Profile: Labour pioneer uneasy in the spotlight

Over the coming months they will get to know more about her but the Johann I know will not be entirely comfortable with being thrust in the spotlight.

That is something she will have to get used to as her career to date within the Scottish Labour, trade union and Co-operative movement has been very much that of someone in the background making sure things get done.

She has always been very strong on promoting women’s rights and in the run up to the first elections to the Scottish Parliament back in 1999, was a leading campaigner in making sure female candidates had an equal chance to get elected with the twinning process for constituency seats.

Although Glasgow born, Johann’s family hails from Tiree, giving her a hinterland that has Gaelic undertones, an affinity for Scotland’s islands and a big city understanding of our social ills.

Those views were honed in her days at Glasgow University, where she joined the Labour Party, then in city classrooms after she’d qualified as a secondary school teacher, a job she held for the next 20 years.

During that time she was active in the teachers’ union, the EIS, and held various Labour Party posts, including being a member of the party’s Scottish Executive and ultimately chair in 1993.

In the previous year she was the election agent for Ian Davidson when he won the Glasgow Govan seat from the SNP’s Jim Sillars.

Following Labour’s victory at Westminster in 1997 and the build up to the first Scottish Parliamentary elections, Johann was one of a number of very able Scottish Labour women who came to the fore in the Party, such as Wendy Alexander, Margaret Curran, Jackie Baillie and Pauline McNeill.

Selected as the candidate for Glasgow Pollok she showed her fighting and campaigning qualities by beating Tommy Sheridan at the height of his popularity, and has held the seat since.

It was after Jack McConnell took over as First Minister that Johann was given ministerial responsibility, having previously served on the Equal Opportunities, Local Government, Education, Social Justice and Communities committees. Her first ministerial post was as Deputy Minister for Communities where she served from 2004-06 before being appointed Deputy Minister for Justice.

She became Deputy Leader of Scottish Labour in 2008 and I was happy to back her for that post. Her self-deprecating style of campaigning is a side that not many see.

At a hustings in Glasgow she said she was worried to see so many people as looking round she realised she’d fallen out with many of them.

Now her style has changed. There are fewer jokes, but the stakes are higher. She is the first female leader of the Scottish Labour Party, a unique position that makes her senior to close friend, Margaret Curran MP, who although Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland is also a Scottish MP. For Johann, her most important role is as mum to two teenagers, Fay and Colin, who are used to a life steeped in politics as dad, Archie Graham, is a senior Glasgow City councillor.

Those of us who voted for her to be leader place a lot of faith in her to turn our fortunes around. Her biggest test yet lies before her. I just wish her good luck.

• David Whitton is a former Labour MSP and adviser to Donald Dewar