By Bill Heaney
The Scottish Labour Party will have a new leader next month. This follows the resignation of Richard Leonard, who left the post with immediate effect on Thursday.
The poison chalice that is up for grabs will be handed either to Anas Sarwar or Monica Lennon with Jackie Baillie, the Dumbarton MSP and deputy leader of Scottish Labour, stepping aside to allow these two to fight it out.
“Monica Lennon has as much chance of beating Sarwar as she has of her namesake Neil Lennon at Celtic winning the League and landing ten in a row for the Parkhead club,” said one Labour insider.
Another ventured his opinion in typical West of Scotland parlance: “She has two chances, a dug’s and nane.”
Nominations for the post will open for one day next week, with a leader finally declared on 27 February, which many Labour supporters think is too long a lapse in time.
The contest is taking place just a few months ahead of the Scottish Parliament election, which is scheduled to be held on 6 May.
Candidates have until midnight on Sunday to declare their intention to run and will require support from at least four of the party’s MSPs, or its sole Scottish MP, by midday the following Tuesday to be formally nominated.
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Scottish Labour members and affiliated supporters will be able to cast their votes from 9 February until ballots close on 26 February. The new leader will be formally announced online on 27 February.
Mr Leonard’s decision to leave means the party is looking for its fifth leader since the independence referendum in 2014 – with Johann Lamont, Jim Murphy and Kezia Dugdale all having held the job since then.
Interim Labour leader Jackie Baillie MSP and Monica Lennon MSP.
Details of the latest contest come after UK Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer, said Mr Leonard had “done the honourable thing” by resigning and that his successor should be elected “as quickly as possible”.
Speaking at the Fabian Society’s New Year conference, Sir Keir said “the decision to step down was his decision … he’s done the honourable thing, the right thing”.
Asked if he had spoken to Mr Leonard before his resignation, the Labour leader said they spoke “all the time” and their offices were in contact “every day”.
Jackie Baillie, who was Scottish Labour’s deputy leader, has taken charge of the party on an interim basis.
She has been busy in recent weeks as Labour’s member of the Salmond Inquiry at the Scottish Parliament.
The party’s health spokesman Anas Sarwar has been named as a potential front-runner in the contest, should he stand, along with MSP Monica Lennon.
Sarwar has been campaigning for families who have suffered and even lost loved ones while being treated in the defective Queen Elizabeth II University Hospital in Glasgow.
Monica Lennon, who made headlines recently for her campaign to supply free period products to women who could not afford them, told BBC Radio Scotland’s Drivetime programme that she had been having discussions with colleagues but was “ruling nothing in and ruling nothing out” at this stage.
Speculation that Richard Leonard was put under pressure to resign by millionaire business who would agree to sponsor Scottish Labour – but only if he quit – have been strenuously denied.
Labour’s finished. What we need is a Mugabe style “Take Out The Rubbish.” Issue the concrete slippers and let them feed the crabs. Since Unite’s “Reclaim Labour” political strategy, 2011, the TUs have swindled their members of £multi-millions of dues to keep Labour afloat and back Corbyn. They are as bad as the banks at robbing the working class. They are soaked in the blood of the innocent as warmongering imperialists who backed every US/NATO war going over the last 30 years and more. Corbyn was never done bad mouthing Assad and Russia. Horrific, If I was in charge they would all be lined up against a wall and shot for treason. It would be an act of kindness and mercy to put them out of their misery. Even Chris Williamson backed the destruction of Libya….. https://twitter.com/DerbyChrisW/status/1340791614093074435?s=20
Now he’s calling for the abolition of Labour.https://twitter.com/DerbyChrisW/status/1326781774949650432?s=20
What nationality is Mr Sarwar.
It’s an honest enough question since his father relinquished his Pakistani passport to become a British citizen before he became an MP.
Later then however, to take up a job as the Governor of the Punjab, he relinquished his British citizenship to take Pakastani citizenship.
More flips than the Labour MP tradition of house flipping. it seems. Or rather was until Labour lost all but one of their Scottish seats. So which one is it Mr Sarwar, like father like son, or am I just getting the family VAT returns mixed up.
And here’s the real deal. Based on current predictions, Labour could in Hollywood be down to fourth or fifth party status with less than a handful of MSPs. Poison chalice. Of course not. Labour are just not the people’s Choice