A TORY Westminster candidate has called for Scotland to leave the Union because it’s fleecing “Conservative-voting English taxpayers”.

The incendiary comments were uncovered as speculation about the possibility a snap General Election later this year continued to mount.

Ryan Henson, who was last year selected as the party’s candidate in the marginal Bedford and Kempston constituency, made the accusations back in 2014 in a blog for the Conservative Home website.

The SNP’s Pete Wishart said the remarks were “typical of the contempt for Scotland that is increasingly in the mainstream of the Tory party”.

In the article, the young Tory claimed that “Scotland’s single biggest offering to the union over the past 50 years has been to provide the Labour party with parliamentary lobby fodder.”

He went on: “In exchange, the people of England have seen their prescriptions and their university fees go up, while in Scotland both have been abolished – using English taxes to pay for it.”

Henson added: “Like a marauding tribe from the Dark Ages, Scottish Labour MPs have travelled south every four years to pillage their hard-working, wealthier and more politically sound neighbours. Enough is enough.”

“Scotland faces economic ruin,” he added, “should it continue with its socialist policies after losing the power to fleece the Conservative-voting English taxpayers. It is we English who bankroll her free health prescriptions; fund the entirety of her children’s four-year-long university courses; and subsidise her bloated, private-enterprise-killing, left-leaning public sector.”

He also said that, after Scottish independence, the English economy would thrive.

The English, he said, should say “what everyone’s really thinking: Scotland, it’s time for you to go”.

Speaking to the Guardian over the weekend, Henson said the article had been an attempt at satire. “This was intended as a light hearted take on the Scottish Referendum campaign, and was taken as such at the time. It does not reflect my views – I passionately believe in the importance of the Union especially at this time.”

Wishart pointed to a recent poll that suggested most Tory members were willing to sacrifice the union for Brexit: “The Tories under Boris Johnson are completely out of touch with Scotland. No wonder more and more people are concluding that independence is the only way forward.”

Henson stands a good chance of becoming an MP at the next election, with the Tories throwing everything they have at the Bedfordshire constituency, currently held by Labour with a majority of just 789.

Yesterday Tory chairman James Cleverly failed to rule out a general election, saying only that the government would not “initiate” a vote.

He told Sky’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday: “What we’ve got is a new prime minister who during the leadership campaign made a number of explicit commitments and he is setting about delivering on those commitments. Prime ministers making good on their promises is a good thing and that is what we are doing.”

According to the Sunday Times, senior Tory sources say Boris Johnson’s team has drawn up a strategy for winning an election, either soon after Brexit or in circumstances where the opposition parties and Tory rebels bring down the government in a no confidence vote to prevent a No-deal.

The paper says bosses at Conservative campaign headquarters have also begun talking to pollsters and data experts who might tender for business. “They’re on a war footing,” said one source.

Meanwhile, the People’s Vote campaign has drawn up a hit list of 100 marginal seats across Scotland, England, and Wales.