It was just as she sat her law finals in 1991 that Alex Salmond asked Nicola Sturgeon to stand in the 1992 general election – and at that point she was the youngest candidate.
Now she says she is living through her adolescence, the most obvious illustration of which is a tattoo which now adorning her forearm. (Shock news – there may be a second sometime soon).
During the intervening period she has lived her life largely in the public eye. Now, after announcing her imminent retiral from politics her memoir of eight and a half years in office as First Minister and as a politician of varying degrees since her late teens is published. Frankly is widely available but has been on sale in branches of Waterstones since Monday – apparently in breach of an earlier embargo.
The audience at the sell out Edinburgh International Book Festival event in the McEwan Hall was clearly made up of Sturgeon fans, ranging from those who individually thanked her for her leadership during the pandemic to the warm applause at various things she said.
Ms Sturgeon said that Alex Salmond was a “strong charismatic individual” and the two of them together became “an incredibly successful partnership. But Kirsty Wark who was conducting the interview issued the first of carefully barbed comments against Salmond who died suddenly almost a year ago, suggesting that Salmond would have been upset “if you had delivered independence”. She also referred to his dual person saying he could be “both charming as well as a bully”, and said to Ms Sturgeon “ I think he undermined you a lot of the time.” Sturgeon rejected that notion replying that he “also bolstered me a lot of the time. He was so integral to some of the happiest times of my life.”
Wark also accused the former female First Minister of failing to achieve closure of the attainment gap as she had promised. Sturgeon admitted it is “possibly one of my biggest regrets” but that her policies to introduce the Scottish Child Payment, funding for early years education and the Baby Box are lifting children out of poverty and will continue to have an effect in years to come.
She also claimed the Scottish teaching profession is the highest paid in the UK and that child poverty is falling right now in Scotland in contrast to the rest of the UK.
On gender recognition reform, her regret is that she did not pause the progress of legislation but claims that the debate is toxic on both sides.
Nicola is now reconciled with Kezia Dugdale (“we are now good friends”) after the 2017 leaders debate, but clearly has no friendly thoughts towards Joanna Cherry, KC, who has said she will reveal information about a conspiracy against Alex Salmond in her own memoir to be published next year. Ms Sturgeon said: “There are certain people who spend a lot more time thinking about me than I do about them.”
King Charles came in for a mention during the hour long talk and according to Sturgeon she feels that the monarchy “should end soon”.
And in a word directed to her SNP colleagues for whom she was a leader without parallel, winning eight elections in a row, she brushed off any thought that they were scared of her. She said: “ I wasn’t as uncollegiate as my critics would say.”
Did we learn anything we didn’t know about Nicola Sturgeon before? Probably not. To find out if there are any revelations in the book – well you will have to buy it to find out.
