BORIS Johnson has been challenged to tell his Scottish Conservative counterpart to quit as an MP before the Holyrood election.
Ian Blackford, the SNP Westminster leader, asked the Prime Minister why he was not ensuring Douglas Ross's resignation while he stood for election to the Scottish Parliament.
Mr Ross, MP for Moray and leader of the Scottish Conservatives, is hoping to secure a seat in Holyrood in May, however has retained his MP position in the meantime unlike SNP MP Neil Gray, who is standing down from Westminster while he seeks a Holyrood seat.
During Prime Minister's Questions, Mr Blackford said: "The Scottish Tory leader is also seeking a place in the Scottish Parliament but is refusing to step down as an MP. So as his boss, will the Prime Minister order the member for Moray to resign his seat, avoid a dual mandate and save the taxpayer £175,000, or are dual mandates one more Tory policy where they think greed is good?"
Mr Johnson said: “[Mr Ross] is doing an excellent job of holding the SNP to account for their manifold failings not least on education, failing to deliver on crime, failing in my view to deliver for the people of Scotland, so caught up as they are in their desire for independence and another referendum for separation.
"I’m amazed actually that he hasn’t mentioned it so far but perhaps he will now."
The SNP leader said Douglas Ross "doesn’t even have the courage to put himself before the voters in a Scottish constituency" and said Ruth Davidson was "fleeing to the House of Lords"
He added that the Scottish Conservatives were "led by a man so devoid of imagination that when asked what he would do if he was Prime Minister for a day replied 'I would like to see tougher enforcement against gypsy travellers’"
Boris Johnson responded: "[He] represents a party that’s so devoid of imagination that it can’t come up with any workable solutions to help the people of Scotland improve their education, improve the fight against crime, cut taxes in Scotland where they’re the highest in the whole of the UK.”
He added: “All they can talk about is a referendum to break up the UK… it’s twice he hasn’t mentioned it, maybe he’s getting nervous of singing that particular song.”
The Prime Minsiter was also challenged over his cuts to the armed forces, announced earlier this week, in contraduction to his promises prior to the General Election of 2019.
Labour leader Keir Starmer asked why the PM had broken his commitment, and said "Only this Prime Minister could suggest a reduction from 82,000 to 72,000 is somehow not a cut.
“But the Prime Minister didn’t answer my question, which is why did he make that promise?”
He added: “What did he do this week? He cut the British Army by 10,000, he cut the number of tanks, he cut the number of planes for our RAF and he cut the number of ships for the Royal Navy.”
Boris Johnson said “not only did we keep our promise in the manifesto” but the Conservatives also increased defence spending beyond their manifesto pledge.
He welcomed Labour’s “new spirit of jingo”, adding: “They don’t like it up ’em, Mr Speaker.”
The Labour leader also challenged him about steel industry jobs, asking if he would so "whatever necessary" to protect them.
He said: "5,000 jobs are at risk at Liberty Steel with many more in the supply chain.
"The UK steel industry is under huge pressure and the Government’s failure to prioritise British steel in infrastructure projects is costing millions of pounds in investment.
"Will the Prime Minister now commit to working with us and the trade unions to change this absurd situation to put British steel first and do whatever is necessary to protect those jobs?"
Mr Johnson responded: “Of course (I’m) happy to co-operate in any way but the steel output halved under the Labour government. I share very much the anxiety of families with steelworkers who work in Liberty Steel.
“And that’s why the Business Secretary has had I think three meetings just in the last few days with Liberty Steel to take the question forward, see what we can do. We are actively engaged, we’re investing huge sums in modernising British steel.”
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