POLITICS: Alex Salmond was ‘true champion’ of the Scottish fishing industry
Several days on from the news of Alex Salmond’s passing, I want to acknowledge his impact as a local politician in remembering some of his achievements and how that contributed to his legendary status, writes Aberdeenshire North and Moray east MP Seamus Logan.
Alex came north to contest the constituency of Banff and Buchan for the 1987 general election, bringing with him an already tall reputation as a professional economist and as a thoroughly seasoned politician.
It was his skill in representing individuals and the local communities of Banffshire and Buchan that set him apart.
He also set a gold standard for me and indeed how any MP should organise their local office. His campaigns against the loss of rural facilities and jobs, as well as the diligent but low-key work on behalf of many thousands of individual constituents that he and his office helped over many years stand in testimony to the work of a dedicated public servant.
It was that ‘covering of the bases’ – in terms of representing his constituents, as well as copious amounts of good old fashioned shoe-leather from local party members who never sought the limelight - which gave him the platform to keep the north-east in the political spotlight, and to advance the cause of self-government for Scotland in the face of the general indifference and occasional outright hostility it faced from the Westminster establishment.
His achievement in leading the SNP into government and taking Scotland to the cusp of independence would, you might think, be what he regarded as his defining achievement in politics. Yet it was his involvement in the campaign to recover the Sapphire – a fishing boat which sank in 1997 within sight of the safety of Peterhead Harbour – which he himself saw as his greatest political outcome.
In a community where opinion was somewhat divided on the matter and in the face of outright hostility from UK Ministers, Alex supported the relatives as they gathered through public donations over half a million pounds in order to raise the vessel and bring the men home for burial.
“It really became a story about courage more than anything else”, he said afterwards.
“As the weeks went on, I regarded it as my absolute obligation to make sure the conclusion was in the favour of the people who had fought so hard for it”.
Alex was a true champion for the fishing industry as legions of folk who work in that sector will testify.
On another, more recent and sad occasion which I attended, Alex gave an unforgettable eulogy on the passing of his great friend and party colleague Stuart Pratt. He did Stuart proud, drawing together their shared endeavours and their stories of the roads travelled in political life as only he could.
Wherever people’s personal or party loyalties lay that day, their commitment to Scotland and independence was as unshakable as the sense of loss was palpable. And it could hardly have been otherwise - we had all walked too far together and shared too many dreams for it ever to be any different.
It's both poignant and fitting that Alex’s last public words were to say that: "Scotland is a country not a county". Yet it’s in the counties of the north-east where he and Moira made their home and which gave him a political base, which were his strength and his stay for so long. We will never forget him.