Latest editorial
Nicola Sturgeon delivers her speech at the SNP conference
LABOUR is right to condemn the SNP’s Growth Commission report as committing an independent Scotland to a “decade of austerity” — a manifesto, as Richard Leonard put it, for “cuts not growth.”
Since the general election, the SNP has been in a quandary over its future direction. Should it shift to the right to regain the dozen seats lost to the Tories in its tartan-Tory heartland in the north-east or move left to forestall further loses in the working-class constituencies of central Scotland ?
The party’s Growth Commission report supplies the answer. For everyone on the left, it is a deeply disappointing document which, if not challenged, threatens to shift the whole balance of debate in Scotland towards the right — aligning the SNP, in terms of the party’s basic assumptions, with Ruth Davidson’s Conservatives.
The new Scottish Parliament looks set to continue a cycle of managerial tinkering while public services face the axe, writes STEPHEN LOW
The biggest strike in global history is a template for our future. The silence tells you all you need to know, writes CLAUDIA WEBBE
Starmer sabotaged Labour with his second referendum campaign, mobilising a liberal backlash that sincerely felt progressive ideals were at stake — but the EU was then and is now an entity Britain should have nothing to do with, explains NICK WRIGHT
Deep disillusionment with the Westminster cross-party consensus means rupture with the status quo is on the cards – bringing not only opportunities but also dangers, says NICK WRIGHT