Scottish independence: How Humza Yousaf showed he's out of tune with country's hopes and needs – Jackie Baillie

Voters know that the solution to the Tory economic crisis is not an SNP one

We’ve all been there, lost in a haze of euphoria, lifted by the music, reliving some of the best tunes of our times. But let’s face it, Humza Yousaf at Dundee’s Caird Hall just wasn’t the same as Rick Astley at Glastonbury, was it?

Sure the SNP leader remixed the old songs from a different era and tried to put a new gloss on things. It might have worked in the hall but the PA system to reality wasn’t working so his lyrics were incoherent and garbled. If I heard things right, Yousaf pledged the SNP would treat the next election as a de facto referendum, which would mean declaring independence after winning over 50 per cent of the vote. Good luck with that. He added that if the SNP ‘won’ the general election, that would be a mandate for negotiations on independence. Really?

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His rambling ballad made you wonder why the SNP ever sent the referendum question to the Supreme Court and whether they read the reply. In truth, what does it matter? Breaking up Britain is not even a priority for most SNP voters, never mind the voting public.

When interest rates have gone through the roof (again), when food inflation is making the last decade of austerity look so last week and when the world spends a weekend wondering which criminal madman is going to be in charge of Russia’s nuclear arsenal, who the hell cares about rerunning all our nationalist yesterdays?

Yousaf failed to answer any of the hard questions for the SNP. He sang out of tune with Scotland. Despite wasting 16 years in government wearing down the needle on the same old collection of worn-out ’45s, the SNP still can’t answer even the most basic questions about separation.

By kidding themselves that they didn’t lose the 2014 referendum, the SNP have spent a decade lacking any coherent answer to questions on currency, the economy, borders and how they will actually turn Scotland into the healthy, job-creating, caring society we all want. It’s the same at every SNP conference. In Eurovision terms, Yousaf scored “nul points” again.

Getting there, to the sunny uplands, turning Holyrood into a parliament for growth not girn, will involve the kind of hard work with which SNP ministers have completely failed to engage. That is not because their attention has been on blue forensic tents and the intrigue of party finances for the last few months. It has been like this for years.

First Minister Humza Yousaf may have pleased the Caird Hall crowd, but his wider audience is unlikely to have been impressed (Picture: Jane Barlow/PA)First Minister Humza Yousaf may have pleased the Caird Hall crowd, but his wider audience is unlikely to have been impressed (Picture: Jane Barlow/PA)
First Minister Humza Yousaf may have pleased the Caird Hall crowd, but his wider audience is unlikely to have been impressed (Picture: Jane Barlow/PA)

Ferries, drug deaths, the educational attainment gap and sustained growth. Each one a failure under multiple SNP ministers who are simply not up to the job. Of course it is not all down to the singer, it is the song too.

Voters want to change the record but people know that the solution to a Tory economic crisis is not an SNP economic crisis. Across the UK, we want the same things: to live happily and healthily in a country that takes pride in itself and its place in the world. That shared prosperity comes from cooperation, not separation.

So there is a solution to Scotland’s stunted progress under the SNP – and it is a song called Labour.

Jackie Baillie is MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour’s deputy leader and her party’s spokesperson for health

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