The new hero of Scottish independence? Nigel Farage

[ad_1] ABERDEEN, Scotland — By all rights, they need to be lifeless and buried.

After 18 years in energy, Scotland’s pro-independence Scottish Nationwide Social gathering, which desires to interrupt up the UK, is on target to win once more at subsequent yr’s Scottish parliament election.

Their annual convention in Aberdeen hammered residence a contemporary technique of constructing the election all concerning the SNP’s final push for Scottish independence. Whereas that aim appears extra distant than ever, SNP chief John Swinney hopes that, of all individuals, arch-Brexiteer Nigel Farage could be the game-changer his trigger wants.

“I consider it is going to be revulsion at Westminster’s race to the precise that can change Scotland’s standing once more,” Swinney instructed the SNP devoted as he closed the social gathering’s convention Monday. “The race to the precise at Westminster is one motive why independence is so pressing and vital.”

Although he didn’t point out the poll-topping Reform UK chief by title, the implication was clear.

Since shedding 2014’s referendum on Scottish independence, the SNP has claimed that successive victories within the 2016 and 2021 Holyrood elections counted as a mandate for a brand new referendum on independence. These claims had been rejected by a number of U.Ok. governments, quoting the SNP’s personal phrases on 2014 being a “as soon as in a era” ballot. In London, Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer has made clear he gained’t budge on granting a brand new referendum, irrespective of the election outcome.

“In a number of methods it feels prefer it’s successfully the identical technique [former First Minister] Nicola Sturgeon stored pushing to no avail with some slight tweaks,” one well-connected former SNP adviser, granted anonymity like others on this article, instructed POLITICO.

“And I don’t know if John Swinney is actually the person to get us over the road to a majority, and to then persuade the U.Ok. authorities to grant a referendum, when she couldn’t,” they added.

As a veteran of the SNP who was successfully strong-armed again into frontline politics whereas the social gathering was in disaster, Swinney has stabilized the SNP and is an enormously in style determine among the many SNP devoted — regardless of doubts about whether or not he's really the type of political large who can ship one thing as monumental as independence. Others suppose the gruff man from Blairgowrie might be simply the ticket.

“John Swinney can be on Scottish banknotes in the future. There can be statues of him in Edinburgh, the capital of an impartial Scotland,” a candidate at subsequent yr’s election stated.

Date with a mandate

Swinney’s “tweak” to the independence push is a brand new goal.

SNP members overwhelmingly backed his new technique on the convention on Saturday. Underneath the plan, Swinney has declared that if his social gathering wins an outright majority in Could, it might be a contemporary mandate for a second referendum that the U.Ok. authorities in Westminster can't ignore.

<img width="1024" height="683" src="https://www.politico.eu/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/13/12671791-1024x683.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-7320486" srcset="https://www.politico.eu/cdn-cgi/image/width=1024,quality=80,onerror=redirect,format=auto/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/13/12671791.jpg 1024w, https://www.politico.eu/cdn-cgi/image/width=300,quality=80,onerror=redirect,format=auto/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/13/12671791.jpg 300w" /> As a veteran of the SNP who was successfully strong-armed again into frontline politics whereas the social gathering was in disaster, John Swinney has stabilized the SNP. | Robert Perry/EPA

They've precedent on their aspect: Britain’s then-Prime Minister David Cameron granted the primary referendum in response to the SNP’s 2011 majority win.

However, unsurprisingly, the U.Ok. authorities doesn’t plan to make it that simple.

SNP strategists say Swinney’s plan is a means of galvanizing assist for the SNP, which sees its personal polling outstripped by assist for independence, at across the 50-50 mark. It’s a method fraught with points.

Along with the sensible drawback of there being no signal of Labour shifting on its opposition to a referendum, one other subject is the comparatively excessive bar the SNP has set for itself .

Solely as soon as has an outright majority for one social gathering been achieved within the Scottish parliament’s practically 30 years of existence. Opinion polling at present factors to an SNP win — due to the difficult Scottish Labour Social gathering’s struggles and a cut up Unionist opposition — however to not a majority.

“John Swinney will suppose he has had convention. He’s put his stamp on the social gathering and gained assist for his most well-liked technique,” Fergus Mutch, a former adviser to Alex Salmond, who gained the 2011 majority for the SNP, stated.

“However the issue is, what if he falls quick? If there’s not a majority secured subsequent Could, would the social gathering members, MSPs and so on suppose the SNP would simply go quiet on independence for 5 years? That’s not going to fly.”

Even when the social gathering does win a majority — which Swinney’s strategists are quietly optimistic is a chance, if not a chance — there's nonetheless the sensible drawback of really delivering to its members the promised land of independence.

“[Swinney] is placing a number of retailer by way of political precedent, and that’s high quality, however we’re dealing in a constitutional atmosphere the place the one clear little bit of steerage on a referendum has come from the Supreme Court docket, which dominated that that is finally right down to Westminster,” Mutch added. “The SNP ought to be cautious about overplaying their hand.”

Talking on Saturday, Swinney stated that “no one is aware of the techniques I’m going to deploy if we get 65 seats … so hold watching.” His mysterious assertion — suspected to contain extra courtroom motion — is but to persuade everybody.

“The ball ought to actually be in Labour’s courtroom and the stress on them to respect our mandate if we get it. However in all honesty, there’s nothing we will really do,” one SNP official added.

Swinney versus Farage

Why would possibly SNP strategists suppose that Nigel Farage might be an asset to the independence trigger?

Regardless of an uptick in his recognition in Scotland, the Reform UK chief remains to be significantly much less in style north of the border than he's in England and Wales. And the looming prospect of a Farage-led authorities in Westminster — he leads within the polls — makes the SNP surprise if its second might lastly come.

“You’re forgetting about Farage,” one senior SNP determine stated, when requested why this newest push for independence might be completely different. “His values are poisonous to Scottish individuals.”

“This might be the perfect time to push for this, with the Unionist vote so divided and the specter of Farage in No. 10 giving individuals an additional incentive to need indy now,” a second candidate at subsequent yr’s election stated. “It is perhaps now or by no means.”

The counterpoint to all that is that earlier “game-changers” within the independence debate — notably Britain’s exit from the EU regardless of Scots voting towards it and the election of Boris Johnson as Prime Minister — failed to maneuver the dial.

However within the absence of the rest that would shift assist for independence and make Westminster’s intransigence on a referendum unsustainable, the social gathering clings to the hope of a brand new bogeyman.

“I’d wish to see us spend extra time constructing the case for independence till it’s unassailably in style, relatively than banging the referendum drum once more,” a second SNP official stated.