Why Kate Forbes is standing down
In a letter she has shared on social media, the Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Gaelic has informed Swinney that 'after careful thought over the summer recess' she will not stand again for the Highland constituency of Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch. Forbes, who has a two-year-old, added that:
Quite rightly this job entails long days far from home, constant attention and total dedication. As I consider the upcoming election and the prospects of another term, I have concluded that I do not wish to seek re-election and miss any more of the precious early years of family life.
Forbes's announcement is significant: she ran for the leadership contest after Nicola Sturgeon stepped down in early 2023, and while she came a close second to continuity candidate Humza Yousaf, she had been expected to go for the top job again. Even after Yousaf's election, her campaign team – slightly depleted after the furore caused by Forbes's religious views – remained intact and were considering their next moves. Although Swinney has said that he plans to stay on as First Minister for the next parliamentary term, there has been much discussion about who his successor may be. Forbes was expected to be a contender, alongside Westminster leader Stephen Flynn and housing secretary Mairi McAllan.
The timing is interesting: the SNP finalised its candidate list three months ago, which saw Forbes as one of 37 MSPs selected to stand again. Pulling out with nine months to go is not ideal for a party that is 15 points behind where it was in 2021 and in need of improving its ground campaign efforts. It's a shock to those who previously supported Forbes's leadership campaign, with one insider explicit in their surprise: 'No one expected this, and I'm not sure why she arrived at this decision.'
While Forbes has claimed her turnaround is down to family reasons, others aren't convinced that's the full picture. She represented a decreasing group in the SNP with socially conservative views and her pro-growth agenda hasn't always gone down well with some of her more left-wing colleagues. Some have suggested that the late announcement shows a lack of faith in Swinney's leadership. Others wonder whether the post-2026 makeup of the group – with 15 councillors and 10 ex-MPs standing for election – looks to push the party further from Forbes's values.
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The National
38 minutes ago
- The National
Kate Forbes's resignation may be welcome for left of SNP
IN a surprising announcement, Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes has announced that she will not be standing for re-election as an MSP at the next Scottish parliament elections due in May next year. First elected as an MSP in 2016 and a fluent Gaelic speaker, she has served as Deputy First Minister of Scotland and Cabinet Secretary for Economy and [[Gaelic]] since May 2024. In her letter announcing that she would not be seeking re-election, she cited her wish to spend more time with her young family. Her daughter Naomi was born in summer 2022. She also has step-children from her husband's first marriage. Her husband Ali's first wife died suddenly in 2014. READ MORE: Highland Council set for by-election after Green resigns seat In her announcement she wrote: "It has been a great honour to serve Highland communities for almost a decade. I am grateful to every voter who re-elected me at the last election with the biggest majority in Scotland. 'I have also been privileged to serve in Government, first as Minister for Public Finance, then as Cabinet Secretary for Finance and most recently as Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Gaelic. 'As I reflected over recess, I have concluded that I do not wish to seek re-election for another five-year term in the Scottish Parliament. 'All politicians face a choice at every election to stay on the same path or not. Quite simply, I've decided on the latter. I remain wholly supportive of the First Minister just as when I backed him to be leader of the SNP and I look forward to campaigning for the SNP at the next election – to lead Scotland to independence.' Forbes stood for election as party leader following the resignation of Nicola Sturgeon, coming second behind Humza Yousaf. She scuppered her campaign early on by saying in an interview that she would not have supported equal marriage as recognising same sex marriages runs counter to her religious beliefs. Forbes is a member of the Christian fundamentalist Free Church of Scotland, for which her father was a missionary in India. Her socially conservative beliefs and conservative economic policies put her firmly on the right of the SNP. Her support for freeports left many SNP members feeling uncomfortable. Although she never mentioned her explicitly, Forbes's elevation to the post of Deputy First Minister seems to have been one of the reasons former MP Mhairi Black recently resigned from the SNP, citing her unhappiness with the direction that the party had been taking. Black was not alone. Forbes' resignation has been welcomed on social media by those who believe that in order to win back the trust of younger voters and working-class communities, the SNP needs to promote more assertively left wing, climate-friendly economic policies. They hope that this development