MHAIRI Black took on Jeremy Corbyn, the Tories, and the BBC at the SNP conference yesterday, in a barnstorming speech that ended with her telling the party faithful to “get out there and get our independence.”
The Paisley MP said she was “so disappointed with Jeremy Corbyn”.
She had originally been heartened to see him elected as the leader of Labour and thought he would be someone “normal and sensible to work with in London”
“But instead we’ve got more of the same London spin and nothing more than talking a good game,” she said.
“If you’re going to call for an end to austerity don’t release a manifesto scrapping only £2 billion of a total £9bn worth of planned Tory cuts.
“Don’t tell the vulnerable that you’re fighting for them while you choose to keep 78 per cent of Tory cuts. Don’t tell young people that you’ll scrap tuition fees but then turn a blind eye to Labour who hype them up in Wales.
“Don’t tell them you’re different then sign up to waste billions of pounds on nuclear weapons.”
She added: “Don’t come to Scotland, like so many before you, and condescend us by claiming the Scottish Government, with 15 per cent of welfare powers, can somehow undo Tory austerity, when you’re party voted against devolving the real powers that matter.
Black accused Corbyn of spreading “fear and utter drivel about an independent Scotland meaning we would suffer turbo austerity”.
“Because while you’re doing that our Scottish Government is saddled with paying £453.8m mitigating and protecting people from the very worst of the Tory policies that we never voted for in the first place.”
The MP said she was “sick to the back teeth of British nationalists perpetuating the myth that Scotland could not afford to thrive in the world as an independent nation.”
Quoting Trussell Trust figures showing an increase in emergency food supplies in the UK from 61,468 in 2010 to 1,182,954 in 2016, Black said the real question was “Can Scotland afford not to be independent?”
She told the party faithful that they needed to prepare the public for the next referendum and that it was the responsibility of those who support a yes vote to “give people the confidence they need” to back independence.
“We were fed a pack of lies during that referendum: ‘HMRC jobs would only be safe in the UK’ — that was a lie. ‘Shipbuilding would thrive in the UK’ — that was a lie. ‘Voting no was the only way to ensure membership of the EU’ — that was a lie. ‘Pensions would only be safe if we voted no’ — that was a lie.
“That we would be treated as an equal partner, yet we’ve been ignored at every possible turn in the most arrogant of ways, and all the while we’re being fed cliches of how you can’t eat flags. Well you can’t eat fresh air and broken promises either.”
Britain, she said, was a “sinking ship”
“Are we really saying we won’t get on the lifeboat for fear it might not work?”
Black who protested outside the BBC’s Pacific Quay studios during the referendum, said Scots were being let down by the broadcaster and criticised the corporation for inviting Ruth Davidson on to last Sunday’s Andrew Marr .
“The importance of effective media as a critical component to democracy cannot be underestimated.
"So I want to know why the Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson was invited on the Andrew Marr show to talk about our conference at great length, and I want to know where our invite was during their conference.”
A spokesman for the BBC said Black’s criticism was unfair: “The Andrew Marr Show has attended three party conferences this year.
“On all three occasions we interviewed the relevant party leader as well as guests from other parties.
“At Labour we interviewed Jeremy Corbyn and Nick Clegg, at the Conservatives Theresa May and Jon Lansman of Labour group Momentum and at the SNP Nicola Sturgeon and Ruth Davidson. Black’s assertion that Ruth Davidson was asked to “talk about our (SNP) conference at length” is simply untrue.
“She was asked about the Prime Minister and Conservative record and asked no questions whatsoever about the SNP conference.
“Again, this was in line with the other interviews we conducted with Clegg and Lansman.”
Labour MP Danielle Rowley called Black’s speech an “embarrassing rant”
“The SNP has no response to the growing number of people who see that radical change is possible within the UK with a Labour government led by Jeremy Corbyn,” she added.
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