Kate Forbes made her name by stepping into the breach in the wake of a senior colleague’s sudden departure – could she now make history again?
The Highland MSP was just 29 when she was unexpectedly thrust into the spotlight on Budget day at Holyrood on February 6, 2020.
She only found out in the early hours of the morning that she would be taking centre stage on one of the biggest days in the political calendar.
Ms Forbes was parachuted in following the shock resignation of Finance Secretary Derek Mackay in the wake of media reports revealing messages he sent to a 16-year-old boy on social media.
She had already made history when she was appointed public finance and digital economy minister in 2018, becoming the first government minister who was born in the same decade that the parliament was created.
And by stepping in as a last minute replacement for Mr Mackay, she became the first woman to deliver the Scottish Budget since devolution.
Her impressive performance on Budget day won her many admirers, and ensured she would be appointed to succeed Mr Mackay as finance and economy secretary.
Ever since that day, she has also been considered the frontrunner to follow Nicola Sturgeon in the top job.
Unless she quickly rules herself out of the running, the hype around Ms Forbes will only grow in the coming days and weeks, now her boss has created a vacancy.
Childhood in India
Born in 1990 in Dingwall, Ms Forbes was educated in Gaelic-medium, although she also spent five years between ages 10 and 15 in schools in India because her father was working there, helping to provide healthcare to locals.
In an interview with Holyrood Magazine in 2019, she described how her experience of living overseas helped shape her politics.
“There’s nothing like being taken out of your home country to make you prouder of your home country,” she said.
“We were very proud of our Scottish heritage and my brother would dress up in a kilt and all the rest of it, so when we came back to Scotland, we were probably more Scottish, we acted more Scottish than normal Scottish kids.
“So, I got involved with the SNP when I was in my late teens, just helping out doing some leafleting and I got involved with Young Scots for Independence at the time.”
Ms Forbes came back to Dingwall Academy before leaving in 2008 to study history at Cambridge, and then a masters at Edinburgh in emigration history.
Emigration and the Highland clearances were subjects close to her heart, her ancestors having been cleared from fertile soil on the Applecross peninsula.
Ms Forbes worked for her local MSP Dave Thompson for a year in 2011/12, before spending two years as an accountant at Barclays.
Rising star
In 2016, she returned home to succeed Mr Thompson in the Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch seat, increasing the SNP’s majority from 4,995 to 9,043.
Immediately tipped as a future star of the SNP after arriving in Holyrood, she delivered an entire speech to the parliament in Gaelic during a plenary debate on the language in 2018.
As well as Gaelic, Ms Forbes has championed a host of local issues since her election, including running a campaign to increase the number of foster carers in the Highlands.
In August last year, she and her husband Ali MacLennan announced the birth of their daughter Naomi at Raigmore Hospital in Inverness.
The politician, who has developed a habit of making history, became the first serving Cabinet secretary in the Scottish Government to take maternity leave.
Ms Forbes has spoken in the past about the importance of her faith, and has campaigned against religious bullying.
In 2019, she was one of three government ministers to sign a letter raising concerns about the potential implications for women of allowing people to self-identify their sex, one of the most controversial issues in the SNP at the moment.
Some commentators have speculated Ms Sturgeon was desperate to push through gender recognition reforms at Holyrood while Ms Forbes was away on maternity leave, knowing there was a risk the finance and economy secretary might resign over the issue.
The ongoing row over transgender rights may, in the end, have contributed to Ms Sturgeon’s decision to resign on Wednesday.
In doing so, it may ultimately also accelerate the rise to power of Ms Forbes.