RICHARD Leonard will today set out plans to use more debt and public ownership to push back against market forces and move to a zero-carbon Scotish economy.
The Scottish Labour leader will tell a party event in Motherwell a Labour administration at Holyrood would “experiment” with new forms of public bodies, and “maximise devolution” to sustain jobs in a “green industrial revolution”.
Pointing towards more government borrowing, he will say: “We must be able to invest in our manufacturing base to make the transition we need. For this we need borrowing powers fit for a parliament.”
He will also accuse the SNP government of failing to use its current powers to prevent or mitigate Tory austerity and address wealth and health inequalities in Scotland.
Mr Leonard will speak event alongside Midlothian MP Daniele Rowley and shadow business secretary Rebecca Long Bailey, who is tipped to succeed Jeremy Corbyn.
He will say there is a need to “experiment in different forms of ownership… so that we cease to be spectators or victims of circumstances, but participants and common owners”.
He will say: “For the avoidance of doubt, we will not attain the transformative change we need by leaving it to market forces. Or merely leaving it to the mitigation of market forces, through defensive rescues.
“If we are to re-purpose the whole Scottish economy it cannot be done according to the central tenets of neo-liberal economics: the old ideas of privatisation, of austerity, of rolling back the state.”
Rather than relying on foreign investment or “multinational financial and corporate interests”, he will advocate “an innovative state” that uses its powers over procurement, planning, and licensing to drive low carbon and renewable energy developments.”
Mr Leonard, who has set up a working group on greater devolution, said he wanted more decisions made in Scotland, but did not want to undermine the Union.
He said: “We are tapping into an understanding… that the UK state needs to be reformed.
“We want to see the abolition of the House of Lords, and I want to see stronger regional and national governments with the UK as well.”
SNP MSP Richard Lyle said: “Labour have been promising to abolish the House of Lords for decades, but they lack the backbone for any meaningful action.
“It’s hollow promises like these that explain exactly why people across Scotland have given up on Labour, and why they’re polling in single figures.
“As long as Labour allows Westminster to do whatever it wants to Scotland, they’ll continue down the path to complete irrelevance.
“If Labour want to stand a chance of recovery, they need to start standing up for the interests of the Scottish people – against Brexit, and for Scotland taking its future into its own hands.”
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