John Swinney says stars are aligning for independence. His party isn’t so sure

At the cavernous venue in Aberdeen for the Scottish National Party’s 92nd conference the first minister John Swinney told cheering delegates that “the stars are aligning” in favour of independence. This year, he said, had been “a turning point in Scotland’s journey towards statehood” adding, “there is no turning back … the wind is now firmly in the sails of Scotland’s independence movement. Most commented 1 Starlink deliberately slowed in Ukraine, says Zelensky Russia-Ukraine war 1,088 comments 2 Katie Zacharia departs as Trump’s press secretary after less than a week US politics 690 comments 3 Hundreds of British troops to rehearse Ukraine mission Politics 311 comments 4 Scotland plane crash: boy, 16, and man, 80, killed Scotland 50 comments 5 All Blacks leave Australia chasing shadows in dazzling first half Rugby union 30 comments “Scotland is ready for independence. And our independence is very, very close.” Top stories 1 US inflation hotter than expected as Iran war stokes fuel costs Economics But others in the nationalist camp see things very differently. For all the big claims from SNP top brass there is growing discontentment within their ranks and the wider country. Ever since the 2014 independence referendum when 55 per cent of Scots voted to remain in the UK, successive party leaders have dangled new routes to breaking away from the Union in front of the noses of eager party activists at conferences. Promises to hold de-facto referendums, convene constitutional conventions and deploy secret plans appeared and were then quietly shelved once everybody returned home. Advertisement On Thursday night about 70 SNP members gathered for the launch of a new pressure group, Independence, set up to challenge the leadership to go further and faster on its attempts to leave the UK. At the unsanctioned meeting in a drab room at the Station Hotel, five miles from the conference proper, members effectively set up an independence wing of the SNP. They are no longer buying the promises they have been fed for more than two decades. Top stories 1 Theo Paphitis: I bought a £100m business for £1 and two packs of Benson & Hedges Family Finances 2 Premium Bonds are fun – until you realise what they are costing you Saving & Investing 3 Will Lyons: my vintage wine tour of South Australia Inspiration The party, renowned for its iron discipline and loyalty, has grown some significant fault lines. Notably it ceases to be just the old guard pushing back against the leadership’s independence plans. Former SNP cabinet secretaries including Alex Neil and Fergus Ewing have been some of the party’s staunchest critics for many years. It was not so long ago that some members of the SNP, so frustrated by the party’s apparent lack of vision for a credible route to independence, defected to Alex Salmond’s now-defunct Alba party. Now, Toni Giugliano, a former SNP policy convener once so favoured by the leadership he was selected to stand in five national elections, is a key player in the new pressure group. Toni Giugliano Iska Birnie for the sunday times “We need to do more to shift the dial,” Giugliano said. “A constitutional convention, establishing a national Yes campaign — these were concrete promises that were made.” He said the group was keen to work “constructively” with Swinney, not to topple him. But he has little time for the leadership’s insistence that independence is imminent. In fact, he said, disgruntled members were only asking for “the bare minimum”. Advertisement “We still haven’t created enough confidence in Scotland , whether it’s currency, pensions or other issues,” he said. “We’ve lost members because there’s a perception there’s not been enough action on getting independence over the line. The party’s been governing for 20 years and you get sucked up into the mechanics of government. This group will hopefully bring a bit of spark and fire to remind us why we’re here.” While there is no doubt Swinney remains a beloved figure within the SNP, his first crack at the leadership, between 2000 and 2004, was far from successful. He returned to the position in 2024 following Humza Yousaf’s tumultuous tenure and was seen by many as the man who could steady the ship. He won a personal mandate in May, winning 58 of 129 seats and a fifth term in power. But in the Aberdeen bars some questioned whether the veteran, at 62 and a fixture in SNP politics since the 1980s, was now the right man to lead the party into the next election. One staffer openly expressed fears that Swinney’s low-wattage persona might be “swallowed up” by the more dynamic Andy Burnham should they face off in a general election campaign. Stephen Flynn, who swapped Westminster for Holyrood in May in a move few doubt was to position himself as Swinney’s successor, would be a far more effective rival to the prime minister, they said. Senior Scottish Labour figures, too, are already wargaming the next Holyrood contest as a fight between Michael Marra, Anas Sarwar’s successor, and Flynn rather than Swinney. In a view shared privately by many in the SNP, Labour strategists expect Swinney to stand down within a few years despite his public insistence he will fight the next Holyrood election. It is scheduled for May 2031, the month after Swinney turns 67, meaning by then he would be a newly qualified pensioner. Advertisement Michael Marra Lesley Martin/PA Wire Burnham, who gatecrashed the SNP conference by giving a speech in Motherwell on Friday, is for now the far more popular leader. A YouGov poll published as the SNP conference got under way gave him an approval rating of +9 north of the border with Swinney at -19. “It’s time to start thinking about the need to get rid of Swinney before 2029,” the SNP staffer said. “He needs to