History of The Scottish National Party - The 1990s, The First Salmond Era

The 1990s, The First Salmond Era

In 1990 Wilson stood down as leader and was replaced by Alex Salmond, who defeated Margaret Ewing for the post by 486 votes to 186. Salmond's victory surprised many as Ewing had the backing of most of the party leadership, including Sillars and the party secretary at the time, John Swinney, although he would go on to become a key ally of Salmond. Ewing's prominent supporters made her many people's favourite to win the contest, but in the end Salmond was the convincing victor. He proved a capable leader with his witty and intelligent style of debate giving him a national prominence and boosting the SNP's profile.

In that same year the SNP presence at Westminster was boosted when Labour MP for Dunfermline West, Dick Douglas defected to the SNP, citing his dissatisfaction with the way Labour had handled the Poll Tax issue as one reason. This boosted the SNP numbers at Westminster to five.

The 1992 General Election had promised much for the SNP. It proved to be mixed in fortunes. The SNP held three seats they had won in 1987, but lost Govan. They also lost Dunfermline West, but this was not helped by the sitting MP Dick Douglas deciding to stand against Labour MP Donald Dewar in his Glasgow seat instead of defending the seat he had represented for years.

The SNP had failed to make headway in terms of winning seats. However, their campaign proved a success in terms of votes won, with the SNP vote going up by 50% from their 1987 performance. It proved too much to bear for Sillars though, and he quit active politics, famously describing the Scots as '90 minute patriots'. It also signaled the breakdown of the political relationship between Sillars and Salmond.

The intervening years between the 1992 and 1997 general elections were marked by some SNP electoral success. In the 1994 elections for the European Parliament the party managed to secure over 30% of the popular vote and return two MEPs (Winnie Ewing and Allan MacCartney). The SNP also came very close to winning the Monklands East by-election of that year, caused by the death of the leader of the Labour Party, John Smith. In 1995 they went one better, when the Perth and Kinross by-election was won by Roseanna Cunningham who later became the party's deputy leader.