MY FIGHT FOR THE UNION
IWAS delighted this past week when opposition parties finally acknowledged the reality that is facing us as a country – we need a General Election before we can move forward. But getting to this point has not been pretty.
Labour have been calling for an Election for months. Yet three times Jeremy Corbyn refused to support one.
If anything, the SNP has looked even more ridiculous. In the space of four days, Ian Blackford, the Nationalist leader at Westminster, went from saying that an Election was ‘barking mad’ to proposing one and arguing it was essential... then he abstained in the final vote.
It is for the opposition parties, the Liberal Democrats included, to explain why it took so long for the penny to drop.
But in the end we have what the country needs – the chance to change a Parliament in stalemate, that for more than three years has been unable to make the big decisions on Brexit. It is a vital opportunity.
Across the UK, we Conservatives will fight tooth and nail to return with a majority so we can honour the result of the 2016 referendum and finally deliver Brexit.
The Prime Minister has achieved what many people believed was impossible. He has struck a great deal with the EU that works for Scotland and the whole of the UK.
It was even approved by this deadlocked Parliament before the wreckers threatened further pointless delays. So the way forward is simple. We need to implement the deal and end the uncertainty.
We are the only party promising to do that. We need to win a majority to get on with the job.
After three years of paralysis and frustration, I’d say the stakes could not be higher. But sadly in Scotland they are – because for us the next six weeks will not be about Brexit.
The Election campaign has not officially begun yet, but already the biggest issue facing Scots has become crystal clear. Within hours of MPs breaking the impasse by agreeing to the Election, Nicola Sturgeon did what she does best – stage another photo op.
She told flag-waving activists exactly what they wanted to hear – that a vote for the SNP on December 12 was a vote for a second referendum on separation.
If the Nationalists win more than half of Scotland’s 59 Westminster seats, she vowed she would treat the result as an ‘unequivocal and irresistible demand’ for a vote to tear us all out of the UK.
Frighteningly, Jeremy Corbyn does not have a problem with that. In fact, he bent over backwards to help. As Ms Sturgeon was putting separation firmly at the heart of the Nationalists’ Election campaign, the Labour leader indicated that if he becomes Prime Minister he will allow a second vote on independence – and that it might happen as early as 2021.
His close friend and ally, the shadow transport minister Andy
McDonald, underlined the pledge, saying: ‘We’re not going to stand in the way of a second independence referendum.’ It was a shocking show of Mr Corbyn’s weakness.
He has surveyed the wreckage that is Scottish Labour and done the maths. He has calculated that his only chance of entering No 10 is by means of a dodgy deal with the Nationalists.
Let’s be clear about what that means. In a heartbeat, Mr Corbyn would drag Scotland back to the rancour, division and uncertainty of 2014. He would risk the break-up of the United Kingdom to become Prime Minister. That alone should be all the evidence you need that he is not, and never will be, fit to serve in the position.
What a let-down. What a let-down for Scotland and the UK.
What a let-down, too, for the thousands of his own party’s supporters who, unlike their leader, understand clearly the danger posed by Ms Sturgeon’s relentless pursuit of ripping Scotland out of the UK and putting up a hard border across the country from Gretna to Berwick.
Ms Sturgeon’s agenda is clear and Mr Corbyn’s connivance in it is just as transparent.
The Lib Dems are too weak in Scotland to stand up to them. Their only real goal in this Election is to rip up the EU referendum result and scrap Brexit, a plan that would do irreparable damage to our politics. It is neither liberal nor democratic. Ripping up Brexit would only serve to widen the divisions in our society.
It is not a plan to resolve Brexit, as people want us to do, it would just pour salt on our wounds.
Across Scotland, only my party, the Scottish Conservatives, are strong enough to stand up to Ms Sturgeon’s SNP and her little Labour helpers.
We are fighting this Election not just to get Brexit sorted, but to save Scotland from the uncertainty and the division of another unwanted independence referendum. It is a fight we relish. We go into it with a message that could not be clearer and that we know people across Scotland want to hear.
We also approach December 12 with a group of candidates and a record in Government that we are intensely proud of.
Since 2017, when most of us were elected for the first time, we have shown what a difference a strong group of Scottish Conservative MPs can make.
In successive Budgets, the UK Government has delivered for Scotland, thanks to a strong push from our MPs.
Duty on spirits has been frozen, for example, in a major boost for our biggest export, Scotch.
What a great result for Douglas Ross, our MP for Moray, whose constituency is blessed with more distilleries than any other.
As a Government, we are also investing across Scotland, so that we can boost our economy and create more jobs.
So far we have committed £1.4 billion to our growth deal programme and Scottish Conservative MPs have battled for – and won – extra resources for their areas.
As a newly elected backbencher, I lobbied hard on behalf of Scotland’s farmers to resolve a long-running dispute over EU funding allocations.
I was extremely proud, having become Secretary of State for Scotland, to stand alongside Prime Minister Boris Johnson when he announced an extra £211 million worth of support for Scottish agriculture, settling the row once and for all. As a Government, we have secured the future of Scottish shipbuilding for decades to come with huge contracts for the Navy’s new generation of warships.
We have also provided an additional £1.2 billion for the Scottish Government – leaving the SNP with no excuses for their failure to improve our schools, hospitals and transport network.
So the Conservatives have a great track record – and I don’t mind if I sound like a broken record, talking about it from now until polling day.
The Election will be upon us all too soon, and the stakes are so high that we will not mind a bit of bad weather getting out to vote.
My message is simple. Only my party, the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party, is promising to sort Brexit.
We promise to end the uncertainty and create exciting new opportunities for our fishermen and, through new global trade deals, all the key sectors of our economy.
We are also the only party which is strong enough to stand up to Nicola Sturgeon – and stand up for the majority of people in Scotland who are sick and tired of her independence obsession.
We know that she will use any SNP success to demand a second referendum on leaving our United Kingdom.
Every vote for us is a vote to say No, loud and clear, to that dreadful prospect.
Jeremy Corbyn knows his only chance of being PM is a dodgy deal with SNP
Standing up for those sick and tired of Nicola Sturgeon’s indy obsession