Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf Quits Ahead Of ‘No Confidence’ Vote
Scottish First Minister and Scottish National Party (SNP) leader Humza Yousaf announced he would resign Monday ahead of an imminent no-confidence vote at Holyrood.
In a speech delivered at noon, Yousaf said that he stood by his decision on Thursday to abruptly collapse the Bute House agreement, which underpinned a power-sharing coalition with the Scottish Greens, but admitted that he “clearly underestimated the level of hurt and upset” the move would cause. The decision last week spiralled into a crisis
In his resignation address, he said: “My hope was to continue working with the Greens in a less formal agreement as the SNP moved into a new phase of minority government. Unfortunately, in ending the Bute House agreement in the manner that I did, I clearly underestimated the level of hurt and upset I caused Green colleagues.”
He added: “For a minority government to be able to govern effectively and efficiently, trust when working with the opposition is clearly fundamental.”
After ending the coalition the situation spiralled into crisis as the Greens moved to join with the Scottish Conservatives, backing a no-confidence motion against Yousaf as First Minister, a vote that was due to take place on Tuesday.
Addressing the no-confidence vote, Yousaf said: “While a route through this week’s motion of no confidence was absolutely possible, I am not willing to trade my values and principles, or do deals with whoever simply for retaining power.”
He continued: “Therefore, after spending the weekend reflecting on what is best for my party, for the government and for the country I lead, I’ve concluded that repairing our relationship across the political debate can only be done with someone else at the helm. I have therefore informed the SNP’s national secretary of my intention to stand down as party leader and ask that she commences a leadership contest for my replacement as soon as possible.”
The Bute House pact, secured by his predecessor Nicola Sturgeon, had been designed to establish a stable pro-independence front in the Scottish parliament. Relations, however, had slowly soured. Tensions grew when the devolved government back-pedalled on its commitment to slash carbon emissions by 75 percent by 2030. The climate issue, coupled with ongoing disputes over gender recognition laws and infrastructure projects.
The Greens had been set to review the coalition agreement themselves, although SNP acted first.
