Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

Pete Wishart’s resignation letter is damning for the SNP

(Credit: Parliament TV)

No matter how heavily it snows today nothing will be as frosty as Pete Wishart’s resignation letter. The senior SNP MP has exited the front bench following the coup that replaced Ian Blackford with relative newcomer Stephen Flynn. 

Blackford is an ally of Nicola Sturgeon and discontent had grown in the party’s Westminster group of MPs about his perceived lack of independence from the leadership in Scotland. Flynn, who at 34 only entered Parliament in 2019, is expected to put distance between his Westminster group and the SNP government in Edinburgh. As MP for Aberdeen South he is seen as less hostile to the North Sea oil and gas industry than Sturgeon, a recent convert to the climate cause. 

This outbreak of heterodoxy is unprecedented in the modern SNP. This is a party where discipline is so iron-tight that the Scottish government suffered its first backbench rebellion last month — after 15 years in power. There has been an attempt to put a brave face on the Flynn coup but Wishart, a 21-year veteran of the SNP Commons contingent, has put paid to that. 

In a missive so icy that you need antifreeze to read it, he quits as environment spokesperson, telling Flynn:

‘I remain bemused as to the reasons why you felt it was necessary to seek a change in our leadership, particularly when we see yesterday’s opinion poll, which shows support for independence at a near all-time high and support for the SNP at Westminster at an unprecedented 51%. Usually change of this significance accompanies failure, whereas we are looking only at sustained and growing success as a movement and party.

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