Johann Lamont
Johann Lamont
Johann MacDougall Lamontis a Scottish politician, who was leader of the Scottish Labour Party from 2011 to 2014. She served as a junior minister in the Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition Scottish Executive from 2004 until the coalition's defeat by the Scottish National Partyin 2007. She was subsequently elected deputy leader of the opposition Labour group of MSPs in 2008, and was elected to lead the Labour Party in December 2011. She announced her resignation in October 2014, and following a leadership...
NationalityScottish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth11 July 1957
I remember going to see Billy Graham in a cinema in Glasgow, and he was down in London. I used to go and hear preachers, and then we always went to church and Sunday school. That mattered a lot to me.
Social injustice is what puts Scotland at its greatest disadvantage, and restoring the 50p tax rate will start to fight that.
The Scottish Labour Party should work as equal partners with the U.K. party, just as Scotland is an equal partner in the United Kingdom. Scotland has chosen home rule - not London rule.
My uncle was skipper on the old Claymore sailing out from Oban to the Inner Hebrides. My father worked for MacBraynes all his life, on freight boats and then on ferries crossing to Skye, Barra, Uist, the small isles and Iona.
The instinct of the Labour Party is if there's a problem, change the leader, then sit back, fold your arms and wait to be disappointed because they're sure it's not going to deliver.
It is not possible to spend on one thing and then not have consequences on something else.
The Scottish Labour Party and its renewal are more important than me.
Scotland has chosen to remain in partnership with our neighbours in the U.K. But Scotland is distinct, and colleagues must recognise that.
The idea that an independent Scotland - having separated assets and liabilities from the rest of the U.K. - would expect the rest of the U.K. to be a lender of last resort, and of course be kind to them, doesn't make any sense.
There is a danger of Scottish politics being between two sets of dinosaurs... the Nationalists who can't accept they were rejected by the people, and some colleagues at Westminster who think nothing has changed.
Telling the truth, and confronting the challenge, is what politics is about.
Separation and devolution are two completely different concepts which cannot be mixed together. One is not a stop on the way to the other.
The Scottish Labour Party, while I have breath in my body, will listen to the views of trade unionists.
We must listen and learn, show humility and seek again to talk for and to people's ambitions and concerns.