Where is Scotland heading this week? 

“When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Psalm 11:3 NIV). 

When the editor asked me to write down in regards to the Scottish election I believed, ‘no trouble, that will likely be easy’. After all it’s a subject I’m deeply immersed in and have been for several a long time. Yet I confess I even have found this really hard. It is nearly as hard to be dispassionate about your country that you simply love, because it is to be dispassionate about your loved ones. This ‘report’ is subsequently a deeply personal one and doesn’t claim to be a clinical objective evaluation – although I hope it’s fair. 

There are many good things about Scotland – not least the standard of a few of its journalists. For those that want good writing and objective evaluation then read Alex Massie’s latest article in The Sunday Times on why the SNP deserves to lose the election. Others like Kevin McKenna of The Herald, Jim Spence of The Courier, or Iain Macwhirter, are equally price reading and following on social media.

They, like many journalists and commentators, recognise that there’s a deep malaise inside Scottish society. Perhaps that is best summed up in an article in UnHerd by Felix Pope, “On Patrol with Glasgow’s vigilantes – Election can’t salvage Scotland’s shipwreck”.   

So, what’s the evidence for this shipwreck? What issues are vital? 

1. Immigration 

There is a reason that Reform are projected to do well in Scotland – possibly even ending up because the official opposition – from a start line of zero. How has a celebration which is forged as a ‘far right’ English nationalist party got to the situation where it is anticipated that 1 in 5 Scots will vote for them?  

There are two fundamental answers. Firstly, many peculiar Scots are fed up with the establishment parties and the society of failures they’ve produced. Secondly is the query of immigration. The Scottish government argues that we’d like quite a bit more immigrants due to population decline. But in so doing they’re ignoring deeper issues just like the falling birthrate, the exodus of talented young (and older) Scots to other countries and the problem of abortion. Scotland’s population is about 600,000 in need of where it ought to be – satirically, the variety of babies killed in Scotland by abortion for the reason that 1967 Abortion Act is around 650,000. 

They are also ignoring the various issues that include using a simplistic ‘immigration is the answer’ policy. As the remaining of the UK and Europe are checking out, there are numerous hidden, and never so hidden costs that include immigration. For example, when it comes to housing between April and September 2025, 43% of applicants for homelessness support in Glasgow were from individuals with refugee status or leave to stay (excluding Ukrainian nationals). The overall figure for Scotland is 15%.

2. The economy

When Kate Forbes was finance minister, there was a slim hope that the SNP might come to terms with the economic crisis their policies are driving us into. But now she is gone, there’s little probability of that occuring. Among Scotland’s political class it’s the accepted doctrine that they need taxes to be fair, they need to lift extra money, and so they want everyone to pay less. It is economic illiteracy of the best order, the sort that comes from school kids who’ve survived in university on subsidy, have never had a correct job and think that there’s a magic money tree which can make everyone wealthy – if only they were in power.    

This was seen within the clash between Malcolm Offord and Ross Greer within the STV leaders debate on 28 April. Offord stated that he owned six houses, five cars and 6 boats and Greer immediately said that Scotland needed fewer people like him. But Offord also identified that he began from a debt background in Glasgow and has worked his way as much as the extent that he paid £45m in taxes, employed lots of of individuals, and made a net contribution to the society. In contrast Greer has never worked outside politics and has lived off State income for all of his life – he currently has a government salary of over £77k and a big expenses account. He even claimed his TV licence fee from the taxpayer!  

The scary thing is that if the SNP should go into an alliance with the Greens, Greer is being touted as finance minister! 

What is occurring in Scotland is classic ‘country in decline’ syndrome. In their election campaign they’re offering a lot of bribes to people – £200 to young people to spend on ‘cultural’ events; free bus rides; a cap on food prices and £10k for first time homebuyers. 

This latter bribe isn’t quite what it seems. Despite the SNP claiming it’s giving ‘as much as’ £10k it is definitely loaning people the cash which they may should pay back in a while after they sell the home. This reflects their economic policy – buy/bribe now with taxpayer/borrowed money to win their votes. Meanwhile wealth creation is non-existent and public services decline. And the SNP then all the time play their get out card – it’s all of the fault of the English and Westminster.  

3. Climate change denialism 

By this I don’t mean that the SNP deny the existence of synthetic climate change.  No – that’s considered one of their cardinal doctrines which to query is taken into account blasphemy. I mean the concept they’ve that Scotland is a ‘world leader’ in climate change and that by decimating the attractive Scottish countryside through wind turbines while buying our oil from a Norway that continues to ‘drill, baby, drill’ within the North Sea, we’re someway saving the planet. Meanwhile 1000’s of jobs have been lost within the once oil wealthy city of Aberdeen. Over 50,000 direct oil and gas jobs have been lost, while only 8,000 have been created in renewables.   

4. Soft creep State authoritarianism 

The Scottish State and the civic elites have their tentacles all over the place. The SNP government works on the policy of he who pays the piper calls the tune. The Times gave an in depth report of 1 woman, Sarah Pedersen, who needed to step down as the pinnacle of a women’s charity in Aberdeen, since the board feared that her ‘gender critical’ views (i.e. that men can’t develop into women) would jeopardise Scottish government funding.  

