The SNP-Green coalition is unlikely to last the week

Scottish nationalists are shell-shocked after their leader did a bunk on Wednesday. And with good reason. Nicola Sturgeon left the SNP leaderless, directionless, failing on almost every policy front – from the NHS to bottle recycling – and with a legislative time bomb in the Gender Recognition Reform Bill, which is due to go off just as their new leader is installed at the end of March. It will probably destroy the Scottish coalition well before then. Indeed, the 18-month-old union with the Scottish Greens, another of Sturgeon’s personal initiatives, is unlikely to last the week. 

Attempts by pro-GRR Bill loyalists to keep the finance secretary, Kate Forbes, out of the leadership race by demonising her as a bigot on social media, have failed. When nominations close on Friday she is likely to be the clear front runner in an admittedly lacklustre field. 

The two Green ministers, Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater, have made clear to the Guardian that they will ‘walk’ if the GRR Bill, passed by Holyrood before Christmas, is dropped or significantly altered.