Achi news desk-
An emergency meeting of the Scottish Cabinet was held on Thursday morning to agree the end of the agreement that had brought the Greens into power in Scotland in 2021.
This means that fellow Green leaders Lorna Slater and Patrick Harvie are no longer part of the Scottish Government.
This is what his end could mean.
After the Scottish Parliament election in May 2021, Nicola Sturgeon’s SNP emerged as the largest party but without an overall majority.
The Scottish Greens saw their best ever result with eight MSPs, enough to give the two pro-independence parties a working majority at Holyrood.
Negotiations began shortly after the election and the deal cleared its final hurdle at the end of August 2021 when Green members voted to approve it – with 1,169 members (83%) supporting the deal, 234 voting against and nine abstain.
The name of the Bute House Agreement comes from the Prime Minister’s official residence in Edinburgh, where the draft agreement was signed.
Ms Sturgeon said the deal was a “historic” moment, and Green co-leaders Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater were “tough” negotiators.
Fellow Green leaders Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater joined the government as ministers. Their portfolios included tenants’ rights, the heating strategy in buildings, the circular economy and biodiversity.
Alongside the text of the Bute House Agreement, which set out the expectations for each party, a shared policy program was published for their time in Government.
This included a number of environmental policies, a commitment to implement rent controls, and a “fair price review” for public transport.
The agreement also identified 10 areas where the two parties could continue to disagree.
These included aviation policy, green free ports, the defense sector and economic principles related to sustainable growth concepts.
Prime Minister Humza Yousaf called Mr Harvie and Ms Slater to his Bute House home and told them he was ending the deal.
In a hastily arranged press conference later that morning, he said the deal had “run its course”.
He told journalists that the decision meant “a new start” for his party in Government.
The SNP will rule at Holyrood as a minority administration, requiring it to work with other parties to pass legislation and – importantly – its budgets.
In the last parliamentary session, the Greens acted as bedfellows to the SNP and managed to extract key concessions – including free bus travel for under 19s, which was later extended.
The Greens could return to this sort of unofficial arrangement with the SNP – as the First Minister has suggested – but it would likely be costly for the SNP to bring in support. a party he has just cut ties with.
The SNP currently has 63 MLAs – two short of a majority. They could turn to all of the parties in Holyrood for help to pass legislation – except the Alba Party which has only one MSP – but the deal would undoubtedly need to be sweetened.
The Scottish Greens were outraged by the decision to end the deal, describing it as an act of “political cowardice”.
Speaking to journalists at a Holyrood press conference after the deal was scrapped, Mr Harvie even suggested the Prime Minister could not wait until the next budget to reach an agreement with his party.