will signal a leftward pivot from the SNP, marking a clear political and economic distinction between the SNP and the increasingly right-wing Labour party. READ MORE: From rising star to Deputy First Minister – Kate Forbes' career as she stands down However, whatever your views on Kate Forbes, her standing down will be a big loss to Holyrood and Government, and yet another indication the price on their family lives MSPs representing Highlands and Islands constituencies are expected to pay. First Minister John Swinney paid tribute to his deputy, writing on Twitter/X: "I pay tribute to Kate for her invaluable contribution to public life over the last ten years. The challenges of frontline politics are considerable, and I understand the decision she has made.' He then added: 'Although I wish it was not the case.' Health Secretary Neil Gray also said he was "very sorry" to hear the news but does "understand why". Social Justice Secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville said: "The pressures on any working mum is considerable but to combine that with senior ministerial responsibilities alongside a young family while serving your constituency is colossal. I wish Kate and her family all the best for whatever comes next." Today's announcement means that the [[SNP]] must run a fresh selection contest to find a new candidate for Forbes's Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch constituency. Forbes's position had been confirmed in April when the SNP revealed that she had been the only nominee to stand in the area, meaning there is no second-place challenger to step in and take her place. READ MORE: What Kate Forbes's exit means for future SNP leadership hopefuls The SNP announced their full slate of nominees for the 2026 Holyrood elections in May, meaning that Forbes's constituency is currently the only area without a confirmed party candidate. In the 2021 elections, Forbes won 56.1% of the vote, while the Tories came second on 19.3%. The LibDems were in third with 15.7%. However, at last year's Westminster election, the Lib Dems took the overlapping [[Westminster]] constituency of Inverness, [[Skye]], and West Ross-shire with 37.8% of the vote against 33.3% for the [[SNP]]'s Drew Hendry.
Spectator
an hour ago
- Spectator
Kate Forbes showed real bravery
There is a certain worldly cynicism aroused by the announcement that a politician is stepping down to spend more time with their family. It was for a long time the refuge of MPs who had earned themselves an entry in the News of the World, the Who's Who of romeos, rogues and reprobates, for their activities with ladies – or young gentlemen – of the night. Less commonly, it was regarded as an admission that someone could not hack it or was frustrated by their slow progress up the greasy pole. After all, no one wants to quit politics. Contra the cynics, Kate Forbes. Scotland's deputy first minister will stand down from Holyrood at next May's elections, having somehow crammed a whole political life into ten tempestuous years. In that time, she has been a backbencher, public finance minister, finance secretary, leadership candidate, backbencher again, and finally deputy first minister and economy secretary. In her letter to first minister John Swinney, she acknowledges that 'quite rightly this job entails long days far from home' but 'I do not wish to seek re-election and miss any more of the precious early years of family life'. Forbes married her husband Alasdair, a widower, in 2021 and became stepmum to his three daughters. The following year the couple had a daughter, who is turning three. (Some men go to war, others jump out of planes, but living with five women is true bravery.) Forbes was never meant to get where she did. Upon her election to the Scottish parliament in 2016, her religious views were known and they marked her as an apostate in an era of secular progressivism. A member of the Free Presbyterian Church, Forbes's religion is not an identity category but a living faith. She believes in it all: birth, death, resurrection and salvation. The happy-clappy bits and the fire and brimstone alike. There was little chance of her progressing beyond the outer ministry in the modern, uber-liberal SNP, and she had to settle for a junior ministerial post in the Scottish government's finance department. Unfortunately for the party leadership, events overtook. The night before the 2020 budget speech, finance secretary Derek Mackay was forced to quit after a newspaper learned of his text messages to a 16 year old. Forbes, who had been allowed no real input into the budget, was thrust onto the floor of Holyrood to deliver – and be interrogated on – a speech she had only been handed hours before. She did so with such confidence and composure that even the SNP's most loyal critics commended her. That performance made her promotion to the cabinet finance post inevitable, though some more glumly considered it unavoidable. By the time Nicola Sturgeon resigned in February 2023, Forbes had established herself as a moderate, pro-business Nationalist who wanted the Scottish government to focus on prosperity rather than gender ideology, an agenda she opposed. Yet the prospect of the party moving to the centre, and especially of it being led by an evangelical Christian, prompted the SNP establishment to throw its weight behind Humza Yousaf, who was