A Scottish Labour review into their latest Holyrood election drubbing should pull no punches. Their manifesto was not ambitious enough and their failure to have a List strategy proved costly.
But the main reason for the humbling was the inept performance of Keir Starmer. Scottish Labour’s defeat was directed, produced and written by the outgoing Prime Minister.
Anas Sarwar could have offered voters 10 grand each and it is unlikely to have made much of a difference.
Scottish Labour’s post-election review and the relationship with the UK party must be front and centre. Scottish Labour were judged on Starmer’s poor record as PM and they had no chance of winning in May.
Former candidate Jack McConnel – no relation to the ex-first minister of a similar name – is leading calls for Scottish Labour to become a separate party.
He makes the valid point that Labour face extinction unless they do something bold and that standing on their own two feet is the way to go. Polling commissioned by his campaign group, Just for Scotland, makes for fascinating reading.
It shows SNP and Green voters could be wooed if Scottish Labour was separate from the UK party. These pro-independence voters could also flock to an entirely new, pro-devolution party.
Scottish Labour have lost five elections in a row to the SNP and cannot get a hearing from voters. A new relationship with UK Labour – with Andy Burnham at the helm as PM – is essential if a centre-left, pro-UK party is to topple the SNP.
With the World Cup about to end, Scotland’s role in the tournament can be remembered with pride – but also disappointment. We got there for the first time in 28 years and started off with a widely celebrated win against Haiti.
But poor results against Morocco and Brazil saw us narrowly miss out on the knock-out stages – again. But that doesn’t mean our white-hot summer of sport is over.
We have the Commonwealth Games coming to Glasgow next week – and already inspiring stories from Team Scotland are giving us a feel good factor.
Today we tell how para-athlete Hope Gordon has overcome serious childhood illness and the amputation of her leg. Now she is set to represent her country in her third sport.
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She has already appeared in the Paralympics as a skier and a canoeist – now she’s set to represent Scotland in the weightlifting in the Glasgow games. Hope is well named – because that is what she is providing the nation as we look for new sporting heroes.
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