John Swinney scraps Minister for Independence post in Scottish Government shakeup

Until last night, SNP MSP Jamie Hepburn had served in the role created by former First Minister Humza Yousaf.

But Mr Hepburn has been moved to the Parliamentary Business brief, previously held by George Adam MSP, and his independence role was left unfilled.

The position of independence minister has only existed for a year under Humza Yousaf’s premiership, and the main responsibility was publishing a series of independence papers.

Opposition parties have previously criticised the ministerial job and the independence papers as a waste of taxpayers’ money.

Incoming First Minister John Swinney confirmed his new cabinet and a series of non-cabinet ministerial appointments last night after being formally sworn in.

Details of the independence role axing were published around 10pm last night. The profile page explaining the role of Minister for Independence has disappeared from the Scottish Government website.

Mr Swinney unveiled his Scottish cabinet yesterday, which includes 11 senior cabinet secretaries and 14 junior ministers.

There had been expectations the cabinet would be slimmed down, however only three ministers have been cut - Mr Adam, Emma Roddick MSP and Joe Fitzpatrick MSP.

The cabinet is largely unchanged from how it was when Humza Yousaf was First Minister - the only major change is bringing in Kate Forbes, who takes on deputy first minister from Shona Robison MSP, and economy secretary off of Màiri McAllan MSP.

One of the other major announcements to come out of the cabinet shuffle is bringing Ivan McKee MSP back into government - he was a major backer of Ms Forbes’s leadership campaign in 2023.

A number of new ministerial positions have been created and filled with existing junior ministers, including Richard Lochhead MSP as business minister, Tom Arthur MSP as employment and investment minister, Gillian Martin MSP as climate action minister, and Kaukab Stewart MSP as equalities minister.

Those keeping the same job as before include Natalie Don MSP as children, young people and The Promise minister, Graeme Dey MSP as higher and further education minister and The Promise minister, Jim Fairlie MSP as agriculture and connectivity minister, Jenni Minto MSP as public health and women’s health minister, Maree Todd MSP as social care, mental wellbeing and sport minister, Christina McKelvie MSP as drugs and alcohol policy minister, and Paul McLennan MSP as housing minister.

The decision to scrap the position of independence minister has already been criticised by Alex Salmond’s Alba Party, who say the SNP’s independence strategy is “a total mess”.

Chris McEleny, the party’s general secretary, said: “The new SNP government has made the decision to de-prioritise independence in order to try and broaden support for itself within parliament.

“Instead of appealing to unionists, the First Minister should be reaching out to Alba’s Holyrood leader Ash Regan to turbo charge efforts to drive forward the case for independence.

“Alba are the only party with a strategy to progress Scotland towards independence.

“We believe every single election should be fought seeking an independence mandate and that the Scottish Parliament should legislate to hold a referendum on giving independence powers to our parliament.”