“Work as if you live in the early days of a better nation.”
Many of us will be familiar with this phrase, popularised by the legendary Scottish author and artist Alasdair Gray. These words have echoed through a large part of Scotland’s modern history and are even engraved in the Canongate Wall outside Holyrood today. Many Scottish nationalists view the quote as a call of motivation, to gather the masses and simply imagine what an independent Scotland could look like. These words would often be used by the Scottish National Party to bring a swell of inspiration to their activist base, though perhaps not too recently.
Yet, Alasdair’s words did not hint at a vague vision for an independent Scotland. In 2007, the editor of The Herald, asked Gray if he could explain in more depth, what the phrase actually meant to him. In his essay, Gray reflects on growing up in the 1940s through and after the Second World War. It was a time when Britain’s classes were united, and much of the socialist policies that the British middle class once feared, instead became a saving grace. Gray cites the Beveridge Report, the foundational document that would go on to form the welfare state, alongside the creation of the National Health Service. He talks about the public ownership of railways, coalmines, gas and electricity supplies, steel production, and road haulage – a time when labour and capital stood on more equal footing. A time when rents and wages were fixed and students who passed their entrance exams to higher education faced zero financial barriers. Instead, Attlee’s government gave young people of the working-class educational grants to train for professions. Attlee’s government built over one million new homes, along with entire new towns and villages.
Gray’s vision of an independent Scotland was not a vague or a mere inspirational cry; it was a call for radical and transformational change in Scotland’s democracy and institutions. It was a call for real change.
The 2024 UK General Election
And so, we turn to 2024, when change is nothing but a slogan used by plastic men with red rosettes. Keir Starmer rules supreme, pledging to carry out his manifesto of fiscal and social conservatism with micro-levels of democratic reform that would take place after 2029. His victory comes with the lowest share of the vote any UK government has ever received, while the far-right under Nigel Farage and Reform, were able to accumulate millions of voters across England. The Conservative Party may have been rightfully defeated at this election, but conservative ideology rules supreme on a level the UK has not seen in decades.
Turn to Scotland and we find the SNP have faced their first major defeat in 14 years. It is here where much of Gray’s words for radical change and vision were absent. The SNP led a largely negative campaign against Labour, with stern warnings of future austerity and privatisation. They adopted the unionist scaremongering tone, claiming Labour’s windfall tax would destroy 100k jobs in Scotland’s oil and gas sector, later to be confirmed as a lie by Full Fact, The Ferret, and wider journalists. They told the Scottish electorate that a vote for the SNP was a vote for Scotland – an empty phrase that had zero indication as to what a vote for the SNP actually meant. It was a campaign that echoed similarities to a desperate Scottish Labour in the mid-2010s, begging voters not to abandon them simply because the alternative is worse.
The Scottish Greens and SNP Conservatives
Many SNP conservatives have attempted to pin the blame on the Bute House Agreement with the Scottish Greens, activating their inner war mode and lashing out at their colleagues to the same unionist media who feed on such infighting. Though I echo the point made by the polling expertise at Ballot Box Scotland: “The Greens did not make Nicola Sturgeon resign; nor did they run a chaotic and embarrassing leadership campaign to replace her; nor did they arrest her, Peter Murrell and Colin Beattie in the Operation Branchform investigation into the party’s finances; nor did they run up Michael Matheson’s iPad bill; nor did they delete WhatsApps requested by the COVID-19 Inquiry; nor did they fail to get ferries floated on time and budget; nor were they even in cabinet holding any major portfolios for areas people want improvement in like healthcare or education.”
While the party’s image has been scarred with scandals, it has also been continuously kicked down by its conservative wing. The SNP’s conservative wing has very publicly spread gossip about the party’s leadership within the mainstream media, if it’s Kate Forbes’ attacking the government’s record on public services on national TV, her allies claiming the party was somehow anti-Christian, or that the party is akin to Stalinism. Yet putting aside the multiple pieces of legislation this group has rebelled against, they have also created a toxic atmosphere within the party membership with their culture war obsessions. Rather than promote a positive case for independence, they have taken every opportunity to exaggerate and mislead voters on legislation their own party is trying to pass. They could at least show principle and a bit of courage by joining the Alba Party for their equal hatred of the SNP.
Weak leadership and poor messaging
Yet, did John Swinney show leadership or discipline within his ranks? No, instead he legitimised Forbes’ behaviour and anti-LGBTQ+ views by promoting her to Deputy First Minister. Rather than challenge the toxic atmosphere and bad behaviour of his conservative branch, he simply caved to them. Perhaps this is one reason why the Scottish Greens quadrupled their vote and came third place in multiple central belt seats.
On top of all this, was the SNP’s failed independence strategy. John Swinney stressed over and over that a vote for the SNP was a vote to make Scotland an independent country. It was as if he selectively removed the memory of the UK Supreme Court ruling that the Scottish government could not hold a referendum without the consent of Westminster. Since then, polls have seen a gradual decline in independence as a priority for voters, even though 50% of the population still support it. Yet Swinney failed to adjust his message or refocus on bread and butter issues. A more obvious message would have been “Wesminster is blocking Scotland’s democracy.”
Which is true. Westminster has blocked legislation that would effectively make the two-child benefit cap illegal. They have blocked legislation to stop a Scottish bottle recycling scheme. They have blocked legislation to make life for trans people in Scotland just a little bit easier. Westminster has circumvented Scottish democracy multiple times and, alongside a manifesto of actual change, would have been a powerful campaign message to focus on. It would have at the very least, severely mitigated the SNP’s losses. Yet the failure to adjust is damning evidence that the current SNP leadership, not just John Swinney, is completely out of ideas and out of touch with regular party members and voters.
