SCOTTISH Green MSPs have expressed amusement over Unionists’ reaction to their co-operation agreement with the SNP – which included Andrew Neil describing the party as “anti-monarchy, anti-Britain, anti-wealth, eco-zealot Marxists”.
Maggie Chapman, MSP for North East Scotland, wrote in the upcoming Scottish Left Review issue about the furious responses to the parties working together.
Today, Green co-leaders Lorna Slater and Patrick Harvie are set to be officially introduced to the Holyrood Chamber as ministers for green skills, the circular economy and biodiversity, and net-zero buildings, active travel and tenants’ rights, respectively.
At the weekend the party’s members voted overwhelmingly in favour of the co-operation agreement, which will see the SNP and Greens work together on a range of key areas. Nicola Sturgeon has said the deal is not the same as a coalition.
Anti-independence commentators and politicians have heavily criticised the deal, with the Scottish Tories branding the Greens "extremists".
Chapman, who was heavily involved in the parties’ negotiations, said GB News chairman Neil’s description was a “high accolade”.
“That’ll do for me, especially as the agreement has many Unionists frothing at the mouth,” she wrote in the piece.
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In the article, the MSP also welcomed the historic nature of the SNP/Green agreement.
“The deal is historic, seeing Greens in government for the first time anywhere in Britain,” she wrote.
"It also sees a new kind of cooperation arrangement in British politics - not a full coalition, not minority government supported by a confidence and supply arrangement - but a ‘short of coalition’ arrangement that sees the SGP [Scottish Green Party] have both government ministers and opposition MSPs. These two facts are not insignificant.”
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