SNP crisis: How much damage has been done to the party and its independence dream?

You have to feel for Humza Yousaf. The new First Minister, who turned 38 on Friday, was already dealing with a formidable in-tray and a wounded party still recovering from a bruising leadership contest.

But his first full week in office turned out to be one of the most extraordinary in recent political history. As police swooped on the home of Nicola Sturgeon and her husband Peter Murrell on Wednesday morning, the whole of Scotland looked on in open-mouthed astonishment.

Mr Murrell, who was chief executive of the SNP until last month, was arrested and questioned for 11 hours in connection with an ongoing police investigation into the party’s funding and finances. He was later released without charge. Meanwhile, police also descended on the SNP’s headquarters in central Edinburgh.

Arriving on the scene that morning, I watched as more than a dozen officers filed into the nondescript office building just off the Royal Mile, which has housed the party of government since 2008. Baffled tourists were met with police vehicles, television cameras, photographers and journalists.

Officers from Police Scotland at the home of Nicola Sturgeon and former chief executive of the SNP Peter Murrell. Picture: Andrew Milligan/PA Wire

“There’s no doubt the last few weeks and the events of yesterday have been difficult and bruising for the party,” Mr Yousaf told journalists on Thursday, in something of an understatement. But just how much damage has been inflicted on the SNP and its independence dream?

Mark Diffley, director of the Diffley Partnership polling company, said the fate of the party was previously bound together with independence, but there had recently been a shift. "What we're seeing for the first time in, I think, a very, very long time, is a sort of separation,” he told Scotland on Sunday.

"In most polls now, [the SNP] are consistently under 40 per cent support in terms of voting intentions for next year's general election. One would expect, given the nature of polling over the last ten or 12 years, that support for independence would also fall as well.

"But it hasn't, which suggests that there's a group of people out there who are moving away from the SNP, but that doesn't mean that they are any less enthusiastic, at least at this stage, about independence. Which I think is really quite interesting, and makes public opinion and public attitudes much more interesting than they have been for quite some time."

Diffley said Labour could pick up between ten and 15 seats in Scotland at the next general election. The Conservatives could also make gains in areas such as the north-east, even if their overall share of the vote drops.

"There is a scenario where the SNP could lose 20 seats, a bit like it did in 2017, except in 2017, of course, it started at a much higher base than it does now,” the polling expert said. "In 2017, it lost 21 seats, but of course it had 56 seats at that point. Whereas now, they've got 45, and losing 15, 20 seats from there is quite different."

He added: "The key question here is, are we in the foothills of a bigger decline? Or is this a blip? We can't really answer that. The problem for Humza is he hasn't been able to get on the front foot at all since he won the contest.”

A likely by-election in Rutherglen and Hamilton West could provide an early test. The current MP, Margaret Ferrier, was suspended from the SNP after breaking Covid rules in 2020. She now faces a 30-day suspension from the Commons. Labour are confident of winning the seat back.

Diffley said: "It is noticeable that support for independence hasn't fallen away in the same way that support for the SNP has. Maybe there's a crumb of comfort in there for Humza if he can get the show back on the road, so to speak. But as far as I can see, he's not really in control of events, which is really not a good position to be in."

SNP figures fear Labour is gaining momentum and the tide could begin to turn against their party. "Momentum is a hard thing to swim against in politics,” said one. They conceded the last few days were “obviously bad news for the party”, but argued voters are able to separate this from their view on independence.

"For the independence side of things, it's not good context – the people leading the independence charge are the SNP,” they said. “But the whole ordeal of the Alex Salmond trial and other things which have not been particularly edifying for the cause over the last couple of years haven't really changed much. They've perhaps stopped the Yes side gaining the all-important majority edge consistently, but they haven't eroded a solid 46-47 per cent of the Scottish population supporting independence.

"I think voters are fairly sophisticated now. They think these things through. They can separate the two."

The source said the recent leadership election showed there were no “let’s-pull-the-trigger-now” solutions on offer for independence anyway. "So before the challenges of the last week, I think there was already an acceptance that now was not necessarily the time, to coin a phrase,” the source said.

SNP veteran Jim Sillars, a former deputy leader of the party, has said he believes around 45 per cent of the public will remain in favour of independence, “but they may not now see the Scottish National Party as the main instrument for gaining that independence”. Alex Neil, a former SNP minister, has warned Mr Yousaf needs to “stop the rot”.

Speaking to journalists in Bute House on Thursday, Mr Yousaf insisted it was still “realistic” to suggest that Scotland could be independent within five years. He added: “I’m not saying we absolutely will, given that none of us can say with absolute certainty what the timeline looks like, and we’ve seen events can change.

"We’re starting at the basis where support for independence is around about 50-50, we’re starting at a strong base. I believe we can build upon that, but the only way we’re going to get independence is if we build that consistent majority and, frankly, events like yesterday are a distraction from that. So we need to get back on to territory of talking about why independence would benefit the people of Scotland.”

As the dust settles on a remarkable week, many activists will fear that far from being five years away, the prospect of independence is receding into the distance.