Hit the road to Malawi, McConnell ordered by MPs

A by-election to test Labour is expected within the next few months as Jack McConnell prepares to stand down.

Wendy Alexander is heading for her first electoral test as Scots Labour leader, with a by-election expected in one of the party's heartlands within the next few months.

Jack McConnell, the former First Minister, is set to stand down as MSP for Motherwell and Wishaw, after calls by the Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee for him to take up his new post as High Commissioner to Malawi within the first half of 2009. Mr McConnell, who resigned as Scots Labour leader last autumn, was nominated for the position last August by Gordon Brown.

But in evidence to the committee, which has a key role in scrutinising diplomatic appointments of people from outside the diplomatic service, Mr McConnell said that he still had not agreed a starting date and might not even take up the post next year.

The committee is unhappy with the arrangement and told Mr McConnell that he and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office should resolve the matter swiftly by publicly announcing a start date wihin the first half of next year. Sir Richard Wildash, the present incumbent in Malawi, is due to leave by Januray 2009.

Sources said that the Foreign Office is expected to ask Mr McConnell to start his new job as soon as possible afterwards. It is understood that Mr McConnell now regards a relatively early by-election in his constituency as “inevitable”.

That could be grim news for Ms Alexander whose leadership has plumbed hitherto unknown depths of unpopularity in recent polls, after controversy over her leadership campaign finance and successive policy U-turns on an independence referendum.

While Labour has a healthy (for Holyrood) majority of almost 6,000 over the Nationalists in the seat, a good part of that is attributed to Mr McConnell's previous high-profile as First Minister. If Labour was to lose the seat, it would place great pressure on Ms Alexander's position. The SNP's present one-seat majority over Labour would increase to three at a time when the Nationalists are in government and Labour in opposition.

It had been thought, before yesterday's committee report, that Labour would prefer to hold the by-election to coincide with the UK general election in 2010. That now looks impossible because of the committee's trenchantly-expressed views.

MPs on the committee said they were satisfied that both the Foreign Office and Mr McConnell had behaved “without impropriety” over the proposed appointment.

But the report added that the committee was “surprised” Mr McConnell had raised the possibility of a long gap between the present High Commissioner leaving and his own starting date, and that Mr McConnell had not ruled out staying on as an MSP for an extended period.

“We conclude that it would be very unsatisfactory for there to be a lengthy interregnum in which no High Commissioner is in post,” the MPs said. “It would be equally unsatisfactory for Mr McConnell to continue to perform the duties of a Member of the Scottish Parliament at the same time that he is preparing to undertake the politically impartial duties of a British diplomat. We recommend that the FCO and Mr McConnell should resolve this issue swiftly and make a public announcement that Mr McConnell will take up post on a specified date within the first half of 2009.”

The Foreign Office said yesterday that it wanted Mr McConnell in post as soon as possible. Sources added that while a gap of two months between one high commissioner standing down and another replacing him might be acceptable, a gap of almost two years would not.

Mr McConnell's concerns for Malawi and its people are well known and became a passion for him during his time as First Minister. Scotland has long-standing links with the country and a co-operation agreement was signed when Mr McConnell was First Minister.

Mr McConnell and Labour said that the handover arrangements for the post were entirely a matter for the Foreign Office.

The SNP said that Mr McConnell should choose between “Motherwell or Malawi”, claiming that he was hanging on to “spare Labour's blushes”.

“That Labour is running scared of a by-election in one of their strongest constituencies shows just how much Scotland has changed in the last 12 months,” an SNP spokesman said.