Jack McConnell's term as First Minister of Scotland began on 27 November 2001 when he was formally sworn into office at the Court of Session. It followed the resignation of Henry McLeish over the Officegate scandal. His term ended on 16 May 2007, following the defeat of the Scottish Labour Party in the 2007 Scottish Parliament election, where the Scottish National Party formed a minority government.
McConnell entered office amid the aftermath of the Scottish Parliament's first political scandal and suffered fierce opposition from the Leader of the Opposition and other Opposition Shadow Cabinets of the Scottish Parliament.
Scottish Labour leadership bid
Henry McLeish resigned as First Minister of Scotland and Leader of the Labour Party in Scotland on 8 November 2001 over the Officegate scandal, regarding the sub let of his constituency office. In the resulting search for a leader, Jack McConnell was seen by many political analysts as the likely successor. McConnell had previously contested against McLeish on the 2000 leadership election following the death of Donald Dewar, but lost. Other likely candidates included Wendy Alexander and Susan Deacon.
McConnell launched his bid to be the next leader and on the 13 November 2001, he emerged as the only candidate to secure the seven nominations needed to run. Left-wing Labour activist, John McAllion, announced his candidacy, however, he only received one nominee from Elaine Smith.
On the same day McConnell was announced leader-elect of Scottish Labour, he revealed he had an extra-marital affair seven years prior. In a press conference in Edinburgh with his wife, Bridget McConnell, he stated: "If I become first minister, it would be very wrong for my family or anybody else to suffer because my behaviour then is still a secret today. That is why we are now being open about the fact that I did have an affair seven years ago. At the time I made mistakes, including denying the facts publicly and privately".
Although McConnell emerged as the only candidate, he still needed more than 50% of the support of Labour MSPs. On 17 November 2001, he was officially elected unopposed as Leader of the Labour Party in Scotland after receiving the support of 97.23% of MSPs. In his acceptance speech, he stated he was "deeply honoured to receive such overwhelming support" and highlighted that much work still needed to be done "to make devolution a success" and achieve "first class public services".
On 22 November 2001, McConnell was elected by the Scottish Parliament to be the next First Minister of Scotland. He had support of his Labour Party and their coalition partner the Liberal Democrats, following talks over concession for electoral reform for local government elections and the abolishment of university tuition fees. McConnell received 70 votes, defeating the leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP), John Swinney, leader of the Scottish Conservatives, David McLetchie, and Independent MSP, Dennis Canavan, by 34, 19, 3 respectively.
Following his nomination, the First Minister-elect visited London to meet the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair. Then after, McConnell attended Buckingham Palace, where he was issued the Royal Warrant of Appointment by Her Majesty the Queen. On 27 November 2001, McConnell was officially sworn into office as First Minister of Scotland at the Court of Session in Edinburgh.
As a result of him becoming First Minister, he was appointed Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland and to the Privy Council, earning the title 'The Right Honourable' for life.
First term; 2001–2003 Cabinet appointments
Shortly after being appointed McConnell began making appointments to his cabinet. Jim Wallace remained in the post of Deputy First Minister and Wendy Alexander and Ross Finnie remained as ministers. Sam Galbraith and Angus MacKay stood down and Jackie Baillie, Sarah Boyack and Tom McCabe were reshuffled out of government, while Susan Deacon was offered the post of social justice minister but refused the offer and moved to the backbenches. Cathy Jamieson, Mike Watson, Malcolm Chisholm, Iain Gray, Patricia Ferguson and Andy Kerr were all promoted to cabinet.
Following the appointment of his first government, McConnell used the first meeting of his newly formed cabinet that he intended for his administration to focus on the priorities of both the country and its people, pledging for unnecessary distractions to be avoided. Speaking during the first meeting of his cabinet, McConnell told his ministerial team he wished for them to "get rid of unnecessary paperwork and diversions" in order for ministers to be able to focus on the "key areas".
His cabinet appointments were met with criticism by opposition parties in parliament, with the Scottish National Party (SNP) leader John Swinney claiming that McConnell had used his cabinet reshuffle as an opportunity to "settle scores and stab colleagues in the back". Swinney further claimed that "Labour are now in turmoil" and suggested that following McConnell's cabinet appointments it would be seen as "the day Labour admitted they have failed to deliver". The Scottish Conservatives leader David McLetchie expressed disappointment that McConnell did not reduce the number of cabinet ministers during the formation of his first cabinet, claiming that McConnell was "more concerned about putting one over on his political opponents" and suggested that McConnell was not interested in "delivering a keener, fitter government for the people of Scotland".
