In 2021, I made three adventurous predictions about the result of the Holyrood election, one of which was that Alba was likely to win at least a seat or two. When I was later taunted about being a long way out with the Alba prediction, I pointed out that I never claimed to be Nostradamus, but actually the other two predictions were proved right, and in the immortal words of Meatloaf, “two out of three ain’t bad”. And in fairness, I think last night’s Question Time was a belated insight into why I made that Alba prediction in the first place, because you could see how the audience started to warm to Alex Salmond once he was given the space to talk sense about a wide range of bread-and-butter issues. What I hadn’t anticipated in 2021 was that the BBC in particular would treat Alba in the same way that they treated Sinn Fein during the Troubles – ie. as a ‘non-normal’ party who could only be given airtime if every second of that airtime was devoted to delegitimising their very existence. Last night will have repaired some of that damage, but only a small portion of it, simply because of Question Time’s modest audience figures.
The programme encapsulated the problem faced by the independence movement at present, because it confirmed that there is a party with the right independence strategy and a convincing leadership, but that party is the one with 2-3% of the vote, not the party with 30-40% of the vote. Mairi McAllan’s answers on behalf of the SNP were dismal beyond belief, and confirmed yet again that the SNP under Yousaf have ceased to be a party actively seeking to win independence for the first time since at least 1942. So how do we square this circle? I know many of my fellow Alba members would say “simple – everyone ditch the SNP and start voting Alba” but in the real world that’s not likely to happen any time soon, barring some kind of game-changing event such as a high-profile defection or series of defections. And while there’s a degree of impatience with the likes of Ash Regan for not joining Alba as of yet, those parliamentarians may well have calculated that there is still a bigger percentage chance of “recapturing the SNP” than there is of building up Alba to the point where it overtakes the SNP as the largest pro-indy party. Given that Yousaf only won the leadership by a wafer-thin margin, it would be hard to argue that they’re wrong about that, at least for the moment. The dilemma is that you can’t pursue ‘change the SNP from inside’ and ‘leave the SNP and replace it’ strategies simultaneously – you have to commit to one or the other, albeit with the option of switching from the first to the second if the first runs out of road.
But the second dilemma is just low long do you give it? What if, despite his vulnerability and unpopularity, Humza Yousaf does a John Major and clings on by his fingertips for a good few years? In that event, some parliamentarians may end up wishing they’d tried to change the weather by switching parties. One possibility that is perhaps more likely than it currently seems is that SNP rebels could set up yet another new party, albeit one that becomes a close ally of Alba’s, perhaps with a relationship along the lines of the SDP-Liberal Alliance of the 1980s. That way they might feel bolder about leaving the SNP, because they wouldn’t have to worry so much about any image problems or baggage that Alba has, while they could still benefit from the political talents of Alex Salmond and other leading members of Alba. It would be a neat way of resolving the current stalemate – but first of all the SNP rebels would have to feel their current party is unsalvageable, and we may yet be some distance from that.
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