All political parties need to do more to counter the “toxic” political culture to help attract women, former Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon has said.
The ex-SNP leader said she is “proud” to have been the first woman in the top job in Scottish politics, but as she announced she is stepping down from the Scottish Parliament she voiced concerns about the ability of all parties to attract female candidates.
Her comments came days after female MSPs spoke about the abuse they have suffered while in the job, with Labour’s Pam Duncan-Glancy revealing she was once branded a “poisoned dwarf” and Tory Annie Wells saying she had been told she would be “set alight”.
Ms Sturgeon, who is the 10th female SNP MSP to announce she will not be running for re-election next year, warned “women, and young women in particular, bear a disproportionate brunt” of such abuse.
Former first minister Nicola Sturgeon spoke to journalists after announcing her decision to step down from Holyrood at the 2026 election (Robert Perry/PA)
She told the PA news agency she is concerned about how parties will “attract women into politics in the future because of how toxic the political discourse has become”.
She also said she hopes in the future society will “feel a sense of collective shame at the vilification of trans people”.
On abuse faced by women in politics, Ms Sturgeon stressed it is “not an SNP issue” but a wider problem across all the parties.
She said: “That does worry me and I think we have all, all of us in politics and all of us who care deeply about the state of democracy in our country, we have all got to think hard about how we step back from the brink of that and get back to, not a country and a Parliament where we don’t disagree about things, but where we can robustly but civilly and respectfully disagree.”
She announced her decision to retire from Holyrood on the same day that MSPs debated the issue of protecting single-sex spaces for women – an issue which has made headlines recently in the wake of an employment tribunal brought by nurse Sandie Peggie after she had to share a female changing room with a transgender doctor.
The issue of transgender rights was prominent during Ms Sturgeon’s time as first minister, including a row over the decision to send rapist Isla Bryson – formerly known as Adam Graham – to a women’s jail.
That decision was reversed, but Ms Sturgeon was also at the helm of the Scottish Government when ministers attempted to introduce legislation allowing self-identification for trans people and making it easier for them to be legally recognised in their preferred gender.
Speaking about the outcry prompted by such issues, Ms Sturgeon said: “I think we all should ask ourselves what more we could have done to stop this debate descending into the state it is in just now.”
She accepted “people have different views on this”, saying “that is democracy”.
However she added: “I think we all need to reflect on the nature of the debate.
“I think, and it is just my opinion, we will reach a point, I don’t know how long in the future it will be, I hope it is sooner rather than later, that we look back and feel a sense of collective shame at the vilification of trans people, one of the most stigmatized, discriminated against groups in our society.”