NICOLA Sturgeon launched the SNP’s manifesto for the European elections in Glasgow on Friday. She set out a positive, progressive, European future for Scotland. One which makes crystal clear that Scotland’s not for Brexit — Scotland is for Europe.
That is where we see our nation’s future for many, many years to come – and, ultimately, as an independent country.
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That positive vision is a far cry from the doom, gloom and utter chaos of Brexit that has entirely consumed Westminster politics for the past three years.
Perhaps what demonstrates the complete and utter lack of vision from the Tories is their Scottish manifesto launch this week. There was a key component missing – a manifesto!
That sums up the state of the Tories amid the ongoing Brexit morass. They are a party with no ideas, no clue, no leadership and no strategy to end the stalemate – still intent on dragging the UK off a cliff-edge with all the damage that will entail.
Scotland did not vote for this and we will not stand for it.
The hardline Brexiteers on the Tory benches at Westminster think the Prime Minister needs to go.
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We don’t disagree. But we want to see this whole rotten UK Government out of office. It has failed at each and every turn and ignored Scotland’s interests.
We have proposed reasonable, sensible compromise at every opportunity for more than two years but the UK Government has failed to listen.
We didn’t crash out of the Europe at the end of March, thanks in no small part to the goodwill of our friends in the EU, and yet there is no sign that the UK Government is using the extra time wisely to reach out to the devolved nations or to put the questions they have singularly failed to answer back to the people.
The problem now is that the chaos of Brexit could be set to get a whole lot worse. Enter stage right (or should that be far-right?) Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson.
Johnson personifies the very worst of the Leave campaign that has taken the UK to the brink of Brexit disaster. He was front and centre of the deceitful campaign in the lead up to the European referendum in 2016 — the lie of £350 million extra for the NHS each week, plucked from the ether and plastered on the side of a bus.
This week he has thrown his hat in the ring to be the next leader of the Tory party.
That is a very dangerous prospect indeed for the UK and for Scotland’s future.
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We should never fall into the trap of viewing “bumbling Boris” as nothing more than a joking jester who likes plays to the gallery.
The trouble with Brexit is that these right-wingers in the Tory ranks are calling the shots.
Theirs is an agenda which is dangerous and risks making an already perilous situation considerably worse.
Johnson, Michael Gove, Dominic Raab and their ilk will ignore all evidence in the pursuit of power.
THE analysis shows that leaving the EU with the hardest of Brexits they so desire will hammer Scotland’s economy, with GDP slashed by 7%, 100,000 people out of work and household incomes badly hit.
It would leave each person in Scotland worse off by almost £2300.
Conservative Brexit brinkmanship has already caused the pound to tumble in value, hiked up costs of goods and plunged savings and pensions markets into a volatile, uncertain state of flux.
Johnson’s short stint as foreign secretary was more than long enough and gave us more than enough warning of the damage he would do were he ever to get his hands on the keys to Number 10.
His track record at the Foreign Office was certainly no laughing matter.
Erratic behaviour and inflammatory statements put relations between the UK and our international partners in peril and risked the security of British people abroad.
That reckless arrogance should rule him out of front-line politics full stop, never mind the leadership of the Tory party.
A few months ago the very notion of a Boris Johnson premiership, propped up by Nigel Farage, would have been dismissed as a far-fetched joke you might hear on Have I Got News For You.
But it’s not funny.
It is now a deadly serious possibility, with nightmarish consequences for all of us.
It is a demonstration of exactly why Scotland must have the option available to it to choose a better course at this critical time.
And Scotland must have that choice — the choice of becoming an independent, European nation.
Support for independence is at record levels and people are realising more and more the advantages of making all decisions over our future here in Scotland.
Brexit demonstrates all too clearly the dangers of leaving our fate in the hands of Conservative Westminster governments that we have not voted for.
I have no doubt that if Johnson is allowed to wrestle control of the wheel, to drive the UK off the Brexit cliff edge, then support for independence will grow and grow.
Scotland has a real opportunity this Thursday.
We voted by a strong majority, in every single part of our country, to reject Brexit in 2016.
By voting SNP we can send a powerful message that will be heard loud and clear in Westminster and across Europe.
Scotland rejects Brexit.
Scotland says no to the agenda of Boris Johnson and the Tories.
Scotland has the right to be heard.
And Scotland is, firmly, for Europe.
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Callum Baird, Editor of The National
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