Better Together’s Frank Roy wants fewer egos involved in campaign

The man who is masterminding the campaign against Scottish independence has called for fewer politicians’ egos in the movement on the run-in to the September 18 vote.

In what will be interpreted by some as a slap-down, Frank Roy pointedly refused to endorse the efforts of big-name campaigners like Douglas Alexander and Jim Murphy adding: “Politics needs less egos, more listening.”

One of the most unexpected developments of an unpredictable referendum campaign has been the emergence of Roy as the man credited with turning Better Together around. His is the name that crops up time and again in any discussion about how the campaign to save the union stopped the rot that appeared to have set in during the spring.

Practically unknown outwith his Motherwell and Wishaw constituency, he’s been the brains behind numerous Labour by-election campaigns in Scotland. When Better Together needed someone to whip the operation into shape they turned to Roy.

One senior Labour figure said: “You’ve got Douglas Alexander poking himself in where he’s not wanted, Gordon Brown and Alastair Darling competing for attention and the Labour party careering around the country in a big red bus with the words Vote No plastered along the side like something even Ian Paisley at his height would have deemed over the top.

“But the No camp has made a better fist of it in the last month and that’s mainly down to Frank Roy. He’s got no ego, he just gets things done.”

Giving his one and only interview to the Sunday Post, the notoriously publicity-shy Roy appeared to have a dig at colleagues courting the limelight.

He said: “I am not a man for the spotlight. I am more concerned with being good and effective, rather than looking good and effective. I think I should stick to what I am good at.

“I come from a working-class family and spent most of my working life as a steel worker. Any hint of any ego gets stamped out pretty quickly. Can you imagine working in the Ravenscraig steelworks with hundreds of other working class men and women, and then trying to lord it over people or have an ego? It just wouldn’t work.”

There’s no better illustration of the professionalism lacking before Roy got involved than when Better Together invited a journalist to their HQ and let slip that internally the campaign was referred to as Project Fear. That’s a stick with which the SNP have beaten Better Together ever since.

However, he rejects the notion that the operation needed an overhaul and criticised those involved who were more interested in the internal dynamics of the campaign than winning the referendum.

He said: “I don’t accept that Better Together needed to be turned around. I joined as we were entering the final phase of the campaign. People in Westminster are only too happy to talk about this kind of thing that most Sunday Post readers won’t really care about. It’s self-serving rubbish that doesn’t really interest me.”

He’s similarly dismissive when it’s suggested that the likes of Labour big beasts Douglas Alexander and Jim Murphy, who got more heavily involved in the Better Together campaign at the same time as him, should be commended for the difference they too have made.

He said: “I am less interested in what politicians have made a difference. The real story for me is the work our activists are doing all around the country. They aren’t making a big song and dance about things, but they put in the hard graft. There is too much focus on big-name politicians in the referendum and not enough on the ordinary people of Scotland.

“It’s the people just going about their daily business who will make the difference in this campaign, not politicians.”

Roy is battle-hardened after overseeing many Labour by-elections. That involved him working to defeat the Tories and Lib Dems he now works alongside in Better Together headquarters.

He said: “Back in the ’80s I worked with people from other parties in the fight to save Ravenscraig. When an issue is that important then party political differences aren’t really that important.

“I disagree with Tories on nearly everything except this issue. Once the campaign is over I will get back to normal campaigning to kick the Tories out of Downing Street and the nationalists out of Bute House.”