'Ludicrous' policies kicked SNP independence dream into long grass, says Ewing
Veteran MSP Fergus Ewing says 'ludicrous' policies linked to the SNP's coalition with the Greens set back the party's long-term dream of achieving independence.
Speaking to STV News after announcing he will stand as an independent at next year's Holyrood elections, Ewing said it 'wasn't an easy decision' but he felt the party had 'deserted many of the people whose causes we used to champion'.
Ewing, 67, has represented Inverness and Nairn for the SNP since 1999, but party rules state that membership ceases when a member plans to stand against the party.
He said: 'Just for the avoidance of doubt, I haven't left the SNP. It's up to them to decide whether or not they want to do anything about [my membership].'
Ewing said he has 'wrestled with his conscious' for a long time out of loyalty to the party and the First Minister.
Ultimately, he said he couldn't reconcile his values with the party's current direction.
Ewing said he began to have doubts about the direction of the SNP in the latter years of Nicola Sturgeon's government when he said he had to 'bite his tongue quite seriously'.
He claims people feel 'scunnered' with the government, and 'let down by the Scottish Parliament that they still very much support'. Ewing added the SNP has 'ceased to be champions for the people of Scotland'.
Describing the Greens as a 'fringe' party with 'really extreme socialist policies', Ewing said: 'It was really the fatal deal with the Greens, which unravelled fairly quickly, that really caused me to have serious doubts. Perhaps I've wrestled with them for too long.'
He added: 'Why we have focused away into side issues like who should use which toilet just completely baffles me, as I believe it baffles the majority of people in Inverness, Nairn, and Scotland as a whole.'
As a result, Ewing believes that trust in the party has been eroded, which the SNP needs to rebuild.
'Independence is in my DNA and I believe that's the ultimate aim for Scotland,' Ewing said.
'You do not want a divided country, and I'm afraid what we have at the moment is a divided country, and the economy is a matter of managed decline,' Ewing said.
Ewing said there needs to be a 'relentless focus' on the economy, public service reform, and a focus on righting the NHS over the next ten years to 'win back that trust and confidence'.
He added: 'That creates circumstances where people are ready to move to a new chapter of independence,' Ewing said.
'We're nowhere near that now, and there's no point in me trying to deny it.'
'But I'm afraid that's the SNP over the last few years – trying to deny the fact that we've eroded that trust by supporting a whole series of unaffordable, undeliverable, impracticable, and frankly at times ludicrous policies mostly imported from the Green party.
'And we still haven't got rid of that Green legacy. It's still there hanging over us.'
Ewing may have blamed Sturgeon's deal with the Scottish Greens for 'most of the problems that we've seen for the SNP over the last four years', but he insisted his decision is not personal.
Despite his issues with the direction of the SNP, Ewing said he would not be drawn into fighting against 'any particular individual politician or party'.
'I'm fighting for a better Parliament, and to stand up for the people in Inverness and Nairn who have stood by me, as I hope I have stood by them for 26 years,' he said.
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