I can heal Labour’s rift, says left-winger
RICHARD Leonard yesterday pledged to “unify” Scottish Labour if he wins the party’s bitter leadership contest.
The left-winger pitched himself as the candidate who can bring the party’s warring tribes back together.
The race to succeed Kezia Dugdale has been dogged by infighting and online skirmishes between supporters of union-backed Leonard and his opponent, centrist Anas Sarwar.
But in a tubthumping speech in Edinburgh, Leonard said he has campaigned for Labour in every election since 1983 and supported candidates from all wings of the party.
He said: “When a Labour candidate is selected, we all get behind them 100 per cent. That’s always been my philosophy and that’s why I believe I am the candidate who can unify the Scottish Labour Party.
“I’ve never joined a faction inside the party and indeed some of my formative experiences were forged on the anvil of tackling a faction – the Militant Tendency.”
Leonard also insisted that an increase to the basic rate of income tax is needed in Scotland to fund the nation’s public services.
He said that it was time “in the teeth of austerity” to debate making that change.
A spokesman for Sarwar dismissed Leonard’s speech as “nothing new”.
Voting opens on Friday and closes on November 17.