I’ve been totally honest from the outset about this: it’s not impossible that the Alba Party intervention in this election could backfire. They could, say, take 2-3% of the vote, which probably wouldn’t be enough to win any seats, but could gift SNP list seats to unionist parties. If we’re really unlucky that could swing the balance and deprive us of a pro-indy majority at Holyrood. That’s exactly the same risk that I identified when RISE were pushing the tactical voting idea in 2016, or when the Wings party idea was being floated in 2019.
But here’s the thing. If we’re in danger of falling between two stools, ie. with the Alba party strong enough to damage the SNP but not strong enough to win any seats itself, there are TWO ways to avert that danger. Either we can encourage people to abandon the Alba party and go back to the SNP on the list, or we can decide that the Alba party is too important to fail and make damn sure that it gets over the 6% de facto threshold in each region.
I don’t have much doubt that the latter course of action is more viable in this particular case, although it remains to be seen whether we collectively pull it off.
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You can catch up with Episode 5 of the Scot Goes Popcast, with special guest Len Pennie (Miss PunnyPennie) HERE.