Policies and continuity of government
McConnell advised his cabinet that he was not seeking a large volume of new initiatives and policies for his administration, but rather that he remained committed to the policy areas of the previous administration. A spokesperson for the Scottish Executive said that McConnell had told his cabinet for the need to "focus on delivering what is already there" as he felt it was important that his administration "makes sure we are delivering on the targets that have been set".
McConnell announced that under his premiership, the Scottish Executive would not change its position on issues such as private involvement in public services, proportional representation for local government elections and the financial independence of the Scottish Parliament. Ministers of his government were given suggestions by McConnell to follow his tactic he deployed whilst serving as the Minister for Education under Henry McLeish by speaking with the public to gauge public opinion to drive forward policy objectives rather than "listening to the interest groups that may come to Edinburgh to lobby".
Entering government, McConnell vowed that his key policy objectives would relate to schools, health services, jobs, crime and transport which he dubbed "the peoples priorities". He remained committed to the Scottish Labour–Scottish Liberal Democrat coalition agreement which had been in place since the creation of the Dewar government in 1999, but acknowledged that some of the policies and priorities of the coalition administration could "take some time" to implement. He appeared to criticise the predecessor administrations to his, particularly relating to education, stating that "failures in relation to children" by the previous governments were "unacceptable".
Following his appointment as Leader of the Scottish Labour Party unopposed, opposition parties in the Scottish Parliament, particularly the Scottish National Party (SNP), were critical of the manner in which McConnell was elected as both party leader and subsequently first minister. The leader of the SNP, John Swinney, said that McConnell's victory unopposed was "deeply damaging to democracy". The Scottish Conservatives said that his appointment as Scottish Labour leader was a "sham", claiming that by being elected unopposed he had "no real mandate" to become the next first minister of the country. In response, McConnell said that he respected "democratic open politics" and vowed to project such values.
Domestic affairs
Income tax
One of the earliest announcements by the new executive under McConnell was the ability for the Scottish Parliament to raise or lower income tax by up to 3p in the pound would not be invoked under a McConnell administration. Shortly afterwards, the Constitution Unit think tank operated by University College London issued a warning that disputed McConnell's position on not altering the rate of income tax in Scotland by suggesting that the Scottish Executive may be required to raise income tax in order to fund the executives increase in spending.
The Constitution Unit warned that as devolution became embedded into Scottish political and public life there was an increased risk of the financial pressures in Scotland being greater than they were prior to devolution coming into force in 1999. The issue of finance and funding public spending on services were widely speculated to be a key debating issue ahead of the 2003 Scottish Parliament election. The Scottish Executive was warned that it could face a funding shortfall of £2 billion as a result on its pledge to increase the pay of teachers, spending on education, free care for the elderly and local government.
McConnell gave no indication that following the 2003 election that his position on not changing the rate of income tax would change.
Sporting event bids
In February 2002, Scotland joined forces with the Republic of Ireland in a bid to host the 2008 European Football Championship. McConnell was initially unconvinced that it was worth spending around £100 million on the tournament, but he later put his support behind the joint bid with the Irish.
Although the bid lost out to Austria/Switzerland, McConnell later supported other attempts to land major supporting events including London's successful bid for the 2012 Olympic Games and Glasgow's bid for the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
Education
In 2002, McConnell pledged that the Scottish Executive would commit to building 100 new schools across Scotland by 2006. In order to achieve this, McConnell advocated for the use of Public Private Partnerships (PPP), stating "we'll work together to sort out how we give people maximum return for every one of their pounds we are spending. Sometimes we'll invest with public capital and sometimes we'll invest with private capital. Let's be clear. We set the standards. We demand the quality and PPPs don't just attract finance; they make sure private contractors deliver hospitals and schools for our communities on time, within budget, well designed and easily maintained". At that time, he advocated that "private finance would facilitate the construction or rebuilding of 100 schools around the country".
In November 2002, McConnell claimed that teachers in Scotland should have the ability to move between primary and secondary schools to assist in the transition of children from primary school to secondary school. One of McConnell's spokesperson said that McConnell had been driven to implement policy changes on the backdrop of "children making the transition can have some problems. The first minister will be setting out the first steps towards addressing what is a problem that has been around for as long as we can remember".
In order to drive standards in Scottish schools, in November 2002, McConnell announced plans that would allow Head Teachers in Scotland to have more authority in regards to setting their own standards and priorities for their respective schools. During this period, McConnell also used his position as First Minister to advocate for schools to provide more vocational education courses to pupils, as well as increased links and partnerships with local colleges and businesses to improve training and educational programmes for young people. Additionally, McConnell advocated for greatest use of specialist teachers in schools to provide learning in subjects including music and sport.