The Scottish Greens co-leader Lorna Slater has insisted that her party could catch Labour in next year’s Holyrood elections.
Speaking at the party's online conference she said that opinion polls showed the “momentum is behind us”, with rising levels of support for the Greens adding: “We can be the spark that brings hope.”
READ MORE: Brexit: Trade talks continuing through the weekend as end of transition period looms
The party returned six MSPs in the last Scottish Parliament election in 2016, with Scottish Labour returning 24 MSPs – but more recent polls have shown support for Richard Leonard’s party declining.
Ms Slater said that at the next Scottish Parliament elections in May the Greens could “grow our numbers all over Scotland”.
She said: “We can elect three MSPs in Glasgow and Lothian, we can elect MSPs in the North East and Central for the first time and win back the South of Scotland.
“The opinion polls show we can do this, maybe we can catch Scottish Labour. The momentum is behind us and we can do the work needed to make this dream a reality.”
She stated that the Greens were the only party with the policies in place to tackle the looming climate change emergency and touched on the the “triple threat of Brexit, a global pandemic and the increasingly evident climate catastrophe”.
Addressing members of the party she added: “It’s clear that people want solutions, we want to see a future that isn’t bleak, the Greens can provide that.”
She criticised the Labour Party for its support for a new coal mine in Cumbria, and said the Tories wanted to add “extra lanes of traffic jams to our motorways”.
Meanwhile, she said the SNP had refused to commit to ending oil and gas extraction in the North Sea
“We are the only party that has practical policies that will bring about the change that is needed,” the Green insisted.
She spoke about Scotland’s potential to “lead the renewables charge not just in these islands but across this continent”.
Ms Slater said: “The Scottish Greens know Scotland has the potential to be a positive role model for the world leading efforts to tackle the climate emergency and restructuring our economy to build a secure future for us all.”
She added: “The future doesn’t have to be bleak, the future can be brilliant.”
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