SNP spent too long focused on independence process - Swinney

John Swinney is at the SNP's annual conference in Edinburgh

The SNP has spent too long focusing on the “process of independence”, Scotland's first minister John Swinney has said.

Mr Swinney was speaking at his party's annual conference in Edinburgh on Friday during a closed-door session to dissect their defeat in July's general election.

His comments to delegates were recorded and leaked to The Times newspaper, ahead of his official speech to the conference on Sunday.

The SNP lost dozens of MPs in July, following 18 months of turmoil that saw three leaders at the helm and an ongoing police investigation into party finances.

Mr Swinney's comment to members that the SNP had spent too long focusing on the process of independence could be regarded as implicit criticism of the strategy pursued by his predecessors, Nicola Sturgeon and Humza Yousaf.

He also pledged to one delegate in the hall that his government “would never treat the party membership with contempt.”

As part of the drive to regain support before the next Holyrood election in 2026, Mr Swinney said the SNP had to win back the middle-classes.

Many party members have cited Labour’s message of “get the Tories out” as the reason for the switch in support from the SNP at the July general election.

The first minister also conceded that his government's performance was "an issue" which had harmed their chances electorally.

He said: “For most of the last 17 years the government has been a big, big asset for the SNP but things have faltered and I need to fix that.”

His party had “got to a position where we disappointed voters,” but he believed they could win again at Holyrood in 2026.

Delegates are attending the SNP's annual conference in Edinburgh

Meanwhile at the conference, the party's leader at Westminster, Stephen Flynn, said there was no hiding from the general election result.

He said voters had sent the SNP a "stark message". He cautioned against attributing blame within the party, but said it had to be "brutally honest" with itself.

Mr Flynn said: "Recent results are our collective burden to bear" and said it was a "collective challenge" to win back voters' trust.

He said the SNP must re-root itself in the priorities of the Scottish people, which it had moved away from.

He also criticised the UK Labour government for plans to "take a hammer to public services"

Normal independent country

Mr Flynn called on the SNP to “offer hope in the face of Labour party austerity cuts and misery".

He said: "We believe that decisions made in Scotland, for Scotland can deliver a better future for all.

"That becoming a normal independent country in Europe can meet our people's needs and their aspirations.

"That it can deliver the basic belief that the next generation can, and should, aspire to a higher standard of living and a better quality of life than that which has gone before."

SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn said his party could have fared worse in the general election

Scottish Labour insisted that the SNP was responsible for the cuts to services in Scotland and said "no amount of spin can hide that".

Deputy leader Jackie Baillie said: "Labour is working to clean up the mess the Tories left behind and renew our country.

"It's time for the SNP to stop making excuses and set out how it will fix the mess it has made of Scotland's public services and public finances."

And Scottish Conservative MSP Liz Smith said the SNP itself was to blame for the mess in Scotland's finances and "cannot be the solution."

In an earlier interview with Holyrood magazine, Mr Flynn also said he believed the SNP would have fared worse in the general election if the power-sharing deal with the Scottish Green Party at Holyrood had not ended.

"It wasn't working, Mr Flynn said. "I think if we'd still been in coalition with the Greens, there wouldn't be nine SNP MPs."

Scottish Greens' co-leader, Patrick Harvie, hit back at the comments.

He told BBC Radio Scotland it was "very odd" for Mr Flynn to defend Humza Yousaf's decision to "throw away" a pro-independence, progressive majority government.