The plight of Russell Findlay reveals a lot about how politics works. Findlay was elected leader of the Scottish Conservatives in September 2024, by which point the party’s vulnerability to Reform was already clear. The Holyrood Tories were not made for a populist era. They are a patrician party of the cosy centre, chiefly concerned with the Union, taxes and crime, and so Findlay’s populist style has not been welcomed by some of his MSPs. One of them, Jamie Greene, has defected to the Liberal Democrats and, whether any of his former colleagues join him, there are several who no longer seem at home in the Tory Party.
Findlay’s unvarnished opposition to gender ideology in schools, the NHS and criminal justice has played its part, but more than any policy position it is his tone that bothers a certain kind of Tory.
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