. If we want strong political systems we need to have politicians not just held to account, but willing – eager, in fact – to have their mandates tested and affirmed at every opportunity which demands it by the electorate.