Does Alex Salmond Fear Ruth Davidson?

The ballots for the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party’s leadership election have been posted to members and few people, I think, have any real idea as to what the result will be. In general terms, as readers know, I’m sympathetic to Murdo Fraser’s analysis of the woes afflicting conservatism in Scotland and unpersuaded that Ruth Davidson’s campaign has been as good as it should have been.

These concerns were scarcely assuaged by Ruth’s article in last week’s Scotland on Sunday. Choked with cliches and boilerplate it was a depressingly thin analysis of the state of the party. “We need to change ourselves, not our name” she wrote which is, well, fine but part of the point of the name-changing idea is to demonstrate once and for all that the party has changed itself. Ruth promises “generational” change but not in any way that challenges the membership. This may be sensible tactics for a leadership contest; it’s not a convincing strategy for the long-term.