The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Labour targeting Gordon Brown’s former seat
Fife Council’s former deputy leader, Lesley Laird, is the party’s candidate
Gordon Brown’s former Fife constituency has been identified by Labour as one of its top target seats in next month’s general election.
In one of the biggest shocks of the 2015 contest, the SNP’s Roger Mullin achieved a huge 34.6% swing to win Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath with a near 10,000 majority.
Former Prime Minister Mr Brown was the local MP for 32 years before standing down at the last election.
Lesley Laird, Fife Council’s former deputy leader, is the party’s candidate for the June 8 vote.
Labour claimed analysis of last week’s council elections shows the party is ahead of the SNP or within a single percentage point in seven constituencies.
These included a series of seats across the central belt, as well as Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath.
James Kelly, Scottish Labour’s general election campaign manager, said: “It’s clearer now than ever before that only Labour can defeat the SNP in vast swathes of Scotland.”
Mr Mullin said: “I feel very good about the campaign. The Labour Party can say what they like but throughout Scotland the main battle is the SNP and the Tories.”
Meanwhile, Labour has claimed that nurses in Scotland have seen their wages fall by an average of £3,400 in real terms as a result of the cap on public sector pay.
With rises limited to a below inflation 1%, Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale pledged her party would scrap the pay cap and give health workers the “pay increase they deserve”.
That was backed by Royal College of Nursing Scotland director Theresa Fyffe, who urged all parties to “show that they value nursing staff by ending the 1% pay cap and paying them a fair wage”.
Chris Stephens, the SNP candidate for Glasgow South West, said newly qualified Scottish nurses are £312 a year better off than their counterparts in England and Wales.
In Manchester, Jeremy Corbyn launched his general election campaign promising that a Labour government would give British people the chance to “take our wealth back” from tax cheats, rip-off bosses and greedy bankers.
Conservative chairman Sir Patrick McLoughlin denounced the speech as “angry, divisive and chaotic”. kiandrews@thecourier.co.uk