It’s wrong to suggest those unhappy with SNP leadership are male, pale and stale

There is a sadness in seeing those who shouldered the burden for so long quitting the stage before the Union flag is run down over Edinburgh Castle. They helped transform a fringe movement into a political juggernaut, in the face of everything the British state and its minions could throw at them. No-one denies them a respite from the daily chores of ministerial office, but the movement will seem bereft without these well-kent faces.

Then there is the silent pantheon of the movement’s finest, who did not live to see the final approach of independence. In particular, the awkward squad who wrestled the SNP from being an eccentric, cultural bandwagon into a progressive ideological battering ram. I think of the wonderful, iconoclastic Margo MacDonald, still the best antidote to anyone who says the SNP is a capitalist plot to split the working class. Or brave, cerebral Stephen Maxwell, whose decades of work promoting a social democratic vision for an independent Scotland are about to bear fruit – if only the movement does not run scared at the final furlong. Or Professor Gavin Kennedy, whose Marxist training gave the SNP a biting edge in economic policy, in the days before the party listened to PR agents or the Duke of Buccleuch’s factor.

I could name a host of other SNP champions, famous and not so famous, who are cheering on from Valhalla. They represent the extraordinarily rich vein of talent, from every walk of life in Scotland, that adhered to the movement. Like my old friend and colleague at Napier University, Kerr MacGregor, a true scientific polymath and global pioneer of green energy. Or Jimmy Reid, who led the famous work-in at UCS in the 1970s then made the journey from the Communist Party via Labour to the SNP. In my days as Scotsman comment editor, Jimmy and I would natter every week while deciding the theme for his column – usually an invective against Tony Blair or Gordon Brown.

Why this delving into history? Largely because I was irked by the too simplistic analysis of the nature of the current debate inside the independence movement presented in Dani Garavelli’s recent BBC radio documentary, Scotland’s Uncivil War. To be fair, her piece was compelling, literate and serious. But her analysis of the internal dynamic inside the SNP and the wider movement was wide of the mark. Garavelli describes the present political divide as between a diminishing band elderly, nostalgic white men responding to their inevitable loss of influence with a crude populism, versus a new, youthful, progressive vanguard – largely female, BAME and LGBT+.

If Garavelli’s will forgive me, this picture is a caricature. For starters, strong women were always a core part of the leadership of the movement. Apart from MacDonald, one thinks of Winnie Ewing and Margaret Bain, not to mention Roseanna Cunningham and her long-time sidekick, a certain Nicola Sturgeon. Not to forget Isobel Lindsay, who was hugely influentially in modernising the SNP in the 1970s. Isobel was a member of the original UK Committee of 100 that spearheaded the anti-nuclear and anti-Polaris movement in the 1970s, using civil disobedience and direct action. Fortunately, Isobel is still with us and an active member of Common Weal.

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I AM not saying that sexism is absent in the SNP or the national movement. And I am certainly not implying that we can ignore sexism, racism and gender issues within our ranks. Modern Scotland was built on slavery and empire. Our treatment of Irish immigrants in the 19th and early 20th centuries was racist in the extreme. Scotland did not decriminalise gay sex till as late as 1981. And for the record, I am a supporter of reforming present gender recognition rules, which are too prescriptive and bureaucratic.

But I am arguing against the view that the present frictions in the movement are primarily about minority rights. Nor do I think Dani Garavelli is correct to imply that those of us unhappy with the present direction of the SNP leadership are doing so because we are male, pale and stale – or simply raging against our receding access to power. Rather, the movement is divided in three distinct but interlinked ways.

First, by a growing frustration in the grassroots at the lack of internal debate in the SNP, where decisions are taken by a highly centralised and somewhat incestuous leadership team. Second, by the subordination of the wider movement to the parliamentary leadership and its electoral timetable. Activists have been repeatedly mobilised for action then stood down without explanation – being taken for granted is not pleasant and soon saps enthusiasm. Third, by an unease that the SNP leadership has grown too cautious ideologically, relying increasingly for economic advice on paid public relations consultants and business executives with a personal axe to grind. The giants of the past – Margo MacDonald, Stephen Maxwell, Jimmy Reid – would agree.

Of course, all these points can be contested. Unfortunately, the space inside the SNP to have a proper discussion has diminished. The day when Roseanna Cunningham could force a debate on the monarchy on the floor of the SNP annual conference has long gone. Unphased, there are those in the movement who cheer the leadership on, citing the surge in polling support for Yes and the SNP as proof of its infallibility. I do not doubt their motives or enthusiasm but – and here I do show my age – the SNP never had a leadership cult and decisions were always subject to membership approval. And for the very good reason that nobody is politically infallible.

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I fear, as a movement, we are sacrificing our historic radicalism for a model of politics based on managerialism, careerism, focus groups and appealing to the non-existent average voter. With this comes being risk-averse, opportunist and ideologically promiscuous. And that, given experience in other countries, is precisely what leads to voter apathy, the erosion of democracy, and the rise of a genuine populism.

In 1995, I was invited to speak at the film festival in Douarnenez, then run by some wonderful Breton nationalists with whom I became great friends. I was still a Labour councillor, but deeply disenchanted by the rise of Tony Blair. Also speaking at the festival – themed on Scottish cinema and politics – was Roseanna Cunningham. In our debate, I found I agreed more with her than Labour. She was not surprised when, a little later, I phoned her to ask how I could join the SNP.

I wish Roseanna was not standing down. I’d rather hoped she would be around to ensure independent Scotland becomes a republic. She’d make a good first president.