Alan Cochrane

The frontrunner must reassure anxious Scottish Tories that he will be able to save our 300-year Union

Dear Boris, First of all congratulations. That you have won such solid backing from among the people you work with on a daily basis can only be a significant fillip to your chances of becoming the next leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

However, as all Telegraph men and women know only too well, popularity is not a permanent position. Or as you might put it: Ante victoriam ne canas triumphum.

That said, I have to inform you that your success in the first ballot of MPS has not been met with unalloyed rejoicing in Scotland. This is because

there is a widespread view that you are more of an English nationalist than a true Unionist. And, further, that your leadership of the party could be a massive boost to the Scottish National Party and its chances of breaking up the United Kingdom. They say you’re irredeemably Right-wing. Are you?

We need some certainties from you. Personally, I can’t believe that you would wish to be the Tory leader, far less Prime Minister, whose legacy was to be the man who presided over the end of the 300-year-plus union of two of the deepest-dyed enemies the world has ever known.

But to that end you must act and act quickly. You may well have all manner of advisers in your team, but the only person who can sell Boris to the Scots is Boris.

You have a great deal to do, but make no mistake – it must be done. And by you. A great many Scots believe that your personal behaviour over recent years has marked you out not just as some sort of jokey buffoon but also as someone who is the darling of the Tory party in the South of England but nowhere else.

I’ve no idea if there’s a Scottish bone in your body but if there isn’t please don’t make one up and patronise us with tales of how much you loved your old auntie in Largs or wherever, or your holidays in Rosemarkie.

What we want to hear is how much you’re Boris the Brit, the man who will bend every sinew to keep Scotland in the UK and the UK as a major player on the world stage.

If you don’t mind, I shall spell out what you’ve got to counteract. It may be unfair but it’s true, nevertheless, that while an Old Etonian like David Cameron was regarded by many Scots as being a “British toff ”, you are regarded as an “English toff ”. Cameron was eventually accepted, with a good deal of reluctance, as someone that Scottish Unionists could put up with. You must seek to do the same.

And the way to do that is to spell out in terms of as few syllables as possible – and not too many jokes, please – that you will never issue instructions to the Scots about how they should fight an independence referendum. And that you will never, ever agree to granting a Section 30 order in the Commons giving authority to the Scottish Parliament to hold a new vote.

I have sought the views of senior members of your party in Scotland about you. They’re pretty brutal. Their research tells them that you currently put off middle-class, moderate Scots, of whom the majority vote Tory. But, if it comes to another independence referendum, we Unionists also need those Labour moderates in West/ Central Scotland who don’t like Jeremy Corbyn and who have been looking to Ruth Davidson to represent them to fight off the separatists. Her style and the substance of her policy agenda have had a fair measure of success in winning that backing.

Will your leadership help or hinder Ruth in enlisting that electorate? It’s a tall order but it must be done.

If yes, then we need to hear you saying as much, and that you’ll take your lead about preserving the Union from the woman who has transformed the fortunes of the Tories in Scotland to a remarkable extent.

In closing this letter, there’s no point in me disguising the fact that there are some English Tories who would rather see you as Prime Minister of England and who’d let the Scots go their own way. I suspect that’s not your view but, as you continue what seems to be your successful leadership campaign, we Scots need to hear it loud and clear from you.

Is Boris a true Brit? And will he fight to keep Scotland in that great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

Yours sincerely, Alan Cochrane