That’s Entertainment: John Swinney on-song at SNP conference

Who knew John Swinney had so much in common with David Cameron?

The pair share a favourite band, it seems. In his closing speech to the SNP’s annual conference on Sunday, the first minister enthused about The Jam. Paul Weller’s mod icons are his favourite band, he said, revealing that he listens to them while running.

It’s a choice he shares with the former Tory prime minister, who left the Modfather spitting out his tea 20 years ago when he named The Eton Rifles as his pick of the pops. “Which part of it didn’t he get?” Weller asked of the old Etonian.

Weller’s opinion on Swinney’s endorsement – favourite track, Down in the Tube Station at Midnight – is as-yet unknown, but Swinney told delegates the music means so much to him: “That’s an anthem that rails against the evils of fascism, against which I will always stand firm.”

Not being a fascist would once have been the least we could expect of our political leaders. These days, it probably is worth mentioning.

And for Swinney’s SNP, as with so many recent iterations of the party, railing against the right is part of the brand. Where once the focus was Cameron’s Conservatives, it has now switched to Reform UK, whose leader Nigel Farage could, if polls can be believed, become the next UK prime minister.

The challenge of Reform means “Labour and Tories are locked in a race to the right – a race that will only be won by Nigel Farage,” the FM said, claiming that fear of the Cameo star “is driving Westminster to more and more extreme views” on the climate, immigration and human rights. Keir Starmer, Swinney said, “stole Jeremy Corbyn’s clothes and now he’s dressing up as Nigel Farage”.

But if the SNP is making its plans around Nigel, to misquote The Jam’s contemporaries XTC, it may want to think again. After all, its Hamilton by-election campaign portrayed the contest as a straight fight between SNP and Reform, and in the end Labour won, defying bookies and pundits.

Losing that campaign “might have been the best thing that happened to the SNP this year, because it focused minds on what needs to be done,” one insider commented in the hall.

And indeed, there was more of a business-like air at this conference than has been seen in previous years. The sparkle of the Sturgeon era has gone, as are the legions of young activists that would be seen around the halls and stalls. “There are less of them, but they’re still here and they’ve got fewer colours in their hair,” Holyrood was told.

Swinney’s SNP certainly seems to look like its leader – a party less colourful than in past incarnations, and more focused. Even the agenda was more coherent. And when Swinney’s old boss Nicola Sturgeon was around, it was clear that, while still able to draw a crowd, she is no longer the star act.

It’ll be up to the voting public to decide if Swinney himself is box office material, but conference delegates – the most faithful of the faithful – thought the messaging was on-song, giving the Blairgowrie boy seven standing ovations.

Swinney is of course the leader of a band which is about to lose more than a score of its members. The SNP’s conference was something of a farewell tour, then, for the likes of Sturgeon, Fiona Hyslop, Mairi Gougeon, Kevin Stewart, Bill Kidd and other colleagues who have said they will not stand again.

In her keynote address, Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes delivered a love letter to the Highlands, keening for country that will have to choose a new representative, whichever the party.

Does the public want to invite this band back for an encore? If it does, the SNP’s song will play on into a third decade in power. It is notable, then, that it retains an image of itself as a party of challenge, rather than one of authority – an eternal underdog, even four first ministers in.

Swinney described the SNP as “radical” twice in his speech; “champions of the new” was another. There were two big new offers in his speech, both focused on health and social care. The first, an intention to sponsor visas for hundreds of social care workers from overseas, is an attempt to circumvent changes in UK immigration laws and expected to cost around £600,000. The second is a pledge to establish 15 walk-in GP hubs working seven days a week and making appointments more accessible for workers. It drew murmurs in the hall, but lacks any detail so far on the ‘wheres’, the ‘hows’ and the ‘how much?’

Mystery also pervades Swinney’s independence plan. Delegates backed his plan to declare a mandate for another indyref in the event of an SNP majority being returned to Holyrood next year. Presenting his motion, Swinney said the SNP had a “duty” to provide a “credible plan” to deliver constitutional change, and should present a “clear, simple and unambiguous message” on the matter to voters.

David Cameron took a punt on granting a Section 30 order last time, and no subsequent PM has indicate any willingness to do the same – not after the UK Government then lost the Brexit referendum in a result that has seen agile mover Farage, an ex-MEP, build a platform in domestic politics.

And there was a tease when Swinney addressed the issue of just how he would persuade an intransigent UK Government to grant legal authority for his desired ballot. “Nobody knows the tactics I’m going to deploy if we get 65 seats… so keep watching,” he said.

Is Swinney taking more inspiration from the entertainment industry and taking that well-worn advice to ‘always leave them wanting more’? Recent polling shows a public unimpressed with the SNP’s stewardship of public services and a rehashed independence paper published last week did little to answer the big questions on currency and the economy that are seen to have stymied the party's ambitions last time. The GP plan isn’t enough to patch that up, and nor does the independence plan fill in those gaps. But the FM will be hoping that maybe – to quote his favourite band – it could be a start.