Left Foot Forward spoke to Jamie Stone at this year's Lib Dem Conference
At the 2023 Liberal Democrat autumn conference, Jamie Stone MP told Left Foot Forward that as a ‘staunch unionist’ his political priority was ‘beating the nats’. One year on, Left Foot Forward spoke to Stone – the now re-elected MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross – about the 2024 general election result and its implications for the SNP and the future of the union during the Liberal Democrats’ conference.
When we spoke to Stone, he was clear on the ramifications of the SNP’s routing at the ballot box. With the SNP having gone from 48 to just 9 MPs, Stone made the case that independence is now “completely and utterly off the table”, saying this was the case ‘for the foreseeable future’.
Stone told Left Foot Forward: “I think it puts the independence question completely and utterly off the table. People voiced to me very, very strongly on the doorstep that they were absolutely sick of the concept of Indyref2. And they said again and again why can’t they just get on with the day job?”
He continued: “People are really angry about waiting lists. They’re really angry about the failure to invest in the A9. And promises were made and promises were broken.”
In addition to the SNP’s electoral performance, Stone pointed to reduced turnout at pro-independence rallies as evidence that “for the foreseeable future independence is off the table”.
Stone went on to argue that the SNP’s decline at the general election is unlikely to be a one-off, telling Left Foot Forward that the country’s demographics are likely to move against both the SNP and the Conservatives in the coming years.
“I think the demographics are really against the Tories – big time – and that is a complete and utter change, and oddly enough, I think it’s against the SNP,” Stone told Left Foot Forward.
He went on to say: “the young – we always were taught for the last 30 years – the young would vote SNP, but not now. And I don’t know if it’s social media, I don’t know what it is – there’s a much more fluid vote out there. Young people will cast about and actually think it a lot.”
Given the Liberal Democrats now have their largest ever number of MPs in the House of Commons and Stone is a veteran party member, we closed our conversation by looking at that group of MPs. Asked who among the new intake are the ‘ones to watch’, Stone named three of his colleagues – Zoe Franklin, Jess Brown-Fuller and Al Pinkerton. Two of these – Brown-Fuller and Pinkerton – have since been appointed to frontbench positions within the Lib Dem parliamentary party.
Pinkerton in particular was the subject of Stone’s interest. He told Left Foot Forward: “There’s something about Al that reminded me of the young Charles Kennedy who was a natural speaker.”
Perhaps more indicative of the scale of the Lib Dems’ recent electoral success than the individual names Stone mentions as being part of the new wave of talent is the fact that he admits “I’m still actually trying to get to know who everyone is.” That certainly hasn’t been something that would have been said in the aftermath of other recent general elections.
Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward
Image credit: UK Parliament – Creative Commons
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