For any SNP member, and even regular independence supporters, the above is deeply depressing. Yet, that does not mean that all is lost for the upcoming 2026 Holyrood elections. Considering the above failures, let us address what the SNP can do going forward.
A new progressive vision from Holyrood
The SNP’s early success came from leading by example from Holyrood with policy competence and progressive changes. There are plenty of progressive changes the SNP can still implement by looking forward to a wider civic Scotland. Consider the STUC’s wealth tax, which would replace council tax entirely with a proportional property tax, alongside income tax reforms, a land and buildings transactions tax, carbon emissions’ land tax, additional dwellings supplement, increasing Scottish landfill tax and many more. This can raise £3.7 billion a year in the long run. John Swinney can take credit for being the first First Minister to scrap council tax, unlike his predecessors, and in doing so, he would be able to vitally boost government spending on vital public services hammered by Tory austerity and inflation.
The STUC wealth tax would not only bring greater fiscal flexibility for Holyrood and local councils, but it would also build up positive relations with Scotland’s trade union movement. As Labour desperately lurches further to the right, John Swinney can instead show he is listening and learning from Scotland’s trade unions.
The revenue streams do not need to stop there. John Swinney can also look to renewable projects, such as ScotWind, and ensure the Scottish government will take an equity stake in the future. An equity stake would mean that companies making profit would thus see a proportion of it returned either to the Scottish government or local communities. In Denmark, the government has taken 20% stakes in offshore windfarms, and there is nothing stopping the SNP from taking equal or even higher stakes in Scottish produced wind power.
Along with boosting public spending, John Swinney can bring forward measures for price stability in land and housing markets through the advice of leading economic experts at Future Economy Scotland. They have praised the Scottish government’s Land Reform Bill for steps towards the lotting of large landholdings and greater opportunities for communities to own land, but this could go further. A new Scottish Land Agency should purchase, develop, and sell land with the goal of delivering a Just Transition, along with meeting our climate and nature targets. That would include sales that must prioritise delivering housing, infrastructure, new towns, and regeneration projects.
By lowering the cost of land through community purchases, housebuilders would need to bid on the quality of overall construction instead of seeking a profit through exploitative speculation. This leads us onto rent controls, ensuring tenants are protected from the exploitative actions of landlords. Campaigners at Living Rent have praised the Scottish government’s Housing Bill for allowing rents to be capped at 0% in rent control areas (RCA), tying rents to property, greater transparency from landlords, and more flexibility when ending joint tenancy. But, again, much more can be done.
When landlords break regulations to increase their unearned incomes, they face either zero or very minor fines. A one-off £1k slap on the wrist for those already very wealthy is not enough to discourage disruptive market behavior. On top of this, if landlords wish to increase rents unfairly, then the onus is on tenants to appeal, which is a process that is deeply confusing and stressful. There is no consequence if landlords attempt to push their luck. On top of this, councils will face challenges in implementing RCAs due to exemptions made for certain tenancies. There is nothing stopping John Swinney from listening to these concerns and saying, “We hear you, and we’ll take this bill further.”
Scotland’s education sector is also in need of a massive overhaul, especially considering the growing challenges to young people’s mental health coming out of COVID-19. The SNP often looks to Scandinavian countries for inspiration, so why do they not look to massively expand outdoor and residential learning? With increased spending from the STUC’s Wealth Tax, you could further expand a range of social programmes and have better access to counselling, putting our children’s wellbeing first. Educational materials should come from organisational bodies in a more digitally friendly format, rather than a top-down approach telling teachers what they should and should not use. Teachers have been stuck with more demands and fewer resources over the years, but the SNP can deliver both with the right principles in place.
And what about opposition from the SNP’s conservative right? Well, what about it? The independence movement is a broad church, but the SNP is Scotland’s biggest social democratic party. It should be consistently socially democratic without sacrificing good legislation to a handful of dinosaurs that seek to aid the mainstream unionist media. If John Swinney wanted to deliver a programme for government that was truly transformational, he should do so by either telling conservatives to stick to the plan or leave. It would be a demonstration of Swinney’s leadership strength and show that he is putting Scotland’s interests first, not the interests of a few MSPs.
A radical vision for an independent Scotland
And what about independence? I addressed this in my earlier piece, “Future Scotland”, as to how the independence movement must become a national movement uniting civic Scotland (please read for more details). For the SNP’s role, they must now have two manifestos for each election. One manifesto must be a healthy mix of both reformist and radical policies, in stark contrast to the Labour Party. It must be a manifesto that directly tackles everyday bread-and-butter issues from Holyrood.
The second manifesto must be grander in scale – an independence manifesto. It should be more expansive and show that with the full fiscal and monetary powers of an independent country, we can go so much further than devolution and properly fund our public services. This can include policies such as a publicly owned Scottish national energy company, increasing workers’ rights, a four-day working week, a Job Guarantee, a citizen’s basic income, a worker’s democracy model within the workplace, community wealth building, a real living wage, a Foreign Investment Review Board, a Green New Deal that massively expands Scotland’s research and development of renewables, a Just Transition for the oil and gas sector, directly reducing interest rates for household debts, a further expansion of social housing, and so, so much more.
This more radical and reformist vision of independence cannot just be held within government white papers that 99% of the public will never read. It must be translated into materials that independence supporters are motivated to share and talk about with voters.
This is what Alasdair Gray was telling us. The SNP have recently lost that vision, their bravery, and charisma. They are becoming the very establishment they once fought so hard against. It’s time we took Gray’s words to heart and truly work as if we live in the early days of a better nation.
More in Holyrood
