Candidates clash over proposal for new rules to recall absent MSPs
The Tory candidate trying to take over from disgraced MSP Derek Mackay has challenged her SNP rival to back a ‘Mackay’s Law.’
Julie Pirone says voters need to know where the SNP candidate Natalie Don stands on the issue.
She wants Don to commit to backing plans for a ‘Mackay’s Law’ in the next Scottish Parliament.
But Don has bitten back in the row and said she will support new rules to defrock MSPs who fail to attend Holyrood.
The duo are fighting for the Renfrewshire North and West seat at Holyrood vacated by Derek Mackay.
Pirone is a long committed supporter of the plans brought forward by fellow Scottish Conservative Graham Simpson.
The former finance secretary Derek Mackay (pictured below) quit on the eve of the Scottish budget on February 6 last year after it was revealed he had pestered a 16-year-old boy with hundreds of text messages.
But he continued to pick-up his meaty salary and expenses and has only recently stood down.
The legislation would ensure voters would never again be left with nobody turning up at Parliament.
Mackay’s Law would guarantee that MSPs who didn’t appear in parliament for six months would be forced out in the same way absentee councillors are.
Pirone said: “It is shameful that voters here in Renfrewshire North and West have been left without proper representation for over a year.
“Derek Mackay should have done the honourable thing and resigned immediately. However, he continued to pocket vast sums of money at the hands of the taxpayer. That situation must never happen again which is why I’m backing Mackay’s Law.
“The parliament simply must have the powers to ensure absentee MSPs can be forced out.
“That’s my promise to the voters in Renfrewshire North and West.
“Will Natalie Don make that same promise and commit to backing these plans? Voters here have a right to know that she wants MSPs to be accountable to the voters here. I hope that other candidates standing here will join me in telling voters where they stand on Mackay’s Law.”
Don, a serving Renfrewshire councillor, told the Paisley Daily Express she will back the law.
And in a blistering response, she said: “The Scottish Parliament needs a recall system. People deserve to be able to hold politicians to account and this is true of all parties.
“Now that I have answered the Tory candidate’s question, perhaps she can answer one for me.
“Does she think it is acceptable that the Conservative UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson called gay men ‘tank topped bum boys’ and called black people ‘picaninnies’ with ‘watermelon smiles’?
“I hope the Conservative candidate would condemn this.”
Also fighting for the seat are Labour’s Johanna Baxter, Ross Stalker for the Lib Dems and Marty Bell for the Scottish Family Party.