FORMER SNP MP Mhairi Black has said the Scottish Government has “made an arse” of delivering policies.
In an interview for the Leading podcast, the former SNP deputy Westminster leader said she thought First Minister John Swinney was “economically right-wing” while describing Alex Salmond as a “charlatan” for setting up Alba.
She said: “I think there are examples of where the Scottish Government have, over the last 17-odd years, for want of a better word, made an arse of it. There’s no getting away from that.
“Maybe less so on policy and more on how they're actually delivering that policy.”
She agreed that without the “glue of independence” holding the SNP together it would crumble and said: “That’s partly why the SNP got such a bruising result in the election - the outside world could see those cracks.”
The 30-year-old, who became the youngest MP at Westminster since 1832 which she took the Paisley and Renfrewshire South seat in 2015, said she was not considering running to be an MSP because she would “find too much to disagree with”.
Many have speculated she may run to be an MSP after saying she would quit Westminster ahead of the General Election.
She added that she didn’t think the Scottish Parliament had the power to “really change lives”.
Asked whether she would run for Holyrood, she said: “No, truthfully, because I think I'd be flung out the SNP within a week, just because I'd find too much to disagree with.
“But I think that the main reason why I wouldn't do it is because Westminster is where the power lies that really changes lives, that fundamentally changes society. It's not the Scottish Parliament.”
She did, however, say there was "only so much" blame that can be placed on devolved governments who have "one hand tied behind their back".
Black said she believed Nicola Sturgeon and Humza Yousaf were left-of-centre leaders, while she described Swinney (below) as “right wing…economically but everything else about him is more left leaning”.
“He started off as very far left and just gradually moved…and when he moved on to his Alba stuff, not to speak ill of those who have passed, but a charlatan.
“He was political to his bones, he had a mind that was sharper than most and his ability to spot opportunity and game plan in his head, he was incredible at that but the problems as his ego…in my opinion was just as big as his talent was.
“When you are able to take a party to success and you're the face of it, and you start to believe your own hype, then anybody challenging you…they are the problem. It’s not ‘I have to reflect’, it’s that ‘you're not appreciating the genius you see before you’”.
Black also said Salmond made the decision to appoint Peter Murrell, then husband to his deputy Nicola Sturgeon, as the SNP’s chief executive.
She said: “ At that time there were a lot of people saying this isn’t a good look, we need to separate this. Once everybody complained about it other things were happening and we stopped thinking about it.
“It was easy to fall into place when you’re winning.”
Asked about former SNP leadership contender Kate Forbes’s views, Black joked that she wouldn’t be able to be gay or married “if she was in charge”.