go before the general election.” It is not just the SNP’s newly formed independence wing that has begun publicly asking questions of the leadership. At an early morning fringe meeting on Friday the party’s councillors staged what amounted to an open revolt against Ivan McKee, appointed to Swinney’s cabinet to lead on a controversial and wide-ranging programme of public sector reform. The launch of the SNP’s independence wing Iska Birnie for the sunday times SNP largesse on welfare and public sector pay has contributed to a projected £5bn black hole in the devolved government’s finances. A reckoning, a series of independent experts have warned, cannot be put off any longer. Part of the enforced efficiency drive is a radical shake-up of local government with Scotland’s 32 councils to be replaced by as few as six super-authorities. But details remain sketchy. Advertisement A succession of nationalist councillors openly attacked McKee’s plans, saying “policy wonks” were to blame and that loyal councillors had been blindsided by the policy. The meeting ended with one councillor heckling him. McKee, usually soft-spoken and fairly mild-mannered, responded by admitting he was “fed up” with ill-informed critics. Perhaps it was a form of projection when Swinney, in his conference speech to activists, said unionists were “united in panic”. He said his party had “won the trust” of voters in May meaning he could now set about “delivering Scottish independence.” The party’s domestic record on education, criticised after Programme for International Student Assessment rankings revealed plunging results for Scottish pupils in maths and reading, on drug deaths, for which Scotland remains the fatality capital of Europe, and on law and order, which this week saw the SNP’s own David Linden bemoan the presence of marauding masked gangs in Glasgow, have been easy targets for the party’s critics. His main policy announcement in his conference speech — a pledge to bring Scotland’s bus network “back into public control” through “franchising and regulation” — was the one announcement that appeared to be a genuine surprise to activists. A promise to legislate on misogyny was recycled from the last parliament. But there was little or nothing on the NHS or a plan to drive up school standards. David Linden Robert Perry for The Sunday Times At a More in Common focus group on Friday voters, too, were animated and angry. The idea that the Scottish people were cheering the SNP on in their quest for independence was swiftly debunked. Luke Tryl, the think tank’s executive director, said: “Clearly they thought the SNP had made lots of bad decisions, particularly on public services. Advertisement “But they kept coming back to this wider idea that Scotland had lost its way.” In his speech, Swinney attempted to claim that arguments against independence in 2014 — on defence, pensions and EU membership — had been turned on their head and were now factors in favour of his cause. “More and more people in Scotland can see the evidence all around them,” he claimed. “It’s no wonder people are looking for a better way.” But only one member of the eight-person panel, a mix of those who voted SNP and Conservative in the recent Aberdeen South by-election where the Tories took the seat from the nationalists in a landslide, was keen to revisit the issue. That by-election was triggered by Flynn’s resignation as an MP so that he could stand for Holyrood. Far more pressing to them was the state of public services that the SNP has control over. One told of her 97-year-old grandmother whose request for a daily visit from a carer had been rejected on the grounds that she was still able to turn on a microwave. John Swinney with Stephen Flynn at the conference Paul Reid/Getty Images An Aberdeen bar owner complained of extortionate business rate increases. Another told how a child she knows, at high school, was given colouring in as an activity as a symptom of Scotland’s declining education system. “We still have constant conversations about an independence referendum,” one said. “But at the moment they should be looking at sorting out the basics.” Others shuddered at the prospect of a repeat of the “horrible” 2014 campaign, noting that it had pitted family members against each other. One said she had become convinced there would be a death due to how divisive the debate became. “It was only the Yes voters who had Yes signs in their windows,” one said. “You didn’t see any No signs because they’d have got their windows panned.” Swinney claimed in his speech that arguments used against independence in the 2014 referendum had now been turned on their head Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images SNP colleagues of the first minister applauding Swinney’s conference speech Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images A retired police officer, open to the idea of Scotland leaving the UK, said he was appalled at the state of the country after almost two decades of SNP rule. “I wouldn’t mind independence but I don’t want to be a pauper either,” he said. “Let’s get this country sorted out and then go for independence, and I would hope to hell it wouldn’t be the SNP that was in charge.” Yesterday, as activists drifted away following Swinney’s speech, they passed an eight-foot tall white canvas on which they were invited to scrawl their aspirations for an independent Scotland. One entry written in careful handwriting alongside calls for a republic, peace on earth and both higher and lower taxes stood out for its modesty. It was a plea to the SNP to help with travel expenses for members of the party’s island branches. It was a reminder that for all Swinney’s grand ambitions some in the SNP, like those in the country, have their minds on the here and now, the fundamentals of day-to-day life.