Ross: Vaccine rollout only happened so fast because of the Union

SCOTLAND’S successful rollout of the coronavirus vaccine is a benefit of being part of the United Kingdom, Douglas Ross said yesterday.

The Scottish Conservative leader said Nicola Sturgeon’s obsession with independence meant she failed to even acknowledge the Union’s vital role in moving quickly to inoculate people.

Analysis by the Scottish Conservatives shows that 1.5million fewer Scots would have been vaccinated by now if the UK had been part of the delay-hit Brussels-led programme.

Around 2.5million people in Scotland have now received their first dose but if the average vaccination rate across the EU were applied to Scotland, this would have been only 877,952.

The EU had threatened to block vaccine exports to the UK this month and its policy in

‘It’s clear. You can’t spin it any other way’

this area is still unclear. The World Health Organisation has also said the bloc’s programme is unacceptably slow.

Mr Ross said the vaccination effort demonstrated the overwhelming benefits of Scotland remaining part of the United Kingdom.

He said: ‘The figures are clear, you can’t spin it any other way than the rollout of the vaccine has been incredibly poor across Europe. That is because they are working as one big bloc. It can’t move quickly to adapt to circumstances in front of it – it can’t be as agile at procuring so many different vaccines as the UK was.’

Mr Ross added: ‘People think it’s rather confusing the SNP don’t even acknowledge that. They can’t – even with something like a vaccine and the rollout of the vaccine here in the United Kingdom – accept we benefit from being part of the Union. They are still trying to suggest we would be better as an independent nation in the European Union, which no one could credibly argue.’

Yesterday, Nicola Sturgeon was asked if the EU’s threats and slow vaccine rollout could damage the SNP’s policy of an independent Scotland in the EU. She said: ‘No. The UK procures vaccines – we’ve procured the flu vaccine every year on a four-nations basis and there would have been nothing to stop the UK deciding to procure vaccine in the way it’s done, even if it was still in the European Union.

‘Success from procurement to getting vaccine into people’s arms is down to getting the vaccines developed and to the brilliance of our scientific community, the global scientific community, and the magnificence of people working across the National Health Service with, again in all parts of the UK, some support from the Armed Forces.’

Pressed on whether the issues on the Continent would change Scots’ views of the EU, she said: ‘You would struggle to find any evidence. These kind of arguments might move some people [but] people just want to get vaccinated.

‘So if I look at my Twitter feed it’s just full of people posting pictures of their blue envelopes and full of joy, getting to be vaccinated. That’s what most normal people are focused on right now.’ Asked if she believed the UK Government had ‘played a blinder’ over vaccine procurement, she said: ‘If I wasn’t explicit enough, I’ll rectify that... the UK Government procures the vaccine but it does so on behalf of the four nations.

‘We could choose to do the procurement ourselves as could Wales and Northern Ireland but as with the flu vaccine, we don’t.’