by Duncan MacLaren

Frankly, Macmillan, 2025

 A caveat before I begin a review of one of the best political memoirs I have ever read.  I have been a member of the SNP since I was 15 (I lied about my age) and worked for the Party at the House of Commons and at HQ in Edinburgh from my mid-twenties to early thirties.

I was part of that generation which started to modernise the SNP, move it to the left through the 79 Group and sharpen the focus on self-determination for Scotland. I knew and worked with Alex Salmond, Margo Macdonald, Roseanna Cunningham and the late Donald Bain, author of ‘It’s Scotland’s Oil’, among many other political colossi, to use Nicola’s word for Alex Salmond, acknowledging his political acumen while admitting his huge failings. Nicola is of a different generation but one that made the SNP a force to be reckoned with.  It is still, although a little battered and bruised after so many years in power in Holyrood, a force to be reckoned with. I have stated, with the same honesty that Nicola uses in this book, where I stand.

Dr Duncan MacLaren KCSG was Director of SCIAF and Secretary General of Caritas Internationalis in the Vatican and is a member of the Bishops’ Committee for Interreligious Dialogue, representing the Archdiocese of Glasgow.