Nationalist MP is branded ‘inept’ in extraordinary Commons clash
NATIONALIST MP Pete Wishart provoked an extraordinary clash in the House of Commons yesterday after goading the tories over the Scottish election.
Mr Wishart, convener of the powerful Scottish Affairs Committee, used his position to try to embarrass Scottish Secretary Alister Jack, who had been invited to answer questions.
the outspoken SNP politician opened his questioning by asking Mr Jack to clarify ‘who actually won the election a week ago today’.
It prompted a stinging rebuke from Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross, a member of the committee, who branded Mr Wishart’s chairmanship ‘inept’.
Mr Wishart then went on to ask 20 minutes of questions about independence – and was accused of ignoring crucial issues such as the coronavirus pandemic and the economic recovery.
Yesterday’s meeting of the committee was the first since the Holyrood election and Mr Jack had been invited to face questions about a wide range of issues, including the economy, government spending in Scotland and post-Brexit policies.
After Mr Jack congratulated Nicola Sturgeon on her election victory and praised the performance of the Scottish Conservatives, Mr Wishart said the result was ‘overwhelmingly decisive’ and said the SNP won a record number of constituency seats and a higher percentage of the vote than ever before.
He then asked a series of questions about the SNP’s demand for an independence referendum.
Conservative MP John Lamont was first to confront Mr Wishart, telling him: ‘People watching this at home will find it extraordinary that the SNP chairman of this committee has spent more than 20 minutes talking about another independence referendum when there are so many other things that are pressing, like how for example we are managing Covid, how we are managing the vaccine programme, how we are dealing with the economic recovery plan.’
When it came to his turn to ask questions, Mr Ross said: ‘I have to say at the outset how disappointed people must have been to watch the quite frankly inept and poor chairing of this committee so far by Mr Wishart.’
A furious Mr Wishart interrupted, saying: ‘Listen Douglas, excuse me, Douglas Ross, there is no need at all to make attacks on the chair of this committee.
‘I have been elected by the House to chair this committee, could you please just get on with the job of addressing your questions.’
When Mr Ross said he was being ‘sensitive’, Mr Wishart said: ‘I’m trying to get on with doing my job without any sort of personal attacks – please get on with your questions.’
Mr Ross said: ‘When you are so poor at your job I will personally attack you because you have talked over a witness repeatedly today.’
Mr Wishart responded: ‘this is just absolutely pathetic, will you please just get on with your questions without erroneous attacks on the chair.’
Mr Ross said: ‘Well it is not erroneous if you are poor and inept.’
Retaliating, Mr Wishart urged the MP to ‘get on with your poor and inept questions please, so we can get on with this session’.
the Moray MP, who was taking part through a video link from the Scottish parliament, said: ‘So our impartial chair has already decided my questions will not be as good as his and I think yet again people will see the SNP don’t like to be criticised.’
He added: ‘Hopefully you can calm down now, chair, as I address my questions to the Secretary of State and the minister.’
Chairmen of select committees receive an additional £16,422 top-up to their salary, on top of the £81,932 for all
‘SNP don’t like to be criticised’
MPs. After the meeting, Mr Ross said: ‘I look at how Labour and Conservative MPs chair committees and they are non-partisan and impartial and don’t try to goad people and put personal views across. this is not the first time that Pete Wishart cannot hide his political affiliation when doing an important role for parliament, which he is paid handsomely for.’
During the meeting, Mr Jack said the Scottish parliament must be ‘100 per cent’ focused on rebuilding from Covid and insisted there should not be an independence referendum in the next five years because most Scots don’t want it.
He also said the UK is entering a ‘critical phase’ in the fight against the pandemic.
‘You are so poor at your job’