Following the election to the 6th Scottish Parliament, Johnstone was the only candidate to run for Presiding Officer. She received 97 votes in-favour and was elected unopposed as Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament. Johnstone is the second female and first Green Party member to hold the position of office.
Early life
Johnstone was born on 11 October 1965 in Edinburgh, Scotland, where she attended St. Augustine's High School.[5] She is a qualified athletics coach and board member of Scottish Athletics, and formerly held the East of Scotland 800m and 1500m records.[2] She worked at Basil Paterson College as a registrar for a decade.[6]
Early political involvement
Johnstone began to have an interest in politics in the mid-1990s, when she joined the Keep Meggetland Green, a campaign against a proposal for flats to be built on Meggetland Playing Fields. She wrote to politicians to gain attention, with Green politicians Robin Harper and Gavin Corbett the only ones to respond. Although the campaign was unsuccessful, Johnstone attended a Green party conference as a non-member and became more involved in politics.[6]
She was a member of Scotland FORward and campaigned in-favour of a devolved Scottish Parliament.[6] Following Harper's election to the Scottish Parliament in 1999, Johnstone served as his parliamentary assistant until 2011.
Political career
City of Edinburgh Councillor
Johnstone (Middle) with then Green Party of England and Wales leader, Natalie Bennett (left), and Maggie Chapman (right).
Johnstone first stood as Scottish Green candidate in the 2003 North Morningside by-election, but finished third, gaining 10% of the vote, ahead of the SNP and Scottish Labour. With Single Transferable Vote now being adopted in Scottish local elections, Johnstone saw an opportunity for Greens to enter local government. She stood as the candidate for Edinburgh's Meadows/Morningside ward in the 2007 local elections. After a successful campaign, she was elected to the City of Edinburgh Council, becoming one of three Green politicians to be elected into local government.[6] She did not stand for re-election in the 2012 local elections after being elected as a Member of the Scottish Parliament for the Lothian region in the 2011 election.
Following the Scottish Greens' poor performance at the 2007 Scottish Parliament election, she was nominated unopposed as co-convener of the Scottish Greens.[7] Johnstone was "certain that the Green Party will grow and attract more support as the other parties reveal themselves to lack the ambition to really change course from business as usual when it comes to the crunch". She served alongside Robin Harper, and both were replaced in 2008 as co-conveners by Patrick Harvie and Eleanor Scott.
She served as Co-Leader of the Scottish Greens in the Scottish Parliament, serving with Patrick Harvie from March 2019 to May 2021.[11] In 2020, she introduced a measure to grant protected species status to the mountain hare in Scotland, which was accepted on 17 June 2020.[12]
Johnstone previously represented the Green Party at First Minister's Questions and in September 2019 sketch writer Stephen Daisley commented, "Going by her performance at First Minister's Questions, they [the Greens] should dump the rest and put her in charge full-time. Unlikely as it sounds, she was the star of this week’s FMQs, giving Nicola Sturgeon the toughest time she’s had in parliament in many a week."[13]
Presiding Officer
On 13 May 2021, Johnstone stood unopposed in the election to appoint the 6th Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament. A yes/no vote was held on her nomination, and she won with 97 Yes votes,[14] 29 No votes, two abstentions and one spoilt vote.[15] The Presiding Officer is expected to be strictly nonpartisan, so Johnstone resigned her Greens membership to take on the role.[2][16]
Johnstone is the second woman in the post. The first was Tricia Marwick, who was Presiding Officer from 2011 to 2016.[17] She is also the first Green MSP to serve as Presiding Officer. She is also the second Presiding Officer to be elected unopposed, after George Reid in 2003.[15]
On 14 May 2021, SNP MSP Annabelle Ewing and Liberal Democrat Liam McArthur were elected as the two Deputy Presiding Officers.[18] This is the first time since the establishment of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 that neither the Presiding Officer nor any of the deputies has been a Labour or Conservative MSP.[18]
On 16 March 2022, Johnstone was appointed to the Privy Council by Her Majesty The Queen and therefore granted the title 'The Right Honourable'.[19] She said in response to her appointment: Johnstone said: “It was a great privilege to be elected Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament last May, and it was an honour to be made a Privy Counsellor by Her Majesty The Queen this afternoon. “This appointment is recognition of the important role the Scottish Parliament and the Office of Presiding Officer plays and I am pleased to accept it.”
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