UK will come back stronger, says PM on Scotland visit
BORIS JOHNSON yesterday pledged that the UK will “bounce back stronger together” from the Covid-19 crisis as he played down polls showing majority support for Scottish independence.
Speaking on a visit to Scotland to mark his first anniversary as Prime Minister, he said any differences between his strategy and Nicola Sturgeon’s for tackling the virus were
“superficial”. With Ms Sturgeon’s personal approval ratings in Scotland having soared, he acknowledged there were “differences in presentation” but insisted that “when you strip away some of the rhetoric” there was little between them.
Rejecting demands for a second independence referendum, he said the response to Covid had been a “fantastic demonstration in the way we work together as one country” and argued it had “exemplified” some of the United
Kingdom’s “key strengths”. In a sepa- rate statement issued today to mark a year since taking office, he said the Government had made “great progress” on delivering its priorities before the “devastating blow” of the coronavirus outbreak.
Mr Johnson added: “Today I want to make this pledge: I will not let the virus hold this country back.”
Ms Sturgeon yesterday accused him of using the pandemic as a “political campaigning tool” in Scotland and said he should not “crow” about the Union’s success in tackling the virus.
Scotland’s First Minister insisted a separate Scotland could have provided the same support to struggling businesses and families, despite having no central bank or currency of its own and the largest national deficit in Europe.
Ms Sturgeon said: “I don’t think any of us should be championing and celebrating a pandemic that has taken thousands of lives as an example of the pre-existing political case we want to make.
“None of us should be crowing about this pandemic in a political sense.”
Rejecting Mr Johnson’s claim the Covid-19 response demonstrated the Union’s “might”, she said: “If Scotland was an independent country then just like Ireland or many of the other small countries, we’d be doing these things ourselves. So in that sense it’s a bit of a
redundant argument.” But the Prime Minister adopted a consensual tone and argued that the “incredible speed” in which the Treasury implemented the furlough scheme, which protected 900,000 Scottish jobs, demonstrated the Union’s benefits. His intervention came as the Treasury announced the devolved administrations will receive at least £3.7 billion of extra funding this year, on top of £8.9 billion already provided.
The Prime Minister’s trip to Scotland, the first since the election, was aimed at increasing public awareness of the support provided by the UK Government during the pandemic amid intense frustration in 10 Downing Street that Ms Sturgeon is reaping the credit.
Recent polls have put support for independence at 54 per cent and suggested Ms Sturgeon is on course to win a majority in next May’s Holyrood election, placing huge pressure on Mr Johnson to agree to her demand for a second referendum.
But the Prime Minister highlighted her pledge before the 2014 vote that it would not be rerun for another generation and said six years did not meet this test “by any computation”.
He travelled to Orkney, where he met crab fishermen and unveiled a £50million growth fund for Scotland’s islands, and later visited RAF Lossiemouth in Moray.
Mr Johnson said: “What came home to me today is how we as one country can bounce back stronger together through growth deals and through ensuring we get through a crisis which is not only medical but also I’m afraid
economic.” In the statement marking his anniversary since taking office, he said: “It is one year since I stood on the steps of Downing Street and made a promise to the British people. That this government would get Brexit done and then unite and level up the country.”
He added: “Today I want to make this pledge: I will not let the virus hold this country back. We must harness the unity of purpose and resolve we have shown as a country in fighting coronavirus – and use it to build back better.”
Today Boris Johnson marks his oneyear anniversary as prime minister, and no British leader in the post-war era has had so much thrown at him in so short a time: a general election, withdrawal from the EU, a pandemic, and to cap it all off, the Prime Minister came down with coronavirus himself. When he won the Tory leadership vote last summer, Mr Johnson promised to confound “the doubters, the doomsters, the gloomsters”. In large part, that is what he has done.
The scale of the Brexit challenge is easy to forget: MPS were against it, but they would not back an election. The Prime Minister tried every trick in the book – even prorogation – until, finally, he won his campaign and his historic majority. The Conservatives broke through the Red Wall in the North, capturing a new working-class base and finishing off Corbynism for good. Anyone who doubts the importance of that achievement should ask themselves what Britain would be like right now if Jeremy Corbyn had won the 2019 election.
The country left the EU on January 31 – and a few weeks later walked into another, unpredictable crisis. There are legitimate criticisms to be made of the Government’s pandemic strategy, and the country still faces a situation unparalleled in many people’s lifetimes. But there have been successes, too. Capacity in the NHS has been increased (the great fear was that we would suffer Italy’s fate); testing is finally on course; PPE is far more widely available. And Britain is a world leader on Covid-19 research.
The Prime Minister also had to contend with his personal fight against the virus. Now that he has recovered, the in-tray is piled high: the Tories need to get Britain through the winter, yes, but also to tie together the coronavirus recovery package with their election mandate, to deliver free ports, reformed immigration, to shake up education and build a better business environment. The Union, according to polls, is also in trouble, and the Prime Minister’s trip to Scotland yesterday was a crucial reminder that the country will only get through this by working together.
The political environment is very different from July 2019; Labour looks closer to a functioning Opposition. But even with the ups and downs he has been through, the defining quality of this Prime Minister remains his winning optimism. It has been a remarkable year – but there are still tough times ahead.