Why Labour's popularity soared in Scotland – until the party actually got into power at Westminster

The latest polling is bad news for the Labour party in Scotland. The decline in its support, from a high of 35 per cent in July to only 18 per cent now, is not a one-off but a steady trend. Whether it’s a tailspin or a stall matters little, Anas Sarwar shows little sign of being able to control his party’s descent.

What has gone wrong, why the calamity? Might I offer two words? Reeves and Starmer? It is strange that politicians never learn, but the main problem today’s breed have is their uncanny ability, irrespective of party, to break the bond of trust that over time they have cultivated with the electorate.

I was just a young thing when I came to the conclusion that Prime Minister Harold Wilson had a problem of over-promising and under-delivering. Ted Heath and Jim Callaghan were no better.

Margaret Thatcher was more canny and, despite being pressed by Brian Walden, would often refuse to promise a tax cut of even a penny in the pound until she thought the public finances could afford it. It has always been my view that the reason she won three consecutive elections was that she was careful to avoid over-promising.

Under Keir Starmer, Labour's standing in the polls has been sinking since the general election (Picture: Leon Neal) | Getty Images

Starmer’s safety-first approach

In last year’s general election, the Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer was careful to not offer too many promises, but then he was also careful to not offer a great deal that was different from the Conservatives either.

What he and his party crafted was a safety-first approach, a sense that Labour would not frighten the horses with scary policies, that it was on the side of reasonableness and competence, that it would lay the foundations for a recovering economy with economic growth.

For many voters, it was simply enough to be reassured their taxes would not rise like they had, to record levels, under the red Tories self-identifying as Conservatives. For others in Scotland, it was an opportunity to reprimand the SNP for its attempts to put men in women’s spaces – be they female toilets, sports and changing room or women’s prisons.

Moreso, Labour had volunteered all the “right noises” without request or prompting, with its politicians at every level taking up the cause of Waspi women, or defending the winter fuel allowance for pensioners.

Tory copycats

Meanwhile the Conservatives at Westminster, flush with the arrogance that comes from winning in 2010, 2015, 2017 and again in 2019 became more comfortable fighting each other rather than thinking about challenging the harms that their opponents might do if they gained power.

What were once Labour policies became Conservative policies, be it through spending more and more money that had not been earned – to aping policies such as windfall taxes.

Rather than argue that the huge domestically earned tax revenue non-doms brought to the UK in return for not being taxed on their overseas earnings, Tory Chancellor Jeremy Hunt actually began the process of removing the status that Rachel Reeves would later double down on – to everyone’s economic loss.

Likewise, Hunt increased various corporate and business taxes that punished innovation and taking risks, accelerating the departure of some of the brightest, best and most ambitious individuals and their businesses to more hospitable jurisdictions such as Portugal, Italy and the UAE.

With these and other policies, the faux-Conservatives lost the trust of many of their previous supporters who either voted for some other party or simply stayed at home.

Saintly Sir Keir

The greatest breach of political trust came with the series of lockdowns during the Covid pandemic. It was arguable if the NHS required the initial three-week breathing space at the start, but the repeated extensions and variations of the lockdowns – and the huge burden of the additional debt-funded spending that resulted from them – challenged the belief our government could at least be trusted with competence in the face of adversity.

If, as Starmer demanded, the lockdowns should have been sooner, harder and longer then our national debt would have grown earlier, faster and be far larger. The loss of trust he encouraged also extended to the bad behaviour of politicians and officials – allowing the saintly Sir Keir to play the role of witch-finder general – just in case we ever forgot who was eating cake they never asked for.

When the public was given the chance it voted, without great enthusiasm but with some curious relief, in the hope that Starmer would be different. Has he delivered the change people wanted?

Reform on the up

Having inherited the fastest-growing economy in the G7, the Chancellor talked down the state of the public finances to justify cutting winter fuel payments for ten million pensioners. She later would refuse any funds for Waspi women, despite having campaigned on behalf of her mother. In its report based upon the Chancellor’s first Budget, the Office for Budget Responsibility could not find the £22 billion black hole Reeves had talked of – but thanks to her it could find reasons to justify cutting its growth forecasts by half.

Now the revenues are falling short and borrowing is going up and we can expect more tax rises announced on 26 March when Reeves makes her Spring statement. Meanwhile scandals are already enveloping Starmer’s administration and ministers are being let go with a slapstick regularity.

Is it any wonder Anas Sarwar is struggling to cauterise the flow of support from Labour to Reform UK or back to the SNP, the Liberal Democrats or even the Scottish Tories?

Being a Labour leader in opposition to a Tory government is often a free hit, but being in opposition to a Labour government takes guile and skill. Only Starmer and Reeves can save Sarwar now, but as they appear unable to save themselves that is unlikely.

And with Reform having overtaken Labour in the UK, the question becomes can it do the same in Scotland? There’s time yet for more upheaval.

Brian Monteith is a former member of the Scottish and European parliaments and a senior advisor to the Tax Reform Council