Swinney seizes on Starmer exit to renew independence referendum demand

It took John Swinney only hours to turn Sir Keir Starmer's resignation into an argument for Scottish independence. The First Minister and SNP leader said the Prime Minister had made the 'right decision' in quitting, but framed his departure as fresh evidence that the Westminster settlement is fundamentally incapable of serving Scotland.

Calling for a 'fundamental change of direction' from the UK government, Mr Swinney accused Labour of a litany of 'broken promises' and argued that genuine renewal was 'just not possible within the Westminster system'. His conclusion was characteristically direct: 'A fresh start is possible, but only with independence.'

Chaos as the argument

The SNP's pitch leans heavily on instability. With Britain on course for its seventh prime minister in a decade, Mr Swinney cast Sir Keir's exit as another turn of a Westminster revolving door that, in the nationalist reading, traps Scotland in a 'perpetual cycle of chaos, broken promises and unmitigated decline'.

He also turned his fire on the frontrunner to succeed Sir Keir, challenging Andy Burnham directly: if the Greater Manchester mayor 'has any belief in democracy', Mr Swinney said, he must grant Scotland the power to hold a referendum and 'end Westminster's chaos'.

“Scotland deserves better than this. Change is just not possible within the Westminster system. A fresh start is possible, but only with independence.”

A familiar roadblock

The constitutional reality is unchanged by the change of premier. The power to authorise a legally binding independence referendum rests at Westminster, and successive UK governments — Conservative and Labour alike — have refused requests for a second vote since the 2014 ballot.

Critics, including the Scottish Daily Express, dismissed the First Minister's intervention as opportunistic, accusing him of reaching for the referendum lever to deflect from instability rather than to resolve it. The SNP counters that no Westminster leader, however well intentioned, can deliver the change Scottish voters want from inside the union.

Unionist politicians at Holyrood argue the opposite: that a change of UK prime minister is precisely the kind of normal democratic renewal the union allows, and that the SNP's instinct to translate every Westminster event into an independence demand reveals a party more interested in grievance than government. The exchange is, in microcosm, the argument Scotland has been having for more than a decade.

The nationalist arc across the UK

Mr Swinney's intervention does not stand alone. With Plaid Cymru topping the Welsh poll and Sinn Féin leading in Northern Ireland, pro-independence and nationalist parties now hold sway in all three nations outside England — a configuration the SNP is keen to present as a settled verdict on the union's direction of travel.

• Swinney said Starmer made the 'right decision' in resigning
• Accused Labour of 'broken promises' and called for a change of direction
• Argued renewal is impossible within the Westminster system
• Challenged Andy Burnham to grant Scotland a referendum
• Power to authorise a binding referendum remains reserved to Westminster

Background

Scotland last voted on independence in September 2014, rejecting it by 55% to 45%. The SNP has sought a second vote repeatedly since, and a 2022 Supreme Court ruling confirmed that Holyrood cannot legislate for a referendum without Westminster's consent.

Mr Swinney, who returned to the SNP leadership and the role of First Minister in 2024, has sought to rebuild the party's standing after a turbulent period, and views Labour's collapse in the polls as an opening to reclaim disillusioned voters.

What happens next: the SNP will press the independence case hard against whoever wins the Labour contest, but with the constitutional roadblock unmoved, the immediate battleground is the contest for Scottish votes rather than a referendum itself.