By Keith Aitken in
Edinburgh
6 May 2011
A landslide victory in the Scottish Parliament election has
left Alex Salmond and his new Scottish National Party administration facing the
daunting challenge of meeting its ambitious programme of public spending
promises.
As dawn broke, it was clear that the SNP had won over
disenchanted voters from all other parties, especially the Liberal Democrats,
to deliver a seismic change in Scottish politics. Labour has been tossed aside
in heartlands such as Lanarkshire, Glasgow, Renfrewshire and Ayrshire that had been
impregnable for generations.
Just before 2.30 pm today, with 108 of the 129 results
declared, the SNP passed the 65-seat barrier to win the overall majority long
been assumed all-but impossible under Holyrood’s Additional Member System (AMS).
It is now the dominant political force
in all the major conurbations and much of rural Scotland.
But the sheer scale of victory also leaves the SNP with scant
hiding places if it cannot deliver on its public finance commitments across a
five-year term – when budgetary
pressure from the UK Treasury is certain to remain intense. Former SNP MP Margo
MacDonald, now an Independent, today predicted ‘the Parliament from hell’.
During the closing stages of the election campaign, a
growing rumble of scepticism about the financial viability of the SNP’s
programme was heard from think-tanks, academics, local authorities and trade
unions. The main promises in question are: no compulsory redundancies in the
public sector; continuing the council tax freeze for the full five years; no
university tuition fees; an expanded Modern Apprenticeship programme; universal
free NHS prescriptions; and free personal care for elderly people.
Professor David Bell of Stirling University, for example, puts
the cost of funding the council tax freeze at almost twice the SNP’s figure,
while university principals have estimated the tuition fee funding gap at £200m–£360m,
against the SNP’s working figure of £93m.
In reply, the SNP can now point to voter endorsement of its
record in the four years of the past Scottish Parliament as a disciplined and
competent minority government that did meet most of these commitments through
the onset of recession.
It will also be helped by facing what will be, at least in
the early days of the new parliament, a woefully inexperienced Opposition,
especially once, as seems inevitable, Scottish Labour leader Iain Gray steps
down.
Unlike other parties, Labour has used the AMS regional lists
to blood new talent rather than provide a safety net for senior figures who might
lose their seats. Thursday’s rout of Labour constituency fiefdoms replaced ex-ministers
and potential leaders such as Andy Kerr, David Whitton and Tom McCabe with
virtual unknowns.
Results as at 2.30
pm, Friday 6 May
Seats declared:108
(out of 129)
SNP 65
Labour 29
Conservatives 9
Lib Dems 4
Greens 1
