Claim of Right for Scotland

Chris Stephens Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Douglas Ross]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman confirming in the House of Commons, so that it will be on the official record, that the SNP garnered votes at this most recent election on the pretence that it was nothing about independence—it was not supporting independence—but less than a month later we are here discussing constitutional issues, because it is all the SNP can bring forward.

I want to pick up on a number of points that the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran made during her speech. She spoke about the absent Secretary of State for Scotland; I am just scanning around and I cannot see the shadow Secretary of State for Scotland anywhere in the Chamber either. The hon. Lady said that the people of Scotland have made their choice, and I agree; as the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber said at Prime Minister’s questions last week, the people of Scotland said no—the people of Scotland said no in 2014.

The hon. Lady said that that 2014 referendum on independence was won on the back of lies and mistruths. I wonder whether the lies and mistruths she is speaking about were in the White Paper that the SNP put forward—the White Paper that promised us oil at $100 a barrel and said that oil was going to pay for absolutely everything in Scotland. [Interruption.] Well, we are really getting animated now, but I will just try to finish my remarks—[Interruption.] We were told that the Scottish economy would be based on oil at $100 a barrel, and we were told that the referendum was a once-in-a-generation event. That is not rhetorical flourish, as some in the SNP would now like to say; that is written in black and white in the White Paper they put forward for independence. That was their model for separation and therefore—

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

On what page?

[Douglas Ross]

The hon. Gentleman is shouting from a sedentary position to ask what page that was on, but I can do better than that; it was in the sixth paragraph of their document to take Scotland out of the United Kingdom. They said very clearly it was a once-in-a-generation event.

The hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran also said that successive election results have proved that the SNP has support across the country, and she reeled off a number of elections in which the SNP has been successful. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray) says, “Every single one,” but not in recent council by-elections. The final council by-election of the decade in Scotland was in my Moray seat, and I am delighted that the Keith and Cullen ward returned a Conservative councillor. Indeed, only last week, in the first council by-election of the decade, a Scottish Conservative was elected, and do you know what the percentage of the vote was for the Scottish Conservatives in that by-election, Mr Speaker? That Scottish Conservative councillor was elected with 62% of the vote, so it is no surprise at all that the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran refused even to comment on those successes of the Scottish Conservative party. [Interruption.] I think that winning 62% of the vote is the big picture.

As I said at the beginning of my speech, there are many things that we should be focusing on in this Parliament, and indeed at Holyrood, that the public in all our constituencies can relate to and be assured that their politicians are dealing with. We should be focusing on issues such as the fact that the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People remains unopened by the SNP, because it has failed in its hospital building. Nor should we be dismissing concerns about the state of our Scottish police stations, which have been shown to be flooding, with water coming through the roofs. These are the issues that the people of Scotland expect our politicians to be dealing with, not constitutional wrangling, which we always get from the SNP. I think SNP Members should focus on that.

Question put and agreed to.