GEORGE Osborne has branded SNP MPs “noisy and aggressive”, ruled out a second independence referendum and said Labour’s decline in Scotland presented the Conservatives with the opportunity to rebuild north of the border.
The Chancellor, who will take Prime Minister’s Questions because David Cameron is on a ministerial trip to Europe, said it would be a “tragedy” if Scotland left the Union and made clear that the vote in 2014 had settled the issue of Scottish independence for a generation.
“We got a clear result with 55 per cent in favour of staying in,” he declared.
Speaking in New York to the Council on Foreign Relations, Mr Osborne said the election of 56 SNP MPs out of a total of 59 in Scotland had created a major change at Westminster.
“They are a noisy and aggressive bloc in the House of Commons, who are not trying to be part of the UK Government and that is a departure.
“Now, whether that ends up being some kind of settled position for Scotland - that they elect a Nationalist but don’t want to leave the UK - I don’t know.”
The Chancellor stressed how Nicola Sturgeon and her Nationalist colleagues were “not asking for another referendum”.
He went on: “It was agreed before we had the referendum that the outcome would be decisive and that would settle the issue at least for a generation, if not for people’s lifetimes. As far as I am concerned, the deal done before the referendum is the deal that should stay after the referendum.”
Mr Osborne added that the success of the SNP and the failure of Scottish Labour had created an “opportunity for the Conservative party to rebuild itself in Scotland a little”.
In response, the SNP’s Pete Wishart MP said: “George Osborne is absolutely right that SNP MPs are not trying to be part of the UK Government; with Labour in utter turmoil both north and south of the border, it is up to SNP MPs to be the only effective opposition to Tory austerity at Westminster.”
The Perth MP said his Nationalist colleagues were committed to representing the people of Scotland and one of the many ways they did that was by turning up in the Commons chamber and questioning ministers on their policies and proposals.
“If all the work that SNP MPs are doing to represent Scottish interests means creating a noise, then that is exactly what we will continue to do and George Osborne would do well to heed our example and stand up for the people of England instead of hammering on with the Tories' damaging obsession with austerity," he added.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel