The great unknown in the SNP leadership contest is an extremely significant one: who are the voters? Nobody but Peter Murrell really knows how many members the party has, but almost nobody believes the claimed number of over 100,000. (Our guess, based on pretty much nothing but a gut feeling, is 75,000 plus or minus 5000.)
But more to the point, nobody knows who they are. The average member age in most political parties is over 50, and according to figures published in 2019, more than 80% of SNP members are over 40, with half of those being over 60. There’s also an almost 3:2 bias in favour of men.
Humza Yousaf will not be the next First Minister of Scotland. We’re calling it now. His trainwreck of a performance on last night’s leadership election debate on STV dealt a blow to his chances that we can’t see him recovering from, and the SNP establishment is now under such intense scrutiny over the electoral process that the chances of a fix being orchestrated by Peter Murrell are receding fast.
In the debate Yousaf declared that Nicola Sturgeon was the best politician in the UK, that he wasn’t as good as her, and that she’d failed to find a successful strategy for independence and therefore he couldn’t either.
If you’re talking about “transwomen”, you’re almost always talking about people with a fully intact and functional penis. More than 95% of people who identify as trans have NOT undergone any genital surgery, and that’s a fact that’s still not widely understood.
We must admit it’s a shock – we were expecting the SNP President to remain neutral in the leadership election – but it’s hard to reasonably interpret this any other way.
(We’re not aware of Russell giving any media interviews last night so we assume from the timing that these comments were made at the regular meeting of the SNP Westminster Parliamentary group.)
Because both Humza Yousaf and Kate Forbes couldn’t have been any clearer that their indy strategies centre on getting Westminster to agree to another Section 30 order, and by pointing out that that’s never going to happen (which we all knew anyway), Mike Russell is admitting that a vote for anyone but Ash Regan is a vote to surrender any hope of independence for the foreseeable future.
We don’t often agree with him these days, but on this one he couldn’t be more right. For the sake of the SNP (and the Yes movement) we hope its members heed the sage, albeit coded, advice of their President.
Last month this site ran an article entitled “All The Nice Greens Love A Rapist”, and two days ago the Scottish version of the party officially confirmed it.
Let’s take a moment off, folks. In our latest Panelbase poll, we also threw in a question just for fun, with genuinely no agenda at all, simply because we were curious to know what the answer was. Here it is:
By now many of you will have seen last night’s article on Craig Murray’s site, in which a current SNP branch convener revealed how the party machine is setting fire to all its own rules in a desperate attempt to secure the succession of Humza Yousaf.
Yousaf is the party establishment’s last hope of keeping all of its misdeeds in the last few years under wraps, and realising the magnitude of what’s at stake if he loses to Ash Regan or Kate Forbes, they’re abandoning all pretence of neutrality or integrity and throwing everything they’ve got at getting him elected.
Last month Wings broke a story about a “survey” being conducted by dozens of primary schools in the Aberdeen area in which children as young as nine were being asked about their sexual orientation and “gender identity”.
The charity LGBT Youth Scotland is currently the subject of a live police investigation over its involvement in a second major child-abuse scandal in little over a decade.
So you’d expect Police Scotland to be taking that pretty seriously, right?
Confused on Only An Excuse: “the authorities have made their statement, there is nothing in it. The ref decides, he doesn’t need to blow his…” May 21, 22:39
Tinto Chiel on Off-topic: “@sarah: thanks for that. It’s back to brassicas then……” May 21, 22:31
Andy Wiltshire on Only An Excuse: “I had no idea there were that many people in MI6.” May 21, 22:12
Southernbystander on The Land Of No Laws: “Geri, I daresay this is part of the wider conversation above and I did not read all of it. I…” May 21, 21:14
sarah on Off-topic: “That’s a good idea about the hens, Dan – several neighbours have them. Yes, we have corrugated iron sheets to…” May 21, 21:13
Northcode on The Queer Parliament: ““…the ‘trans’ sadism and madness needs to be removed before independence, Alf…” Not so, that’s retrospective determinism — treating the…” May 21, 21:09
Geri on Only An Excuse: “Do you remember who it was that brought that shit to Scotland? They should be sued for all the money…” May 21, 20:50
Dan on Off-topic: “I reckon snails could easily travel a hunner yards back to a succulent cabbage leaf. Best to get some chickens…” May 21, 20:46
Geri on The Queer Parliament: “Dan, LOL! Lorncal “Personally, I have no faith in the UN. It is filled to the gunnels with former colonized…” May 21, 20:44
Alf Baird on The Queer Parliament: ““Scotland’s malady is tribalism” The colonizer will always manipulate and ‘exploit tribal rivalries’ (Fanon), we know this from postcolonial theory.…” May 21, 20:42
agentx on Only An Excuse: ““21 May 2026, 18:37 BST Single-sex spaces – such as changing rooms and toilets – must be used on the…” May 21, 20:28
Scot Finlayson on Only An Excuse: “4 bookings after 90 mins, refs ,generally, put on 30 seconds per booking, so another 2 minutes should have been…” May 21, 20:27
Hatey McHateface on The Queer Parliament: “Surely a blinkered attitude if you stand to make a killing by betting on how long he will last as…” May 21, 20:27
George Ferguson on Only An Excuse: “Well that was the 5 days up and there we have it, nothing to see here move on. The reputational…” May 21, 20:19
sarah on Off-topic: “If your wee ones want to see more than one large snail, I recommend leaving one or more kale [or…” May 21, 20:18
Hatey McHateface on The Queer Parliament: “Arse over tit, Bilbo. The policies over the past 4+ years were sane and rational. It’s the buying of diesel…” May 21, 20:17
Geri on The Queer Parliament: “Another one that doesn’t understand “Scroll on. Piss off” Leave her alone eh? Yer one post today had to be…” May 21, 20:16
Lorncal on The Queer Parliament: “Stuart: that was not my point. It will only come back to reality when the pressures start to show the…” May 21, 20:14
Hatey McHateface on The Queer Parliament: “Hey Alf. Did you know that Northy posts in praise of you as well? He also writes that the only…” May 21, 20:10
Paul Eden on Only An Excuse: “Outrageous, not fair, biased. Who knew?” May 21, 20:09
Bilbo on The Queer Parliament: “O/T. I see that the UK is lifting sanctions and buying oil produced by R via India. They do this…” May 21, 19:56
GM on The Queer Parliament: “It’s a toss up between her and Ivan McKee who is the best minister amongst them. I see Somerville still…” May 21, 19:56
Calum on Only An Excuse: “What’s even more depressing is, I have a couple of mates who are most def not Celtic fans who have…” May 21, 19:53
Bilbo on The Queer Parliament: “I have no interest in English politics but it’s obvious Burnham is only seen a popular candidate to become PM…” May 21, 19:50
Hatey McHateface on The Queer Parliament: “Never wis ony union, Alf? If only I had £1 for every time you’ve sat stumm after some thicko on…” May 21, 19:47
sarah on Off-topic: “Hi Tinto and Marie, I agree that it is all very depressing and worrying. The crookedness, incompetence, and obsession with…” May 21, 19:44
Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh on The Queer Parliament: “ROYAL COLLEGE OF NURSING SLAMMED FOR FLYING ‘TRANS PRIDE’ FLAG The Royal College of Nursing has come under fire for…” May 21, 19:43