As I write Alex Salmond is holding a press conference where he is announcing his resignation as First Minister of Scotland and (again) as leader of the Scottish National Party.
While his cause is not one that is endorsed much here on Liberal Democrat Voice, he has clearly brought his party and the independence movement a very long way indeed. That is an achievement to give credit for, even if we rather wish he hadn’t.
So the thread below is open for your comments on Salmond’s contribution to politics, and it wouldn’t be entirely inappropriate to lean more towards tributes than we might othewise.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Have resignations led to a rethink?
High Fell leaflet watch (2)
No, Leave didn't win the Brexit referendum because of Northern working class voters
Two new Makerfield by-election polls gives Burnham 5 and 12 point leads
Geoffrey Payne
Richard Whelan
David Raw
Tom Reeve
18 Comments
I’m not surprised , but a little saddened. Alex Salmond was decent first minister for Scotland and fought a good campaign. Getting so many people interested in politics in this cynical age and taking the impendence vote to 45% are no mean feats. He is also showed that there are viable political alternatives to the two party stranglehold on power. Moving on for the good of your cause and for that of your party are again an admirable traits. His successor as some big boots to fill.
Salmond was perhaps the most gifted of this current generation of politicians; he succeeded in galvanising and energising a large number of Scots (and others) with his vision of a future for Scotland. Whether one agreed with him or not, it was always pretty clear what his goals were. The same cannot always be said for many of his counterparts or would-be counterparts south of the border.
When I had dealings with him over 25 years ago, Alex Salmond impressed me as a genuine, friendly guy without a trace of arrogance. Of course his opponents will laugh at this last attribute, but he had a belief in his country which too many Scots no longer have, preferring to believe the scare tactics of the No campaign (in which, sadly, Danny Alexander and Alistair Carmichael played a leading part).
As a respected economist in his own right, he was able to assemble a team of distinguished economists to help support his case for independence and to counter the members of the same profession who tended to fashion their arguments to match their prejudices and then gain a full billing in the media.
It is a wonder he has survived all the “bandwagon wheels coming off”, body /crippling / double / hammer/ fatal / blows, bombshells, bad / disastrous / weeks, “spiralling black holes”, “deepening crises”, double / triple whammies etc. which were attributed to him in a very personal campaign by the UK media as each new piece of anti-Independence “news” was unveiled.
It all amounts to a picture of, above all, courage and competence, characteristics he shares with the leading entrepreneurs and self-made men (McColl, Soutar, Martin Gilbert, Angus Grossart, Dan McDonald, Spowart) who openly sympathised with Yes, while the mere managers of the business world opted for negativity and helped to frighten voters into the No camp.
HoL…?
A great and respected politician, and one known for keeping his word – if only there were more.
I don’t think his career’s done yet!
Heavens no. I trust Salmond would have the good sense not to accept any such offer were it made.
I pretty sure the SNP have no Lords at all. Also, I understand that he’s said he ‘s going to continue as a MSP
@jedibeeftrix
The SNP do not nominate for nor sit in the HoL.
As a supporter of Better Together, there was no campaigner I feared more as a political opponent than Alex Salmond. That he took the SNP and, more broadly, the Independence movement to yesterday’s vote is an achievement worthy of great respect. He also took a great gamble as now the movement he led has now lost a great pillar of it’s platform – that Scotland were forced into the Union and the people had no say – that argument is gone, the debate lasted years and the SNP had a, previously unthinkable, majority government in Holyrood to support the argument. The Union, by democratic mandate, stands.
The gap between Yes and No does not mean though that the argument is over, but enough of a decision to put the matter to rest for a generation. Was the gamble worth it? from his perspective, of course – he had to sieze it and I respect him for doing so. But the people of Scotland made a clear choice and there is the new reality – a Scotland that chose to be part of the Union.
The vote does though open space for the SNP and the LibDems to find a common ground on further devolution. I will never expect the SNP to except federalism but, from yesterday’s vote, it is their best chance of increasing the powers of Holyrood. As Liberals, we must seek equal powers for the rest of the Union as well – but Salmond, and whoever his successor proves to be, are part a mandate that cannot be moved aside. Scotland demands new powers, it it should have them. We all in the Union should.