well-meaning but plainly not up to running a devolved government. In a straight fight, he would have been no match for Forbes, but instead the leadership contest was shaped by her internal enemies and the media into an inquisition on her religious beliefs. Journalists well-laden with secular prejudices delighted in making her answer for those verses of Scripture which scandalise modern sensibilities. To her credit as a Christian, but disastrously for a politician, she refused to lie or be evasive about her beliefs. When they asked her views on abortion, she told the truth. When they enquired as to her thinking about gay marriage, she did the same again. When they tried to corner her on trans rights, she was honest and took the punishment that came with it. Compelled to bear witness, she did so with her head held high, fighting the good fight and keeping the faith. It is one of the most personally admirable and politically suicidal decisions I have ever seen. In the end, she lost, though only narrowly, and was vindicated when her opponent swiftly proved as unequal to the challenges of office as she had warned. He inflicted so much damage with a programme of Continuity Sturgeon progressivism that, just 14 months later, his successor was drafting in Forbes as deputy head of the government to repair relations with the business sector, steer economic policy back to growth, and serve as the symbol of a new pragmatism. Despite our fundamental disagreements, I rate Forbes as a politician and a public official and said so regularly on Coffee House and elsewhere. This did nothing for her reputation among Nationalists. In fact, I know that it was used against her, and I'm sorry for that. Some regarded with bemusement, others horror, the sight of a gay Catholic Unionist simping for a Wee Free separatist, but the simping was not for Forbes so much as for the fleeting possibility that a leader of her calibre could get her hands on the controls. In a way, I should be relieved that she was sabotaged by the liberal bigots in her own party. If she had been half the first minister I reckon she might have been, she could have broadened the SNP's electoral coalition to the point at which independence became the consensus view across the electorate. She was a very dangerous woman for a time there, and might be again if she were to return after her children have grown up. The cynics will reassert themselves in the coming days, pronouncing that Forbes has seen the writing on the wall, that the SNP is finished, that she is hinting at her lack of faith in Swinney, that she had risen as high as she would be allowed to in a party thoroughly in the grips of identity politics progressives. Or, and I will tread lightly here, perhaps she truly values motherhood above career, one of the few remaining mortal sins in a non-judgemental age. Her fellow Nationalist Gail Ross did the same in 2021, admitting that five days a week away from her son was just too much. Not coincidentally, she too was a Highlands MSP, where constituencies rival small countries for square mileage. Labour's Jenny Marra, a considerable talent, walked away after ten years darting up and down the vast North East Scotland region. Family had to come first. Anglo culture is hardly alone in associating labour with fortitude and moral uprightness, but it is noticeably unforgiving of those who opt out in favour of raising children. Try to balance work and family but say you find it impossible, and you can expect to be chastised for failing at something so many parents do. The resentment is not for admitting you cannot manage but for forcing others to reconsider how well they are managing. I have sat in many a newsroom well into the evening, hearing bedtime stories read over the phone by loving parents who were wanted at home, and wanted to be there, but who were working late to give their children the best start in life. I'm not a parent, and maybe it's not my place to comment, but I know too many people whose fathers and mothers worked those hours, provided abundantly for their offspring, but now have no relationship with them. Their material needs were more than met but at the expense of other, deeper needs. No doubt Kate Forbes has made the right decision for her family but I can't help but wonder how many more families would have benefited from her making it to Bute House. Yes, she's hopelessly wrong about the constitution, but there's more to politics than policy. There's talent and character and leadership. We will have to settle for much less.
Times
3 hours ago
- Times
Kate Forbes choosing family over Holyrood leaves a vacuum in the SNP
T here are not many public figures in Scotland whose loss to politics can be regarded as a calamity. Kate Forbes's decision to stand down as deputy first minister and MSP at the next election, is not just a blow to the SNP — a party singularly lacking in sound business sense and independent thinking — it diminishes Holyrood as well. Hers was a voice in parliament worth listening to, whether explaining the balance between religious belief and political affiliation, or setting out the path for a faltering economy. Her partnership with the first minister John Swinney was a strong one, and together, in the run-up to next year's Scottish elections, they would have offered a powerful challenge to their opponents, including a rampant Reform party.
