Scottish First Minister John Swinney reveals new slimmed-down Cabinet

John Swinney has unveiled his new slimmed-down Cabinet following the SNP's success in the Holyrood elections.

After being selected to remain First Minister of Scotland at a parliamentary session on Tuesday, Mr Swinney was sworn in at the Court of Session in Edinburgh before choosing his cabinet at Bute House in Edinburgh, the First Minister of Scotland’s official residence.

Stepping into the deputy’s role Kate Forbes vacated when she stood down from frontline politics, former transport and education secretary Jenny Gilruth was John Swinney’s first formal appointment.

John Swinney’s new right hand described her appointment as “the greatest honour of my life”.

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Ms Gilruth said: “We are coming into Government refreshed by the faith people have placed in us and determined to deliver on the job they have asked us to do: supporting people through the cost of living crisis; giving people easier access to the NHS; and delivering a fresh start with independence.”

She is not alone in newly appointed Cabinet ministers who have extensive resumes in Government.

Nobody was fired from the top table and the only faces missing from the Cabinet prior to May’s General Election were those who chose to stand down or were unsuccessful in their re-election campaigns.

However, John Swinney has shuffled the deck of the nationalist party’s top parliamentarians.

Angela Constance swapped her Justice role with Neil Gray’s Health brief; Máiri McAllan takes over Education from the Deputy First Minister and picks up Kate Forbes’s reinvigorated Gaelic portfolio; and fresh from the halls of Westminster, Stephen Flynn walks straight into a Cabinet role for Economy, Tourism and Transport.

GB News asked the First Minister if he was looking forward to the different type of experience the long-time politician, brand-new MSP would bring to his Holyrood Cabinet.

“I set out in the manifesto the importance I attached to growing and strengthening the economy,” he said.

“By appointing Stephen Flynn to the Economy brief,” he continued, “there are a whole variety of different areas where colleagues will contribute to strengthening our economy and I know Stephen Flynn will give excellent leadership to all of that activity.”

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He also recognised the work Shirley-Anne Somerville will take on with Housing was “crucial” to improving Scotland’s economic fortunes.

In addition to the Scottish economy and the National Health Service, he again rounded on his priority “to make sure Scotland’s future is in Scotland’s hands”.

Reacting to the First Minister’s slimmed-down cabinet - from 12 spots to just 10 including the First Minister - Scottish Conservative deputy leader Rachael Hamilton described the appointments as “a chronic lack of talent”.

She said: “Jenny Gilruth was a flop as transport minister and, as education secretary, did nothing to tackle the epidemic of classroom violence, yet she’s been rewarded with the most important portfolio and the role of Swinney’s deputy.

“Neil Gray and Angela Constance presided over crisis, chaos and scandal as health and justice secretary respectively, yet we’re to believe that things will improve by them swapping jobs.”

The top Tory closed her remarks by guessing the First Minister handed the “poison challace” of Transport to Stephen Flynn for “eyeing up his job”.

The new Cabinet will come together for the first First Minister’s Questions of this Parliament on Thursday.

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