The Bute House Agreement falls. Patrick Harvey may well be resigning today too. Minority government to continue for rest of the term, no sign of a no confidence vote but next budget negotiations to be fraught for sure
The Bute House Agreement falls. Patrick Harvey may well be resigning today too. Minority government to continue for rest of the term, no sign of a no confidence vote but next budget negotiations to be fraught for sure
I really can’t see Labour ever jumping into bed with the Tories. It’d be electoral suicide and not only in Scotland; it’d be potentially damaging in Wales and many university towns in England, too.
A Lab-Lib Dem coalition is a maybe, but there probably aren’t and won’t be enough of them for it to be worth it.
They do it in councils up and down the land. Now they may not do a coalition, confidence and supply only, but it’s the only viable route and I’d bet money on it if the numbers made sense
I don’t think this is true? As far as I know, there was just one council (Aberdeen) where any Labour councillors formally joined a Conservative coalition, and they were all suspended and so are no longer members of Scottish Labour. There may be others where there’s confidence and supply agreements short of a formal coalition, granted.
I’m not sure how much local agreements can tell us, anyway.
There are several councils with formal Lab/SNP coalitions, [EDIT: I was wrong about this, see discussion below!] but I don’t think that makes a Lab/SNP coalition in Holyrood very likely!https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_government_in_Scotland - hard to gauge how often an anti-snp deal is done here. But I don’t know many councils where Labour/Con minorities are engaging with the SNP.
Turns out I’m out-of-date with my info!
You’re right, there aren’t currently any Lab/SNP or any Lab/Con coalitions, and I guess all those Aberdeen former-Labour councillors lost their seats, as well as their membership of the party, which is a good cautionary tale for any Labour politicians considering a pact with the Tories.
Further than that. Labour councilors that support SNP councils to stop Tories getting in power have been kicked out the party.
Labour hate the SNP. Tories are just colleagues they disagree with. They don’t think along lines like left/right, progressive, best for governing etc.