Scotland didn’t vote for the Status Quo and neither did we Liberals, and that is the shown will of the Scottish people. As the successors of the Grand Old Man, it is our duty to grasp this opportunity. If we work for further devolved power in Holyrood, we can and must do so in Cardiff, Westminster and beyond – cooperation with the SNP can help make this possible.
I’m relieved the Union stands – the words Better Together sum my beliefs in so many ways – but we have Alex Salmond to thank for opening the door for something the Liberal movement has long, long campaigned.
I wish him and his family well. In the words of Highland Cathedral, “gone is the past/let us start anew”.
@ATF: “enough of a decision to put the matter to rest for a generation.”
I’ll mark my calendar for Referendum 2044!
@David-1
Thirty years… Good Lord, let’s hope we are both around! 🙂
The contrast between Alex Salmond who took responsibility and stood down when only 45% of his electorate supported him, and Nick who refused to accept responsibility when he only achieved 6.7% is breathtaking.
Alex Salmond is a galactico. If the SNP are daft enough to let him go on a free transfer, we should snap him up!
David-1
If what has been reported about the age of YES voters is correct, you will not have to wait thirty years. The unravelling of the VOW in the Daily Record with Cameron’s dawn raid on Clegg and Miliband is breathtaking but will only serve to convince the 45% that they,were right they are not going to melt away, and next time they will be able to point to what happened at 7am on 18th September 2014 as evidence of why you should never trust the Westminster elite again.
Miliband and Clegg, Gordon Brown and Alastair Darling have all done the Tories’ dirty work for them and Cameron has rewarded them with English Votes for English Laws. It looks like that Bullingdon Club mentality is still there.
Salmond has done the decent thing.
However, his repudiation by the voters was nowhere near as comprehensive as that sustained by Clegg in May’s euro-elections, and yet Clegg has clung on.
Alex Samond might have just done the UK a huge favor and managed to see off the disastrous IDS Universal Credit.
If IDS has been looking for the right time and an excuse to drop the disastrous policy, now would be it.
With Scotland being devolved new power, the fact that the tax and benefits systems in Scotland will soon begin to differ from those in the rest of the UK means that the currently non-existent IT for universal credit would soon have to become even more impossibly complex to cope with separate calculations for Scotland.
In addition, more devolution for Wales and Northern Ireland now seems to be on the agenda. If tax and benefits systems begin to evolve differently in all four countries in the UK then the possibility of the IT systems keeping pace with so many changes becomes ever less likely.
With so much uncertainty about the future, and with a paltry 11,000 people so far signed up to universal credit ( Far short of the Million) , Millions of pounds already written off in wasted IT Sftware, Thursdays’ vote may be the perfect excuse for the coalition to abandon this disastrous project
i on the other hand, think that UC is a brilliant idea in principle, and just wish that they could get it right.
i have always considered brown’s labyrinthine rats-nest of taxes and benefits produced a socially toxic form of redistribution, and i’ll be glad to see the back of it.
@Jedi
Whether you think it is brilliant idea or not in principal. The fact remains that it has been an utter disaster from the start with hundreds of Millions of pounds already having to been written off in defunct IT.
By April 2014 we were supposed to have 1 million people claiming UC, to date it is a pathetic 11’000.
In Birmingham, there are currently just 10 UC claimants whilst Manchester has double that, at 20 claimants.
The IT system will not be able to cope with people who have fluctuating pay conditions, i.e the self employed and those on Zero hour contracts who have no idea what or how many hours they will be working from one day to the next..
Add into the complicated mix of different tax/welfare in Scotland, possibly Wales and Northern Ireland.
It is clear that the policy is doomed.
The policy has been doomed from the start and it has only been the arrogance of Ian Duncan Smith and the Tories not wanting to admit that they get something wrong why the policy is still going ahead.
It will eventually have to be dropped anyway. Question is when, Will IDS use Scottish devolution as reasons for the policy becoming unworkable.
Will it be Labour if they win in 2015?
Either way, The policy is going to have to go, better the Liberal Democrats be first on the ball and on the right side of the argument from the very start , demanding that it be scrapped now as it has already costed Millions, it will be totally unworkable after devolution and better to stop throwing further Millions of pounds of tax payers money at an unworkable policy.