How Scottish Labour’s strategy of disowning Starmer’s toxic policies is failing badly

Everyone seemed to believe it inevitable that after the 2026 Holyrood election, Labour would be the largest party with Sarwar occupying the First Minister’s chair, the only question being whether they would seek to govern as a minority, or come to an arrangement with other parties. Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton was preening himself at potential Deputy First Minister in a new Labour-Lib Dem coalition, barely concealing his ambition to take his party back into government for the first time since the glory days of Nick Clegg.

Labour’s optimism did not appear to be misplaced. In the general election last July, Labour won a staggering 35 seats from the SNP, on a vote share of over 35 per cent, trouncing the nationalists who were reduced to just nine constituencies. With a near busload of fresh-faced new Labour MPs representing Scotland, it might well have been expected that this momentum would carry Sarwar on a wave into Bute House.

Where it all went wrong

Fast forward to January 2025, and it all looks so different. The latest polling indicates a dramatic collapse in Labour’s support. Although there has been no significant increase in SNP poll numbers in that period, as matters stand the SNP would appear to be in the driving seat in advance of the next Holyrood election, with Labour struggling to hold on to even the seats that they currently have. Those curtain measurements might have to be filed away at the bottom of the filling cabinet for a future occasion.

It is not hard to identify where it has all gone wrong for Labour. Across a range of issues, they have disappointed those who put their trust in them. First came the withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance, felt particularly hard in Scotland where this payment was especially important to those having to live with the colder weather, and higher fuel bills, here compared to other parts of the United Kingdom. What particularly infuriated pensioners – let us not forget, the section of the population most likely to vote – was that this decision was not signalled in advance of the election, and therefore felt like a betrayal.

We then saw the Budget, with the changes to inheritance tax affecting both businesses and farms, again in contradiction of promises which had been made prior to the election. It is little wonder that there is fury amongst the farming community at a tax change that will have a devastating impact on the viability of family farms.

An extraordinary choice

The same Budget hiked employers’ National Insurance, hitting hard already struggling sectors of the economy such as hospitality and retail. For a government that claimed to be focussed on growth, it was an extraordinary choice to make, when all the predictions say that growth will be harder as a consequence.

More recently, we had the announcement that payments would not be made to the Waspi women, fighting for compensation following changes to the retirement age. This was particularly infuriating for those impacted, given all the pledges that had been made by Labour MPs and Cabinet ministers prior to the general election.

The combination of toxic choices by the Labour government in Westminster has left Sarwar in the role of a hapless bystander watching in slow motion a multi-vehicle car crash on the motorway, powerless to act.

Scottish Labour’s latest strategy seems to be to try to disown the party’s Westminster policies. Whether it is on the two-child benefit cap, which UK Labour says it will retain but Sarwar wants rid of, or the winter fuel allowance, where he demands that the Scottish Government now takes action on the matter, the Scottish Labour leader finds himself in disagreement with his Westminster colleagues.

Sarwar’s negligible influence

Unfortunately for Sarwar, there is little evidence that this tactic of trying to put distance between the choices being made by his Prime Minister and MP colleagues is cutting through with the public. When voters hear through the media what Labour is doing and see it impacting on them directly, they don’t pay much attention to promises being made in opposition by a Scottish Labour leader whose influence on his party appears negligible.

Complicating matters for Sarwar is that he is leader not just of the Scottish Labour MSPs at Holyrood, but technically also of the 37 Labour MPs in the House of Commons, amongst them the Scottish Secretary Ian Murray. If he really was in charge, then those 37 Labour MPs would be taking Sarwar’s lead on issues such as the two-child cap and Waspi women compensation.

Yet, we know, that is not the case. With a few brave exceptions, those MPs regard their loyalty as being not to Sarwar, but to Keir Starmer and the Labour Westminster whips. So while Sarwar has said the UK Government was wrong not to provide compensation to the Waspi women, Ian Murray, technically his inferior, takes the opposite view. Murray cannot be blamed for this, as otherwise he would have to resign his position from the UK Cabinet under collective responsibility, but it does leave Sarwar looking like someone not in control of his party.

With Scottish Labour floundering and now looking like a busted flush, it leaves the Scottish Conservatives as the party providing effective opposition to the SNP at Holyrood. Pro-Union voters looking for a place to put their cross next May will now see that Labour are in no position to offer the change they once promised.

Murdo Fraser is a Scottish Conservative MSP for Mid-Scotland and Fife