Next SNP leader odds and polls: the race to replace Nicola Sturgeon

The SNP’s leader in Westminster has called for party unity as the leadership contest to replace Nicola Sturgeon descends into infighting.

Stephen Flynn told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland that the SNP must “come together and move forward together” after the new first minister is announced later this month following a vote by party members. The appeal followed what The Telegraph’s Alan Cochrane described as a “bitter and acutely personal war of words” in last week’s face-off on STV between the three candidates: Finance Secretary Kate Forbes, Health Secretary Humza Yousaf and backbencher Ash Regan.

The SNP had long “been known for its extraordinary public unity and iron political discipline”, said BBC Scotland editor James Cook, first under Alex Salmond and then under Sturgeon, following Scotland’s rejection of independence in the 2014 referendum. But “old fissures are opening up again, with heated debate about the party’s direction of travel on economics, independence and social issues”.

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Roughly 75,000 party members began casting their votes on 13 March. The ballot closes on 27 March, when the new leader will be announced.

Humza Yousaf

Seen as the continuity candidate, Scotland’s health secretary has secured the backing of SNP heavyweights including the party’s Westminster leader Flynn and Deputy First Minister John Swinney.

Despite being only 37, Yousaf has also served as justice secretary, transport minister and international development minister. In 2012, he became the first Muslim to be appointed to the Scottish government.

However, Yousaf’s running of Scotland’s NHS has come under intense scrutiny of late, and he was criticised for urging the public to “think twice” before calling 999 in September 2021.

Yousaf has disagreed with Sturgeon’s belief in treating the next election as a de facto referendum on independence, insisting it is time to talk about “policy” rather than “process”.

He has, however, pledged to continue to fight for the outgoing leader’s gender reform law, which would allow 16-year-olds to self-identify as the opposite sex without needing a medical certificate.

On the hot-button issue of same-sex marriage, Yousaf told LBC’s Tonight With Andrew Marr in February that “I’m a supporter of equal marriage”.

“I’m a Muslim. I’m somebody who’s proud of my faith,” he continued. “But what I don’t do is, I don’t use my faith as a basis of legislation.”

Yousaf has also “insisted there was no money left to increase NHS pay deals following a series of walkouts”, said The Telegraph, but he did submit “a request for extra funds to cover pay rises, which was rejected by Westminster”.

Kate Forbes

Aged just 32, Finance Secretary Forbes was the initial front-runner and returned early from maternity leave to join the race. Launching her campaign, the MSP for Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch said she could not “sit back and watch our nation thwarted on the road to self-determination”.

She declared: “Our small, independent neighbours enjoy wealthier, fairer, and greener societies – and so should we. We urgently need to unleash the full talent of the SNP, the wider Yes movement and the country at large.”

Forbes was first “thrust into the limelight” in 2020, when she was forced to step in and deliver the Scottish budget at “the 11th hour” after her predecessor Derek Mackay resigned, said Sky News.

However, concerns have been raised about whether Forbes, a member of the Free Church of Scotland, holds views that conflict with party policies on abortion and same-sex marriage. In 2018, Forbes “made a pro-life speech at a prayer breakfast in Edinburgh”, The National reported.

She faced criticised from within her party in 2019, when she became one of 15 SNP politicians to sign a letter urging the leadership not to rush ahead with plans to overhaul the Gender Recognition Act.

As finance secretary, Forbes has increased benefits and urged Rishi Sunak to raise all social security benefits in line with inflation.

But she appeared to give away her chance of succeeding Sturgeon by making an “ill-judged assertion that she would have opposed gay marriage had she been in the Scottish parliament when the law was passed”, said Politico. The comment, during an interview with Channel 4 News, went down “like a lead balloon” north of the border.

“But Forbes remains the enigma,” said John Boothman in The Times. She “should have been down and out well before now” owing to the response to her “socially conservative views” yet “it seems the public still likes her, at least more than” Yousaf.

“She has confounded those who should not be crossed and they are now on the verge of conniptions,” Boothman concluded. “For the SNP, it may be that a bigger end game has also begun.”

Ash Regan

Regan, 49, is currently a backbench MP but was a community safety minister until recently. She resigned over Sturgeon’s controversial proposed gender reforms. Unsurprisingly, she has vowed to ditch them, telling the The Mail on Sunday that “women’s rights will never be compromised with me”.

Regan has also insisted that any majority for independence-backing parties at an election, whether in Westminster or Holyrood, should be seen as a mandate for independence.

In her leadership campaign announcement, the MSP for Edinburgh Eastern Constituency said: “People expect a first minister to concentrate on boosting the economy, creating jobs and helping them deal with the cost of living crisis.”

However, she has so far said “relatively little” on public sector pay, said The Telegraph.

Regan has previously supported the objective of reaching net zero on carbon emissions by 2035, but last month she tweeted: “I will not support an accelerated net zero path which sees us turn off the North Sea taps, throw 10s of 1000s of oil workers out of jobs, hollow out NE & H&I communities whilst still using and importing hydrocarbons. I will stand up for our oil workers and their communities.”

Who is favourite to win?

Who the all-important constituency of SNP members are backing remains to be seen, but a poll conducted before a candidates debate on Sky News on Monday revealed “pretty disastrous findings” for the party’s next leader, said Cochrane in The Telegraph.

The “bad news”, said Boothman in The Times, is that “support for the SNP, for the cause and for each of the contenders is seeping slowly down the plughole”. And despite being the leadership front runner, Yousaf “was the biggest loser”.

The Sky/YouGov survey of 1,002 people found that 44% thought Yousaf would be a bad first minister, compared with only 22% who said he would do a good job.

The figures for Regan were 39% and 14%, while Forbes was the most popular, with 36% and 27% respectively.

But bookmakers still have Yousaf as the favourite among party members, with odds of 4/11 on his being the next leader, followed by Forbes on 2/1 and Regan way back on 33/1.

“There is no decent quantitative data out there about what the Scottish National party’s rank-and-file think,” said Stephen Bush in the Financial Times. “But what little solid information we have – the sharp decline in Kate Forbes’ standing among SNP voters as a whole, the SNP membership’s social liberalism and economic progressivism, the activist base’s loyalty to Nicola Sturgeon – points to Humza Yousaf as the most likely victor.”

“I’m not saying he is guaranteed to win,” Bush added, “I’m just saying there isn’t any good data-led case to think he won’t.”