\n<\/p>\n
SNP members have overwhelmingly backed leader John Swinney\u2019s \u201cclear and unambiguous\u201d independence strategy that a majority election win is the only route to another referendum.<\/p>\n
On the first day of the party\u2019s annual conference in Aberdeen, the vast majority of members backed the leadership\u2019s motion that next May\u2019s Holyrood elections should be fought on a \u201cclear platform of national independence\u201d and that winning a majority in the Scottish parliament \u2013 by securing 65 seats or more \u2013 would be \u201cthe only uncontested way to deliver a new vote on Scotland\u2019s future\u201d.<\/p>\n
After a passionate \u2013 and at times highly technical \u2013 debate, the conference rejected a rebel amendment put by more than 40 local branches that set out a more fundamentalist strategy of treating next year\u2019s election as a de facto referendum, meaning that if the SNP and other pro-independence parties win a majority of the popular vote in 2026, it should be treated as a mandate to open independence negotiations directly.<\/p>\n
This de facto idea was first promoted by the former party leader and first minister Nicola Sturgeon, who acknowledged it as a \u201cmistake\u201d in her recent memoir.<\/p>\n
Echoing the confidence of SNP strategists reported in the Guardian yesterday, Swinney told the packed conference hall that \u201cwe are within touching distance of the 65 seats that will make the world sit up and take notice\u201d and urged the party to back taking a \u201cclear, unambiguous message\u201d to the public. Depute leader Keith Brown, who seconded the motion, told delegates: \u201cThe only way we can achieve independence is to ask a clear question and get a clear answer.\u201d<\/p>\n
This call to clarity is key: while independence is not high on the list of voters\u2019 priorities, activists have unhappy memories of trying to explain what many believed was a fatally muddled independence strategy on the doorstep for the general election last year, where the SNP was humiliated by the resurgent Labour party, losing 38 of its 48 Westminster seats.<\/p>\n
A year on, the party\u2019s pivot to its core message is a mark of renewed confidence, with the SNP once again leading the polls ahead of Scottish Labour and Reform UK, and an understanding that the battleground demographic for the coming campaign is made up of those \u201csoft yes\u201d independence supporters who have drifted away from the party.<\/p>\n
Speaking for the de facto amendment, veteran activist Graeme McCormick insisted that it was not proposed by \u201cromantic nationalists\u201d. He warned that the SNP was being \u201chollowed out\u201d because it had failed to inspire its membership with a date for another referendum.<\/p>\n
The former MP Tommy Sheppard said it was \u201cremarkable\u201d that such a large conference was able to have such a detailed discussion in public and in front of the media, but insisted there were \u201cno quick fixes\u201d. \u201cWe have been chasing the next election for too long,\u201d he said, arguing that the party needed a strategy to take it into the 2030s and deepen support for independence.<\/p>\n
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Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Regardless of leadership optimism, a majority remains a high bar given Holyrood\u2019s proportional electoral system \u2013 the SNP has only won a majority once, under Alex Salmond in 2011.<\/p>\n Keir Starmer has repeatedly said he would not grant Holyrood the power to hold a second vote on independence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SNP members have overwhelmingly backed leader John Swinney\u2019s \u201cclear and unambiguous\u201d independence strategy that a majority election win is the only route to another referendum. On the first day of the party\u2019s annual conference in Aberdeen, the vast majority of members backed the leadership\u2019s motion that next May\u2019s Holyrood elections should be fought on a<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27464,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[1348,10296,7209,120,2651,765,5764,10671,1670,16399],"class_list":{"0":"post-27463","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics","8":"tag-backs","9":"tag-clear","10":"tag-independence","11":"tag-national","12":"tag-party","13":"tag-referendum","14":"tag-scottish","15":"tag-snp","16":"tag-strategy","17":"tag-swinneys"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}