LONDON — Humza Yousaf reached for the reset button Tuesday. However, with a police probe engulfing the Scottish Nationwide Occasion he now leads, it seems like he’ll want a much bigger button.
In a key speech to the Scottish parliament, the devolved nation’s new first minister set out his platform for the subsequent three years on the helm of the governing SNP. But all the eye was on each his absent predecessor Nicola Sturgeon — and one other high-profile arrest within the get together ranks.
On Tuesday morning, simply as Yousaf ready to ship his plan, the SNP’s treasurer Colin Beattie was taken into custody in reference to an ongoing police investigation into the SNP’s funds.
It’s the newest twist in a near-two-year inquiry by Police Scotland, which started after complaints have been made concerning the get together’s use of a £600,000-plus fund raised by activists and supposed to be ring-fenced for campaigning on its greatest prize: Scottish independence. And it got here within the week Sturgeon — a key participant in Scottish politics for greater than a decade — confronted mounting scrutiny about her personal dealing with of the get together’s monetary affairs.
Addressing journalists within the Holyrood parliament earlier than his massive speech, Yousaf admitted the timing of the arrest was “definitely not useful,” though he pressured these involved are “harmless till confirmed responsible.”
“After all I’m stunned when certainly one of my colleagues has been arrested,” he mentioned, telling reporters he doesn’t “consider” the get together he leads is working in a prison manner.
“Poor Humza,” one former Scottish authorities adviser sympathetic to Yousaf mentioned. “It’s bloody terrible timing. By no fault of his personal, he’s not been off to an important begin.”
The Sturgeon shadow
Beattie is the second main SNP determine to be arrested in reference to the get together’s funds.
Former SNP chief government Peter Murrell — who can be Sturgeon’s husband — was taken into custody two weeks earlier, after officers turned up on the home he shares with Sturgeon. He was launched with out cost pending additional investigation. The SNP has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.
Sturgeon didn’t attend Yousaf’s assertion within the Scottish parliament Tuesday, with a spokesperson for the previous first minister saying she would take part remotely “with a view to guarantee focus of this week is on the brand new FM setting out his priorities for the folks of Scotland.”
Such differentiation seems like an more and more troublesome activity for Yousaf, who has spent days fielding questions on Sturgeon amid calls from Scottish opposition events for her suspension from the SNP.
These calls for come after a leaked video from March 2021, revealed by the Sunday Mail, confirmed Sturgeon telling a gathering of the SNP’s ruling physique that the get together had “by no means been in a stronger monetary place.” Two months after the video was dated, two members of the SNP’s nationwide government committee stop, citing considerations about monetary transparency. In June of that 12 months, Murrell loaned the get together £107,620 to assist out with “money circulation.”
Yousaf positioned himself within the SNP management race because the particular person finest positioned to construct on Sturgeon’s legacy — however supporters hope he can now outline himself as his personal man.
“He’s positively obtained a mountain to climb, however he’s genuinely decided to set out his imaginative and prescient and put his coverage agenda on the forefront — which is broadly a shift to the left from the Sturgeon period,” mentioned one SNP official.
The identical official acknowledged, nevertheless, that will probably be “extraordinarily troublesome to eclipse the fixed radioactive bin-fire we’re coping with … it’s protected to say he’s not had an extended honeymoon interval.”
“All of the stuff within the background I don’t suppose he could be blamed for,” the previous Scottish authorities adviser quoted earlier mentioned.
“Nevertheless it’s the way you seize again the narrative, that’s one thing that’s in your reward,” they added.
Coverage shifts
As a part of these efforts to maintain the present on the street, Yousaf made two notable breaks with Sturgeon-era coverage in his Tuesday speech.
He introduced that the Scottish authorities would postpone a controversial bottle deposit return scheme, meant to chop single-use drinks containers however beneath fireplace from enterprise lobbying teams and a few of Yousaf’s personal backbenchers.
And Yousaf additionally introduced that plans to limit alcohol promoting would go “again to the drafting board.” Each insurance policies have been key measures championed by his predecessor within the ultimate stretch of her premiership.
In the meantime, jubilant unionists combating SNP efforts to take Scotland out of the U.Okay. now spy an actual alternative. The once-dominant Scottish Labour Occasion has made small advances in latest opinion polls and hopes to significantly problem the SNP in subsequent 12 months’s U.Okay. normal election.
Unionists of different colours are simply happy to see a chink within the SNP’s once-impenetrable armor.
“Lastly, the criticisms we’ve seen leveled on the SNP for years are coming to gentle — they’ve misplaced their Teflon coat,” Downing Avenue’s former union adviser Luke Graham mentioned.
Emilio Casalicchio contributed reporting.
