Poor choice for Scottish Labour leader

Ballot papers for the Scottish Labour Party leadership election will be issued from 28 August. The ballot will close on 17 September. There will be two names on the ballot paper: North East MSP Michael Marra, and South Scotland MSP Joe Fagan.

Glasgow MSP Monica Lennon – once she is sworn in at Holyrood next month – got more than enough nominations from CLPs, trade unions and Labour MSPs to make it onto the ballot paper. But she was unable to get a third Scottish Labour MP to nominate her.

This means that, in 2026, the contest for the Scottish Labour leadership will be a run-off between two men. And, whichever one of them wins, it also means that, in 2026, the Scottish, Welsh and UK Labour Parties will all be led by men.

As LabourList has commented: “That should prompt some uncomfortable questions of its own. Why is it that, time and time again, women are struggling to get onto the ballot – and what barriers are they encountering that their male colleagues are not?”

Lennon was the (would-be) candidate with the clearest analysis of where Scottish Labour currently finds itself, and what needs to be done:

“A bigger inclusive tent: Build a welcoming party that debates big ideas, ditching the petty squabbles that divide us. Empowered grassroots: Put campaign leadership back into the hands of members, trade unions, and local communities.”

Lennon’s absence from the ballot paper deprives the Scottish Labour left of an opportunity around which to organise an intervention into the leadership contest. But, to be frank, Lennon would have provided only a limited opportunity.

Lennon is not a member of the Campaign for Socialism (CfS, the organisation of the Scottish Labour left).

Of the three MSPs who are CfS members, one unenthusiastically nominated Lennon (“to help her get on the ballot paper”), one nominated Lennon, equally unenthusiastically, with just fifteen minutes to go to close of nominations, and one nominated Fagan.

After Lennon failed to get on the ballot, one of the two MPs who had nominated her switched his support to Michael Marra. That’s quite a jump.

Lennon makes great play of her green credentials. She has introduced a bill in Holyrood to create a new criminal offence of “ecocide”. She has also opposed the issuing of new licences to drill for North Sea oil and gas.

But when the issue of licences came up as a question at the Glasgow hustings, Lennon ducked out. She replied:

"This is a very timely question. The UK government has just finished collecting information about this question, and I think we should wait to see what they have to say. We should also listen to what people who work in the oil and gas industry have to say, and listen to their union. And I'm very proud to have been nominated by their union, Unite."

Unite policy is to support the issuing of new licences.

After failing to get on the ballot paper Lennon issued a statement attacking Scottish Labour as “the nasty party” and claiming that her failure to get on the ballot paper was all down to her line on trans rights.

This was despite the fact that nothing in her campaign material even mentioned trans rights, and some of the most pro-trans-rights elements in Scottish Labour were vehement in their opposition to Lennon.

With only Fagan and Marra left on the ballot paper, a case could be made out for a vote for Fagan.

Marra is the continuity candidate par excellence. Reports from CLP nomination meetings indicate that speeches in support of Marra have been particularly excruciating. Marra’s recipe for beating the SNP scarcely goes beyond the tried-and-failed method of denouncing their record in Holyrood.

Fagan does not really have any politics to recommend him. But his decision to stand seems to have thrown a spanner in the works of what was meant to be an uncontested coronation. And in last week’s STV debate, Fagan was forthright in his criticisms of Marra:

"You were in Anas Sarwar's shadow cabinet, you were one of the authors of the manifesto that led us to that defeat in May. If you didn't have the answers then, why should we trust that you have the answers now?" 

But if there is a case for voting for Fagan against Marra, the argument is certainly not a hill worth dying on.