POLITICAL BIG HITTERS TARGET CITY
Sturgeon, May and Gove join fight for Stirling
Political big guns are beating a track to the Stirling constituency in a bid to influence voters as they prepare for the General Election on December 12.
Former Prime Minister Theresa May was in Dunblane, Bannockburn and Cambusbarron on Monday to campaign on behalf of Conservative candidate Stephen Kerr.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was on
Tuesday back in Stirling for the second time in three weeks to support SNP candidate Alyn Smith.
And yesterday (Thursday), Mr Kerr’s campaign received a visit from
Michael Gove. The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and former Tory leadership contender, who also served in a number of Cabinet posts including education, justice and agriculture, was on the campaign trail in Doune and Stirling.
Mr Kerr won the Stirling seat with a majority of 148 at the 2017 General Election and while he is battling to return to Westminster, the SNP believes the constituency is there for the taking.
In her latest stop
in Stirling, Ms
Sturgeon visited businesses at Stirling Enterprise Park in the companyofMEPMrSmith.
At Perthshire Preserves, run by Iain Mackenzie and partner Catherine Thornhill, she met‘Yes’-supporting member of staff Bisma Naz then poured and labelled freshly made passionfruit curd.
Perthshire Preserves has been operating for 10 years and is a marmalade world championships gold medal winner.
The company has just secured an order to provide between 75 kilograms and 100 kilograms of strawberry jam to the Balmoral Hotel, Edinburgh.
Ms Sturgeon later visited Bounce OccupationalTherapy. There, the First Minister had a chance to meet the business’s owner Callum McKinnon and children using the facilities from Bannockburn Primary School.
Mr Smith and Ms Sturgeon later met activists and supporters in Stirling city centre.
“It was great to welcome Nicola
Sturgeon back to Stirling and visiting to STEP which is an incubator for a diverse range of exciting businesses and organisations,”said Mr Smith.
“Stirling and Scotland have a choice in this election: more Conservative chaos with Boris Johnson’s candidate, or voting for myself and the SNP to stop this Brexit nonsense so that we can get back to talking about the issues that matter to local people, businesses and communities.”
Mr Gove visited the area to back Tory candidate Stephen Kerr’s election campaign. He said:“In the last two years Stephen has done more for Stirling than any MP here since Michael Forsyth.
“He’s an outstanding candidate and he makes sure that Stirling punches above its weight in parliament.”
During his visit Mr Gove addressed the concerns of farming communities following Brexit, saying that funding to farmers will be guaranteed until 2025.
He added:“It’s a better guarantee than any other party is offering and any other country in the EU has.”
Mr Gove said whilst the future of the Common Agricultural Policy – the system of subsidies paid to EU farmers – was uncertain, a Tory government would protect, in cash terms, the total amount that goes to Scotland’s farmers.
“No other party can provide that five year guarantee,”he added.
He continued: “Obviously, it’s for the Scottish Government to decide how that money is spent, but it’s the strongest guarantee in the whole of Europe.
“On top of that we’re also going to have, outside of the EU, a buy British policy that means that government contracts will go to quality meat producers in Scotland and to farmers across the United Kingdom in a way that we can’t outside and it’s also the case that the trade deal we do with the EU will be based on no tariffs and quotas but also we will have the opportunity to expand on our trade, particularly our meat trade, to the Middle East, to North America and elsewhere.”