The article is price quoting: “In Scotland, there are claims that the SNP has in effect shut down criticism from the charity and voluntary sectors due to a system that leaves them umbilically tied to its political objectives and fearing grave consequences in the event that they step out of line. There are never explicit threats — and never anything put in writing. But in line with quite a few sources, a dependence on public funds has meant scores of charities in Scotland have been co-opted into becoming proxies for the SNP. Those with the identical objectives because the SNP have been given tens of millions of kilos in funding, allowing it to make use of them as advocates for its policies.”

Again, that is something I even have directly experienced. I remember when, after doing an interview in a single paper, they then carried a success piece against me. When I asked why, they said that they were depending on government adverts for jobs etc and so they needed to do it. Nothing after all in writing. Always a wink and a nod. But in a small country, with a big bureaucracy, all the time effective. 

Another example of this controlling cronyism is seen in the federal government bankrolling the recent film ‘Glenrothan’ starring SNP supporters Brian Cox and Alan Cumming. The film, which was panned on its release, was given £500k from Screen Scotland, a government quango that’s funded by Creative Scotland, a government-appointed agency, which is in turn overseen by SNP culture secretary, Angus Robertson. 

If you’re a charity, or cultural organisation then the unwritten rule is evident. If you’re critical of the federal government or any of its policies, then don’t expect funding.

5. Socially regressive policies 

The SNP has largely been taken over by the progressive ideology and its doctrines.   It’s why the federal government are still insisting on putting men in women’s prisons. And why a majority of SNP candidates have vowed to fight for the “bodily autonomy” of trans people and to ban “conversion practices” in the event that they are elected to Holyrood. The conversion practices they’re referring to don’t really exist in Scotland, while those they aren’t referring to – the physical and chemical manipulation of young people as they seek to convert from one sex to a different – will likely be encouraged.     

The power of the progressive ideology combined with political power is felt in all areas of Scottish life. For example, each the National and Herald newspapers refused to hold an advert from the Independence for Scotland Party because that party is gender critical (i.e. pro-women). They were told that they might only advertise in the event that they removed the word ‘women’. Imagine that! A political party was told it couldn’t advertise in a national newspaper unless it stayed silent about women’s rights, safeguarding, and indeed silent about reality.   

6. The dumbing down of education 

The SNP promised to deliver a laptop or tablet for “every school pupil in Scotland”.  They haven’t done so (about 17% have received one). They promised that they might close the attainment gap in education (between wealthy and poor) – they haven’t done so. The SNP’s idea of ‘education’ is a shift from the normal Scottish view that pupils ought to be taught tips on how to think, not what to think. The SNP have moved towards a type of teaching pupils what to think – a type of social and political indoctrination – which is why 16 yr olds are actually in a position to vote. 

Speaking of voting – unlike 17,000 Chinese students on temporary visas, I as a Scot, with family in Scotland, won’t be allowed to vote within the Scottish Parliament elections (although I can vote within the UK General Election). One of those students, Tianrui Liang, was arrested at JFK airport, while flying back to Scotland. He’s accused of illegally photographing sensitive US military aircraft, including “doomsday planes,” at strategic air bases. The incontrovertible fact that someone like Liang has the precise to vote, but a native Scot, who paid taxes in Scotland for 40 years, isn’t, is yet one more illustration of the collective political suicide that appears to be happening in Scotland 

In one sense I’m glad, because like many Christians (one survey suggested that a 3rd had not made up their minds), I might struggle to know who to vote for. As a former SNP voter, I couldn’t vote for them. The Greens are like a pseudo-religious Green/Islamic cult. The Lib Dems have develop into profoundly illiberal. The Tories have been a largely ineffective opposition. Labour have also wandered down the Progressive/Green Road. 

Like many Scots I can be tempted to vote for Reform at the same time as a protest vote. Or for considered one of the smaller parties like Sovereignty or the Scottish Family Party. There are some good independent candidates as well – Ash Regan and Jermey Balfour (a tremendous Christian and politician) in Edinburgh, and Fergus Ewing within the Highlands would have my vote – if I had it! 

However, I don’t need permission to hope, and that I definitely will do. I pray for the Church in Scotland, which has largely develop into apostate and ineffective – although there are still the ‘7,000 who haven’t bowed the knee to Baal’ – and lots of faithful biblical churches. I pray for the long run parliament and that someway from the present morass there’ll arise true and principled leaders. And I pray for the people of Scotland, especially the poor, the sick and the disadvantaged who’ve needed to face, greater than anyone else, the results of those that have no idea tips on how to govern themselves, far less the nation. Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

David Robertson is the previous minister of St Peters Free Church in Dundee and a former Moderator of the Free Church of Scotland. He is currently the minister of Scots Kirk Presbyterian Church in Newcastle, New South Wales, and blogs at The Wee Flea.