BREAKING: Candidates put on the spot over SNP membership exodus

Just hours before the start of the Inverness Courier leadership debate the SNP slipped deeper into crisis with the resignation of its head of communications amid the furore over membership numbers.

Murray Foote stood down after denying reports from mid-February that the SNP had lost around 30,000 members – the reports were confirmed as accurate with at least 10,000 members leaving between the start of the year and mid-February.

Moderator Nick Marr asked the candidates about the decline in members – losing them at a faster rate than at any other time since Nicola Sturgeon was elected leader in 2014 – and what is going on with the SNP.

The case for independence and gender reform

For Ash Regan the answer was simple – not making a strong case for independence and the response to gender reform.

“I have had a lot of people writing to me and saying over the last few months saying they have either left the party or are leaving the party for a couple of reasons,” she said.

“That is the lack of progress on independence. Many people feel that we have been pursuing a strategy that hasn’t been working, we haven’t been making the case for independence strongly enough.

“And also many people have left the party of the GRR (gender recognition reform) and we know that because we can see the times – so it looks like about 31,000 have left since about autumn of last year when the GRR Bill first started to go through parliament.”

Process, Section 35s and de facto referendums do not 'inspire'

Humza Yousaf on the other hand believes the way the party has gone about making the case for independence has failed to inspire members.

He said: “For far too long in the SNP we have been stuck for a number of years talking too much about process. People don't get inspired to stay in a political party or join a movement because you talk about section 35s or defacto referendums.

“They get inspired because you talk about a vision of what independence will do and I am certain we will talk about that. The key for me around independence is that it will help us, not just reduce poverty, but eradicate it.”

An issue of trust

Kate Forbes argued that at the heart of the loss of members is trust after failing to deliver and reflecting people’s priorities.

“For me it all comes down to trust. No political party is guaranteed electoral success, no political party is guaranteed expanding numbers,” she said.

“For all of us it boils down to whether we are hearing our priorities reflected by the political leaders and whether we trust them to deliver for us.

“I have been at pains during this contest that while I am incredibly proud of the SNP’s track record we have to keep using that recipe of delivering priorities and maintaining trust and I think that is what is at the root of membership numbers fluctuating.”

She added: “Also it will be at the root of whether we will have electoral success.”

Why has political party membership been such an issue?

The figures are stark – more than 53,000 members left the SNP since 2019 but despite that it is still one of the largest parties in the UK.

The problem is that in mid-February the SNP’s head of communications Murray Foote Tweeted out that a claim the party lost tens of thousands of members: “This says it all about the original drivel: ‘The 30,000 figure that was reported is not just flat wrong, it’s wrong by about 30,000.’”

Just over a month later the story was found via the SNP’s own figures to be accurate.

He resigned earlier this evening stating there were major issues with information he received from SNP HQ was questionable.

Depending how the candidates see the issue it could signal how they govern if elected as First Minister.

If gender reform is in fact the issue then that could fall down the next First Minister's agenda, if it was the NHS then that would rocket to top of the political debate.

Their answers show that there are clear concerns about the direction of travel, including over promises that were not fullfilled.