There have been mutterings in SNP ranks about Nicola Sturgeon’s failure to notice her former husband, Peter Murrell’s, embezzlement of party funds when she was leader. Her stature is not what it was. However, no one expected Ms Sturgon to positively invite hostility by launching an attack on First Minister John Swinney, who was conspicuously loyal to her throughout the Murrell affair.
In the new introduction to her memoir, Frankly, the former SNP first minister delivers a withering assessment of Swinney’s leadership of the recent Holyrood election campaign. It showed a ‘lack of vision or big-picture thinking’, she says. He ‘failed to bring alive the opportunities [independence] offers people in a tangible sense’, whatever that means. She goes on to say that Swinney was lucky that the Scottish Green party did not stand more candidates, or the result might have been worse.
Clearly the SNP leadership has finally started to distance itself from Nicola Sturgeon
‘Nonsense,’ said the SNP Education Secretary, Máiri McAllan, a one-time Sturgeon protégé. It was a splendid achievement, winning the SNP’s fifth consecutive victory. The SNP Health Secretary, Angela Constance, another former Sturgeon bestie, declared that John Swinney is the ‘best First Minister Scotland has ever had’. That was perhaps just a little over the top even for the most sycophantic nationalist.
