“We can’t work with them. We won’t work with them. No deal under any circumstances.” So said Labour leader Keir Starmer of the Scottish National Party during his 2022 party conference speech.
Starmer was nixing any suggestion that his party could join forces with the SNP in an electoral alliance to defeat the Conservatives at the next election. Speculation on the matter stems from the electoral maths following the Conservative Party’s huge victory in 2019. To win in the next election, Labour needs a 10.52% swing – higher than Tony Blair achieved in 1997. Even then it would have a thin majority. There are any number of other scenarios in which Labour ends up the largest party but fails to win enough seats to govern alone.
The SNP holds many seats in Scotland so the deal in its case would be some kind of post-election government pact. But this would necessarily involve Labour promising a second independence referendum and Starmer insists he will not be dictated to by Nicola Sturgeon.
