Laura Moodie is a newly elected Green MSP, and so you know what follows is going to be something special. Moodie, who secured a list seat in the South Scotland region, has proposed extending the Borders rail line along a very specific route so that freight can pass from Scandinavia, through Scotland, and on to Ireland without going into England.
Speaking on a separatist podcast last month, Moodie added: If we are serious about building an independent Scotland, we need to be thinking seriously about these kind of infrastructure projects that wean us off reliance on English or UK infrastructure. Willie Rennie summed it up best when he said it was pretty weird that the Greens are so into nationalism that they do not even want to use rail links that have touched English soil. One wag referred to the proposal as Thomas the Crank Engine.
I was reminded of the 1949 Ealing comedy, Passport to Pimlico, in which the breakaway Burgundians, incensed that Westminster has introduced border checks, retaliate by halting English underground trains and demanding to see passengers identity papers. Perhaps we could set up something similar at Carlisle to prevent the entry of Sassenach rail stock, or simply line Scottish tracks with little saltire flags and mark the border with a sign reading Here be dragons.
While it is always fun to mock the Greens, their MSPs appear to have shared custody of the same scowl, there is a serious issue here, and that is a lack of seriousness. Public transport infrastructure in Scotland needs a lot of work and the additional investment to pay for it. If we are going to convince people to ditch their cars and switch to more climate-friendly modes of transportation, the alternatives have to deliver a quality, reliable service with a reputation for convenience, cleanliness and safety.
It is not as though the Scottish public is averse to taking the train. What scunners people are bad experiences and many of those involve shortcomings in infrastructure. The very part of Scotland that Moodie represents is a prime example. While there have been rail upgrades and improvements in the Central Belt, the Borders has failed to keep pace. This is despite the efforts of local campaigners and their elected representatives.
The unfortunate truth is that the Borders just is not a priority for the SNP. There are not enough votes there and among those that are, too many of them go to other parties. Having been elected to represent South Scotland, Moodie is well-placed to ramp up the pressure on Nationalist ministers. Instead, she is indulging in absurdity and inanity because that, it seems, is what is expected of you as a Green MSP.
The notion of plotting rail infrastructure to avoid England, in preparation for Scottish independence, would be risible even if there was not substantial freight, to say nothing of passengers, being shifted between the two countries every day. Since the Scottish Government works within tight budgets, prioritising one route over another would inevitably lead to further underfunding for those routes that continue into England. It would be an act of self-sabotage against Scotlands rail network and those who depend on it, all for a thumb stuck in the eye of Unionists.
Nothing should surprise us when it comes to the Greens. Their demeanour is that of sullen teenagers saying the most outrageous things that come into their heads to get a rise out of the grown-ups. Whether it is abolishing prisons or peddling gender ideology, or proposing the prosecution of Scots for complicity in Israeli war crimes, one policy after another is targeted to the niche fixations of the fringes and to scandalising the mainstream.
It suggests people who have gone into politics not to make life better for ordinary Scots but to troll their opponents. This is unfortunate because there are credible figures within the party with a strong grasp of policy and ideas for improving services and outcomes. One such figure was Guy Ingerson, who topped the Greens North East regional list, was bumped just ahead of the election, and has since handed back his membership card. Another is Chas Booth, a thoughtful Leith councillor who was placed too far down the Edinburgh and Lothians East list to secure a seat in the election.
Then again, any higher up the list and he might have deprived Lorna Slater or perhaps Q Manivannan of their place, and what a loss to parliamentary democracy that would have been. If the Greens hope for a future beyond the opposition benches, they need to tend talent, not disregard it in favour of political status and rage-baiting the Right.
Retweets change nothing; laws and policies can change a great deal. This is particularly true of transport policy, an area where the party went into the election making bold promises, including a pledge of free bus travel. Now, it is reasonable to question the viability of such a scheme when public finances are already under strain. But it underscores the importance of safe, affordable public travel both for the climate and for peoples pocketbooks during a cost-of-living crisis.
The Greens have to decide whether they want to be a political party or a Twitter account. If they are prepared to put in the work and give the voters a genuine alternative, there is no reason to suppose that 15 seats is their ceiling. Voters whose entire adult lives have played out in the long shadow of the 2007 financial crisis, who have had to endure a toxic cocktail of low wages, low growth, rising private rents, and unaffordable house prices, are looking for a party to champion their interests.
Those interests have nothing to do with where one set of train tracks ends and another begins. They are priorities far ahead of oddball constitutional pronouncements. When a Green MSP talks about English rail infrastructure and its part in the independence cause, they have not only missed the train, they are off the tracks altogether.
The Greens are fond of bumping their gums about the big, bad media being terribly unfair to them, but what kind of coverage do they expect when their MSPs come out with bizarre proposals like this one? As it happens, the Greens received more than fair election coverage from this column, which began forecasting late last year that they would have a good election and wagged a finger at other outlets for missing the story.
Come polling day, that forecast held up, with the Greens almost doubling their seat tally, including their first two constituency wins in Scotland. Although I disagree with the party on almost everything, I acknowledge that they managed to connect with voters frustrated with the status quo. However, this victory will be a hollow one if the Greens fail to live up to the gravity of the moment and the depth of voters concerns for themselves and their families. Anyone in their MSP group not up to this task should be invited to alight here.
