{"id":3208,"date":"2016-05-04T08:55:03","date_gmt":"2016-05-04T08:55:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/?p=3208"},"modified":"2025-12-27T13:07:37","modified_gmt":"2025-12-27T13:07:37","slug":"five-more-years-dull-it-wont-be","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/2016\/05\/five-more-years-dull-it-wont-be\/","title":{"rendered":"Five more years: dull it won’t be"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

People tend not to get excited by elections where the result is widely predicted. The current consensus<\/a> that the next vote for the Scottish parliament will result in another convincing SNP victory is a case in point.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The comparison with recent visits to the ballot box doesn\u2019t help either. First, we had the SNP minority government of 2007-11<\/a>, then the 2011 SNP landslide<\/a>, which led directly to the independence referendum of 2014<\/a>. Barely eight months later came the 2015 UK election<\/a> in which the Scottish nationalists won an unprecedented 56 of Scotland\u2019s 59 seats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, after all that, this next phase in Scottish politics is bound to be dull, right? Wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Power surge<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Scotland\u2019s increased powers<\/a> will lend extra significance to the main parties’ policy positions. This will create a dilemma for the SNP should it, as expected, win the election comfortably. It will want to continue to present itself as a managerial catch-all party. Hence its relatively modest income tax proposals<\/a>, designed to spike any claims that this is the party of high tax. We will also see incremental alterations typical of long-serving governments \u2013 the proposed changes to council funding<\/a> and council tax<\/a>, for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet the government will be tempted to nation-build by making distinctively Scottish policy changes. Welfare might be an obvious place, though the scope will be limited. The Scottish government will be tied to existing UK welfare spend<\/a>, the bulk of it still reserved and framed within the UK Universal Credit system<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What about the other big parties? Labour\u2019s campaign under Kezia Dugdale has been energetic but incoherent. We have seen contradictions<\/a> on independence, for instance. The party has also proposed tax increases for all without apparently<\/a> determining the effects on people receiving in-work benefits, as well as various other initiatives from a \u201cchildcare revolution\u201d<\/a> to a commission<\/a> to investigate occupations that favour one gender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Add to this Dugdale\u2019s initial opposition<\/a> to UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, and Scottish Labour coming out against<\/a> Trident renewal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This all makes it hard to say how the party will handle the new Holyrood in the short to medium term. And while Labour in Scotland may not quite be in existential crisis, its seemingly embedded difficulty with the Scottish question will prove a real challenge to forming a strong challenge for government. The long-lasting difficulties<\/a> of the Spanish Socialists in Catalonia should provide a warning if not a parallel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Ruth Davidson\u2019s Scottish Conservatives, at least one poll is predicting<\/a> a best-ever second place finish ahead of Labour. Yet the party has struggled to find a voice since the devolution of 1999, having been the only party that opposed<\/a> it, and it will once again rely perhaps solely on the regional lists for its MSPs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fact that Davidson is proposing<\/a> to maintain income tax at UK levels rather than pushing for a \u201clower tax, business-friendly\u201d Scotland, underscores her unionist instincts. Elsewhere she has presented a softer image than the UK party \u2013 she is more supportive<\/a> of accepting refugees, for example. It will be interesting to see how the Scottish Conservatives handle tensions within the party on these kinds of issues following the EU referendum<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can also expect a return to the multi-party politics of the Scottish parliament\u2019s earlier years<\/a>. Competing with the Liberal Democrats for fourth place are the pro-independence Greens, which are expected to<\/a> rise from two to possibly eight MSPs. We might even see the odd MSP from the Scottish Socialists, RISE or UKIP. Overall representation in parliament is also likely to nudge closer<\/a> to gender balance, with all but the Conservatives prioritising it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The independence question<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The SNP is seeking to maintain itself as the<\/i> non-unionist party in Holyrood. It is asking electors<\/a> for \u201cBoth Votes SNP\u201d \u2013 not only the constituency vote but also the regional list vote. The list system is designed to \u201ccorrect\u201d parliamentary representation by favouring parties whose share of the vote is under-represented by constituency seats \u2013 anyone apart from the SNP, in this case. But if a list vote for a smaller independence-supporting party such as the Greens, RISE or the Scottish Socialists would maximise the number of separatist MSPs, why the \u201cboth votes\u201d message?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Arguably, the anti-independence parties make more comfortable opponents for the SNP than other pro-independence parties. The 45% of people that voted Yes in 2014 have broadly maintained their allegiance to the SNP, so this makes opposition to unionist parties almost a given, and their position gains them little political traction. This frees the SNP to focus on the likes of Labour\u2019s unease<\/a> over independence. On the other hand, credible opposition from a group of independence supporting MSPs (like the Greens) may change the tone and give them leverage beyond their small numbers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The party will also have to cope with the fallout from the EU referendum. Many believe a Brexit vote would split the UK by triggering a second Scottish independence referendum. Nicola Sturgeon agrees<\/a> it would create great pressure for another vote if Scotland voted Remain. Yet the first minister, a much more cautious politician than her predecessor Alex Salmond, would probably rather not go down that road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There would be many unknowns around the Brexit negotiations. How smooth would a UK exit be and how would this impact Scotland and Scottish opinion? If another referendum were called, given the choice between the EU and the UK, which way would Scots swing? If Scotland did opt for the EU, what would be the currency arrangements, the accession terms for joining, the fiscal deficit with the UK, and so on?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Polling indicates that<\/a> support for Scottish independence would only rise to the low 50s in the event of a UK Leave\/Scotland Remain vote \u2013 well short of the circa 60% support the first minister has in the past<\/a> considered necessary to trigger a referendum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, this is a problem for the SNP irrespective of the EU referendum, since losing two independence votes would be disastrous for the party. Nevertheless, will it be able to resist calls for a second referendum from its rank and file during the next parliament? And if so, would they remain as politically engaged with the party? In the coming parliament, the SNP could turn out to be the SNP government\u2019s biggest challenge of all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This post first appeared at The Conversation<\/a> and is reproduced with permission<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lots of commentators – we too – have dismissed the next term in the Scottish Parliament as heralding at best managerial competence, at worst policy timorousness. But there’s plenty to look forward to: not least how the SNP in government handles the SNP.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":432,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125],"tags":[20,110,36],"class_list":["post-3208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-election-polling","tag-holyrood-2016","tag-scottish-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3208"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18068,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3208\/revisions\/18068"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}