John Swinney

John Swinney MSP
Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth
Incumbent
Assumed office 17 May 2007
First Minister	Alex Salmond
Preceded by	Tom McCabe (Minister for Finance and Public Services)
Leader of the Scottish National Party
In office 26 September 2000 – 3 September 2004
Preceded by	Alex Salmond
Succeeded by	Alex Salmond
Member of the Scottish Parliament for North Tayside
Incumbent
Assumed office 6 May 1999
Preceded by	Constituency created
Majority	7,584 (21.4%)
Member of the UK Parliament for Tayside North
In office 1 May 1997 – 7 June 2001
Preceded by	Bill Walker
Succeeded by	Pete Wishart
Majority	4,160 (9.1%)
Personal details
Born	(1964-04-13) 13 April 1964 Edinburgh, Scotland
Nationality	British
Political party	Scottish National Party
Alma mater	University of Edinburgh

John Ramsey Swinney (born 13 April 1964, in Edinburgh) is a Scottish National Party (SNP) politician, the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth and Member of the Scottish Parliament for North Tayside. He was the leader (or National Convenor) of the SNP between 2000 and 2004.

Swinney was previously a Member of Parliament (MP) for Tayside North in the British House of Commons, before taking the same seat in the 1999, 2003 and 2007 elections. In 2007 he achieved the largest constituency vote for any candidate in Scotland.

Early life

Swinney joined the SNP at the age of 15, citing his anger at the way in which Scotland had been portrayed by television commentators at the Commonwealth Games. He involved himself in the SNP Youth Wing and gradually became more active in the party, becoming firstly the SNP Assistant National Secretary and then the National Secretary in 1986, at the age of 22. He was educated at Forrester High School and the University of Edinburgh, where he graduated with an MA in Politics.

Swinney was a research officer for the Scottish Coal Project (1987-1988), a senior management consultant with Development Options (1988-1992), and a strategic planning principal with Scottish Amicable (1992-1997). In the SNP, he served as National Secretary until 1992, then Vice Convenor, later Senior Vice-Convenor (Deputy Leader) 1992-1997. At the time of the 1990 leadership contest he supported Margaret Ewing in her bid to become SNP leader, but this did not stop him becoming politically close to the man who went on to win that contest, Alex Salmond.

Member of Parliament and Member of Scottish Parliament

At the 1997 general election, he was elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for the Tayside North constituency, and in 1999 he was elected to represent the same area at the Scottish Parliament.

He stood down as a Westminster MP at the 2001 general election election in order to avoid splitting his time, in line with all of his colleagues who found themselves in a similar 'dual mandate' position.

His surname was the subject of some confusion during his four-year spell at Westminster. Every time he was called to speak by the Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons Sir Alan Haselhurst, he was referred to as 'Mr. John Sweeney', although Swinney noticeably never corrected this.

Leader of SNP

The leadership contest the following year, caused by Alex Salmond's decision to step down as party leader, was marked by serious argument between the SNP Gradualist wing of the party, who in the main supported Swinney and SNP Fundamentalist wing, who in the main supported Alex Neil. Swinney won the contest but the media raised some doubt about his ability to lead the party following poor SNP performances in the 2001 UK General Election and the 2003 Scottish Parliamentary Election.

He successfully defeated a leadership challenge from Bill Wilson in 2003, defeating Wilson by 577 votes to 111.

Resignation

Though retaining its two seats at the 2004 European elections, in a smaller field of 7 (Scotland up until then had 8 MEPs) the Scottish press and certain elements within the Fundamentalist wing of the Party depicted the result as a disaster for the SNP putting further pressure on Swinney who resigned soon afterwards on 22 June 2004.

Finance Secretary

After the SNP emerged as the largest party following the 2007 Scottish Parliament Election, Swinney led coalition talks with the Scottish Green Party. He was later appointed Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth in the Cabinet of the minority SNP government..

His role will oversee the economy, local government, the budget, energy, tourism, climate change, public transport and Scottish Water. The size of his portfolio drew criticism from former First Minister, Jack McConnell, who described it as a "shambles of a department". However, Alex Salmond stated that Swinney would have "a work rate the size of Jupiter" to handle his brief.

External links

• Scottish Parliament - John Swinney MSP
• SNP - John Swinney MSP
• John Swinney MSP