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Scotland’s first minister Humza Yousaf has said he believes he will defeat votes of no confidence next week as he struggles to preserve his leadership after the collapse of his party’s governing coalition with the Greens.
“I intend to fight that vote and I am confident I can win,” he said in Dundee on Friday, where he announced £80mn in funding for affordable housing. “I am focused on the priorities of the people — I will leave the political game playing to the opposition.”
Rejecting suggestions that he would resign, Yousaf said he would write to all MSPs to explore on which issues he could co-operate to sustain his minority administration.
He made the comments after the Scottish Labour party filed a motion of no confidence in Scotland’s Scottish National party government on Friday, putting further pressure on the first minister.
The Scottish Conservatives moved their own vote of no confidence against Yousaf personally on Thursday after he ditched a power-sharing agreement with the Green party.
“It’s a matter now of when — not if — Humza Yousaf will step down as first minister, said Anas Sarwar, leader of Scottish Labour, as he called for an election in Scotland.
“It would be untenable for the SNP to assume it can impose another unelected first minister on Scotland,” he added.
The Alba party, which has one MSP, Ash Regan, said it would not support the Labour motion. Given the parliamentary arithmetic, the opposition is likely to need her vote to force the motion through.
The SNP has 63 seats and its opponents 65, meaning Yousaf would need to persuade one member to back him in the vote of no confidence brought by the Scottish Conservatives, which is expected next week.
On Friday, Regan, who defected from the SNP over gender identity issues, wrote to the first minister requesting a government reset and calling for “a return to competent government, where we prioritise independence and protect the dignity, safety and rights of women and children”.
The Greens set events in motion when they called for a vote on the future of the power-sharing agreement after the government ditched its 2030 climate target.
Yousaf’s decision to then dump the power-sharing agreement boomeranged into a no-confidence motion in his leadership, with his erstwhile coalition partners saying they would back the motion.
Yousaf had hoped the end of the agreement would act as a launch pad for a new set of priorities more aligned with mainstream opinion. He had come under increasing pressure from some SNP colleagues to break from the Greens, given the unpopularity of some of their policies among businesses.
