John Swinney has become leader of the SNP and is set to become the next first minister after nominations closed at noon today and he was the only candidate.

The other names mentioned as possible candidates, former finance secretary Kate Forbes and party stalwart Graeme McCormick, both dropped out of the race after meeting with the former deputy first minister.

They both announced they had productive meetings with him and were withdrawing their candidacies and giving Swinney their full support.

There was a widespread feeling within the party that following weeks of upset and trauma, the very last thing the party needed right now was the expense and uncertainty of a three-weeklong leadership contest.

READ MORE: What happens next for SNP leader John Swinney?

It would have given Scotland's anti-independence media no shortage of negative SNP on SNP sound bites to headline and publicise, a prospect which was being eagerly anticipated on social media by anti-independence politicians.

Over the weekend, BBC Scotland had been excitedly talking up the possibility of a leadership contest, and when it became clear that there wasn't going to be one you could hear the wails of disappointment from Pacific Quay.

You could hear them all the way over in the offices of Labour's Scottish accounting unit in John Smith House in West Regent Street, where they'd be drowned out by the wails of disappointment originating from within the building.

After he was confirmed as the new leader of the SNP, Swinney wrote on social media that he was "honoured to have been elected".

The National: John Swinney gave his acceptance speech at Glasgow University 

He could become first minister as early as tomorrow after out-going first minister Humza Yousaf holds his final Scottish Government cabinet meeting and officially tenders his resignation to King Charles.

MSPs will then be given the opportunity to vote on the new first minister and if the Scottish Greens vote alongside the SNP the result is a foregone conclusion.

However, the debate will of course provide Anas Sarwar and Douglas Ross the opportunity for grandstanding and for demanding the immediate elections that neither called for when Mark Drakeford, the first minister of Wales, stood down or at any point during the revolving door leadership changes in the Tory party.

It is not absolutely certain that the Scottish Greens will vote with the SNP or abstain.

However, they have signalled their openness to discussions with Green co-convenor Patrick Harvie, saying in a statement: "Scottish Green MSPs will meet to discuss our approach to the votes taking place this week.

READ MORE: John Swinney: SNP must work ' very hard' to win back independence supporters

We are committed to delivering on our vision of a fairer, greener, and more equal Scotland, and are open to talks with John Swinney and his team about how we can work together to make that happen."

Following his successful election by MSPs, the new first minister will then have to swear three oaths of office at the Court of Session in Edinburgh before officially taking office.

For his part Scottish Tory leader, who got his own job as a consequence of an internal party putsch which unseated the previous leader Jackson Carlaw who had been democratically elected by the Scottish Tories' dwindling and elderly membership, passive-aggressively congratulated Swinney on becoming SNP leader "for a second time".

Carlaw then immediately demanded that he abandon "his relentless push for independence." Then without a scintilla of self-awareness, he criticised the SNP for engineering a "stitch-up" to "ensure Swinney's coronation."

The National: Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross at FMQ's

Have a wee look in the mirror Ross son, is that not the ghost of Carlaw looming over your shoulder?

In other news, it looks as though a leadership challenge to Rishi Sunak will not come to pass despite his party's dire showing in last week's local and mayoral elections in England as well as a Westminster by-election in Blackpool South - the results have been described as the party's worst performance in 40 years.

The Tories have belatedly realised that a change of leader won't do anything to improve their dismal electoral prospects and potential leadership hopefuls are going to sit back and let Rishi Sunak be the fall guy for deep-rooted Tory problems which, to be fair, are not entirely of his own making - although he certainly bears a not inconsiderable share of the blame.

Plenty of influential voices in the party want the Tories to pivot even further to the right because apparently the party's real problem is that it's not nasty enough and is not completely unmoored from reality.

The fact that one of those influential voices is Liz Truss tells you all you need to know about how deranged the modern Conservative party has become.

If Truss was a doctor she'd have been struck off, but the Tories still think that there is value in her patient slaughtering snake oil.

In the aftermath of the election results, Suella Braverman, another cruel and incompetent right-wing Tory with her eye on the leadership who would never rise above the back benches in any party which still maintained a tenuous grasp on self-awareness, took to the BBC to insist that a change of leadership would not turn her party's fortunes around, and demanded that Sunak must own the Conservatives' failures.

Sunak's grasp on the leadership is really - and paradoxically - being protected by just how dreadful things are for the Tories right now.

There are plenty of vultures circling, not the least of which is Braverman, but none of them want to make a move until after Sunak carries the can for the inevitable drubbing that the Tories are set to take at the Westminster general election expected later this year.

Sunak will stagger on for the time being, unloved by his own party, but safe in his job for the sole reason that no one else wants it.

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