‘Hope is as much a message for the Scottish electorate as the UK’s’

Scottish Labour’s new leader stepped onto the conference stage, on Monday, at a moment thick with fatalism. Analysis after analysis – and a bruising leadership contest – have framed May’s Holyrood results as proof of an existential crisis. But while internal despondency is understandable after a painful election, it is also politically short-sighted. Michael Marra must reject the easy comfort of defeatism. Scottish Labour has a genuine, demonstrable path back to relevance, and the leader’s first duty is to inject steel, perspective, and realistic ambition back into the party – just as the Prime Minister has done at UK level with his message of hope.

First, we must confront the nature of the defeat without catastrophising it. Analysts may treat Holyrood as paramount, but voters do not. For two decades, Scottish Parliament elections have behaved like classic second-order contests. That is not to diminish devolution – one of Labour’s crowning constitutional achievements – but electoral science is clear: turnout is lower, protest voting is higher, and voters use Holyrood ballots to signal discontent rather than choose the government that commands their primary economic loyalty. These elections reward niche grievances and ideological signalling in a way Westminster contests simply do not.

Contrast that with where Scottish Labour stands when the stakes are framed around power, governance, and the direction of the United Kingdom. In the 2024 General Election, Scottish Labour proved that its political foundations are far from eroded. We swept back across the central belt, reclaimed historic heartlands, and returned 37 MPs to Westminster. Scottish voters were not experimenting; they were decisively rejecting nationalist stagnation and choosing Labour to govern. That electorate has not vanished. The coalition of working-class voters, pragmatists, and former independence supporters who backed Labour in 2024 still want delivery, investment, and stability.

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The task ahead is not reinvention but consolidation: hold and expand that 2024 coalition when the country next votes for Westminster. And the timing could not be more auspicious.

With Andy Burnham leading the party and the UK government, we have entered a phase of renewed purpose and distinct national energy. For years, opponents caricatured UK Labour as distant and London-centric. Burnham dismantled that overnight. His political brand – regional empowerment, economic rebalancing, and practical solutions for overlooked towns – resonates directly across Clydeside, Fife, and Ayrshire. A revitalised UK leadership that speaks the language of devolution, public ownership, and regional industrial strategy gives Scottish Labour the tailwind it lacked during darker years.

Our opponents know this. The SNP is exhausted, fractured, and running on ideological fumes after nearly two decades in office. They have relied on Holyrood’s proportional mechanics and low turnout to keep their heads above water, but they cannot hide from their domestic record on health, education, and infrastructure when asked to defend it against a muscular, reforming UK government. Scottish Labour has both the policy space and the ideological credibility to claim the mantle of Scotland’s future.

The new leader’s message must be unequivocal: mourn May if you must but prepare for the next battle now. We are not a regional protest outfit; we are a party built to govern. Holyrood elections may generate headlines, but Westminster elections decide who holds power across these islands. With 37 seats as our baseline, the energy of the Burnham leadership behind us, and a Scottish electorate that has already shown it will back Labour when real change is on offer, optimism is not wishful thinking – it is an electoral necessity. It is time to lift our heads, stand on our 2024 record, and build on it.

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