I’LL HAND CORBYN KEYS TO No.10 SAYS STURGEON

PM warns against ‘coalition of chaos’

NICOLA Sturgeon yesterday threatened to help Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street by propping up a Labour Government. The SNP leader said she would seek to form a ‘progressive alliance’ to stop Theresa May remaining in power.

But Mrs May instantly attacked the plan, which she said would lead to ‘a coalition of chaos’.

Even Labour sources accused the First Minister of deliberately raising the prospect of doing a deal to hasten the party’s demise in England.

Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale said a pact between Labour and the SNP would damage Britain.

Miss Sturgeon made the incendiary comments outside the House of Commons on the day that Parliament voted 522 to 13 in favour of the Prime

Minister’s proposal to hold a General Election on June 8.

She said: ‘If the Parliamentary arithmetic lends itself to the SNP being part of a progressive alliance to keep the Tories out of government then the SNP will seek to be part of that, as we said in 2015.

‘Obviously, now, I’m not sure many people think Labour are going to be in a position on their own or with anybody else to form a government.

‘My job in this election, first and foremost, is to stand up for Scotland. Only the SNP can stand between Scotland and an increasingly hardline Conservative Government.’

Mr Corbyn desperately tried to downplay the chances of a deal, saying he would not work with a party that wants to break up Britain.

But Mrs May said the choice was between the Conservatives or ‘a coalition of chaos led by Jeremy Corbyn’.

Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson said: ‘Nicola Sturgeon has today made it clear: at this election, we face the grave danger of a weak Labour/SNP/Lib Dem alliance, headed by Jeremy Corbyn, plunging the UK into more instability and uncertainty.

‘We know Jeremy Corbyn is “absolutely fine” with the SNP’s demand for a second referendum.

‘There is a real danger of Mr Corbyn and Miss Sturgeon cooking up a deal to suit both their purposes.

‘It’s only the Scottish Conservatives at this election who can be trusted to stand up for our Union and work to get the best Brexit deal for all of us.’

Mrs May seized on the offer of a pact at Prime Minister’s Questions, telling MPs that Miss Sturgeon, Mr Corbyn and Lib Dem leader Tim Farron ‘want to unite together to divide our country – and we will not let them do it’.

Miss Sturgeon said: ‘If the SNP wins this election in Scotland and the Tories don’t, then Theresa May’s attempt to block our mandate to give the people of Scotland a choice over their own future when the time is right will crumble to dust.

‘I will be campaigning and leading a campaign in this election to return each and every one of the constituencies to the SNP that we won in 2015 – and having a go at the other three as well.’

But Miss Davidson said she would ‘make damn sure’ the SNP doesn’t return 56 out of the 59 Scottish seats, as it did at the last election. ‘If she wants to claim a victory when she falls back, then that is entirely up to her,’ she added.

A Labour source said: ‘Nicola Sturgeon knows when she says things like this that it is poison for Labour voters in England.

‘She wants a weak Labour Party because she thinks it gives her a better chance of making Scotland independent. She is happy with portraying it as a Sturgeon-May battle because she will claim it is Scotland against the Tories. All they care about is a second referendum and how to bring that about.

‘If the SNP was genuinely wanting to get the Tories out, she would not be talking up the prospects of a progressive alliance.’

Miss Dugdale yesterday published an article claiming a Labour/SNP alliance would ‘hinder, not help, the fight for a fairer UK’. She said: ‘A socalled “progressive alliance” is simply a gift to the Tory Party. It was central to the Tories’ 2015 election campaign. It is staggering that people who claim to want a genuinely progressive government can’t see that.’

Mr Corbyn last night told Labour’s National Executive Committee he was ‘100 per cent happy’ to rule out a ‘progressive alliance’ with the SNP.

Following the NEC meeting, he said: ‘There will be no coalition deal with the SNP. The SNP may talk Left at Westminster, but in government in Scotland it acts Right. A genuinely progressive party

‘We face grave danger’ ‘There will be no deal with SNP’

would not refuse to introduce a 50p top rate of income tax.

‘The SNP wants to break up the UK; it has no interest in making it work better. Independence would lead to turbocharged austerity in Scotland – not progressive politics.

‘Nicola Sturgeon is trying to convince people in Scotland you can get rid of the Tories by voting SNP. She couldn’t be more wrong. Only Labour or the Tories can win this election and voting Labour is the only way to remove Theresa May from office.’

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