NB. This interview was undertaken several weeks before Kate Forbes’ decision to step back as Deputy First Minister and from the Scottish Parliament on 4 August 2025.  She will not be standing for election in the May 2026 Scottish elections. At the time there was no indication that she was considering spending more time with her young family. Indeed she appeared excited by the prospects for her political future. This should be considered as context for the article in The Business. Ms Forbes has since indicated that she may well return to front line Scottish politics in the future, when her children are older. The fact remains that representing one of Scotland’s largest and remote constituency placed an extra burden on her of travelling from Edinburgh to her home.

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Kate Forbes exudes confidence and self-belief. At a time when most commentators agree that Scotland is not in a great place, how does the Deputy First Minister retain her sense of assuredness?

There’s no need for a crystal ball to predict that Kate Forbes will be the fresh-faced Scottish leader who finally delivers an independent Scotland. Set aside the SNP’s economic mismanagement, the toxic in-fighting which lead to the resignation of Hamza Yousaf and Nicola Sturgeon, and the current First Minister John Swinney claiming he has “fixed the broken party”, because the main political force of Scotland is sailing towards parliamentary victory in less than a year.

With inflation rising, Keir Starmer’s flip-flop Labour government struggling to show leadership, and the prospect of Reform splitting the Conservative Unionist vote, there is a “once-in-a-generation” opportunity for the Yes movement. A winning performance next year would give the nationalists a legitimate mandate to demand another independence referendum. Even Michael Gove, the former Conservative Cabinet minister and now Lord Gove, agrees with this.

With Scotland’s young people swamping the vote, and with little prospect of a Gordon Brown-style ‘Union Pledge’ shifting the momentum, there would be a surge. Swinney, who has steadied the ship, will take the rap for the SNP’s poor delivery, stepping back to allow the brightest younger nationalists to lead the country to independence by 2029.

Of course, there are a lot of ‘ifs’. Yet it is worth considering this, to find out what Kate Forbes, now 35, and Scotland’s Deputy First Minister, believes. If she becomes leader, she could well be Scotland’s premier for 30 years or more, leading a reborn European nation before collecting her state pension. 

“Scotland has unparalleled strengths and there is a once-in-a-generation opportunity right now in the energy transition. We can either set the balls in motion to reap the benefit for generations to come – or we’ll miss it. I’m determined that we don’t miss it,” she says.

So what makes her tick, and what does she think about the economic outlook? The Business interviewed Forbes in mid-May. Her morning photocall took her to Summerhall arts complex in Edinburgh where Pickering’s Gin is distilled, and she was about to attend First Minister’s Questions. With no written notes or prepared statements, she answered openly and off-the-cuff.

Forbes is a Highland politician, and not part of the Central Belt bubble. She spent several formative years with her parents in India, before returning to high school at Dingwall Academy.

It is well known that she has strong Christian foundations and sits in the centre-right wing of the SNP. So how does she view her own evolution as a political figure?

“I was first elected in my mid-20s and spent three years working in business. I was an accountant with Barclays Bank. I then came into politics and in politics confidence is currency,” she asserts confidently.

“I learned very quickly in my mid 20s that you couldn’t sit around thinking too much about whether you had a right to do the job or not. Or whether people believed in you or not.”

Forbes’ confident demeanour stems from her understanding that the slightest whiff of fear is pounced on by “friendly but diligent journalists or by the public”. She might add that fellow Nationalists have never been slow to criticise her stance on social issues.

I learned very quickly in my mid 20s that you couldn’t sit around thinking too much about whether you had a right to do the job or not. Or whether people believed in you or not

She attended Selwyn College in Cambridge, studying history, then the University of Edinburgh, where she undertook an MSc in diaspora and migration history. She came to the public’s attention in February 2020 in the early phase of the Covid pandemic when she delivered the Scottish Budget with a few hours’ warning after the departure of her boss Derek Mackay.  

“That was a really good learning curve, and it has served me well,” she says.

She hit the ground running, announcing £220m for the foundation of the Scottish National Investment Bank, £180m to raise attainment in schools, a massive £1.8bn in low-carbon infrastructure, along with £1.2bn for the railways. Funding for the motorways and trunk roads was slashed from £80m, which exacerbated the pothole misery for drivers, and a £50m hand-out given to troubled Ferguson Marine building two ‘dual-fuel eco-friendly’ ferries. Above all, Forbes announced a record £15bn in health and care services.

“The global climate emergency is at the centre of our Programme for Government and we have already in place the most ambitious climate legislation and targets,” she told the Scottish Parliament at that time. Much of that 2020 money has made an indelible impact on driving Scotland towards net-zero carbon emissions.

Forbes left the Scottish Government in March 2023 when Nicola Sturgeon resigned. She went off on maternity leave, returning at the behest of John Swinney, and now has her daughter, Naomi, nearby at the parliament’s nursery. 

Most commentators agree that Scotland is not in a great place and faces a ticking demographic timebomb. So how can this confident Nationalist leader build the trust required to deal with an uncertain future?

“I think it calls for honesty and openness on the issues. We’ve come through a few months of intense geo-political insecurity,” she says referring obliquely to President Trump, Putin’s war on Ukraine and the destruction of Gaza. “But I believe that we’re all in it together in Scotland.

“When the threat against us is the magnitude that we’ve seen, whether it’s new unexpected tariffs, whether it is invasions and illegal wars, whether it’s major efforts of hackers damaging our major businesses, we all sink or survive together.”

She speaks of the “grave international threats” which should make us appreciate our good fortune of living in a relatively safe and prosperous country. But dangers await. 

The Scottish Fiscal Commission has pointed to the bulging strain on the National Health Service to deal with our unhealthy and ageing citizens. By 2074, almost 55 per cent of our national income will be spent on the health service while “projected Scottish devolved public spending is unsustainable”.

A chippy Nationalist might predictably answer that Scotland should be an independent state by then and able to manage its economic growth. But that doesn’t wash anymore.

There is a very honest acceptance that we have a major population issue in Scotland

“On demographic decline, the National Records of Scotland statistics suggest that our population has grown slightly more than we expected but that has masked the real issue. 

“The concentration is in the cities, while across the coastal, rural and island communities, there are double digit forecasts of declining population, and yet Scotland’s biggest growth industries are food and drink, from our rural areas, and renewable energy, largely situated in rural areas,” she says.