DOUGLAS Ross has backtracked on a promise that Boris Johnson will visit Scotland in the election campaign, amid claims the Scottish Tory leader is struggling in the polls.

Mr Ross insisted just four weeks ago that the Prime Minister would be on the campaign trail north of the border before voting on May 6.

He twice told the BBC’s Sunday Show: “The Prime Minister will be up here.”

In January, Mr Johnson himself had said: "Wild horses won’t keep me away."

However Mr Ross today changed his tune, conceding the PM may not visit after all, and might only take part in the campaign “virtually”.

Asked if Mr Johnson would visit, Mr Ross replied said: “I don’t know is the honest answer.”

Mr Ross suggested the unique circumstances of the pandemic would be a factor.

“Whether it’s coming up here to physically speak to one or two people that they’re allowed in a room with, or doing it virtually, or doing it some other way, that’s still got to be discussed and decided upon,” he said.

“I’m just trying to be as upfront as I can be in this very uncertain election where nothing is playing by the normal rules.”

However Mr Johnson was able to visit Scotland in February, when Covid levels were higher and the vaccination program less advanced. 

But with the PM deeply unpopular with Scots, the Scottish Tories could also feel he would add little to their campaign, while risking a loss of support they can ill-afford as they fight with Labour for second place.

Mr Ross is also feeling the heat after a widely criticised appearance in the first TV leaders' debate last week, when Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar told him to “grow up”.

The SNP today mocked Mr Ross after Tory candidates put pictures of his better-known predecessor, Ruth Davidson, on their election leaflets, claiming the part-time football referee was now “on the subs bench.” 

Mr Ross defended Ms Davidson’s participation in the campaign.

However he also said voters wanted to hear what “those who are seeking to be elected to the Scottish Parliament would actually deliver”.

Ms Davidson is not standing for re-election, but moving to the House of Lords.

Speaking to the media after a campaign visit to Edinburgh, Mr Ross was asked if Mr Johnson would physically visit Scotland in the campaign.

The Moray MP replied: “I don’t know it’s going to work out, because this election campaign is entirely different to any other we’ve faced or held here in Scotland than before. Visits are far more constrained. 

“You will be hearing from Government ministers at a UK level during this campaign.

“However I’m the leader of the party here in Scotland, it’s our campaign, it’s our message, it’s our manifesto, and I think that’s what people want to hear over the course of the campaign is what those seeking who are seeking to be elected to the Scottish Parliament would actually deliver.”

Pressed if it was possible Mr Johnson might not visit, Mr Ross said: “Anything’s possible. We’ve just to see how the campaign rolls out, whether he’s here virtually, physically, making comments, I’m sure many people south of the border will be asking him similar questions.

“But the campaign we have here in Scotland is focused on our pledges, on our commitment, the positive ambition we have for Scotland, and ensuring that we focus on the recovery Scotland needs after the last 12 months.”

Pressed again on whether the PM would visit Scotland, Mr Ross said: “I don’t know is the honest answer. We can’t determine in this campaign when or if senior members of the Government at a UK level are going to be able to come up to Scotland to campaign.

“But as I said, they will play a part in this campaign, whether it’s virtual, whether it’s commentary, whether it’s explaining the outstanding roll-out of the vaccine process here in Scotland and across the UK, whether it’s articulating the message of business support, protecting people’s jobs, that will all happen.

“The way that happens, as we’ve seen throughout this campaign, is going to be really unpredictable. 

“Whether it’s coming up here to physically speak to one or two people that they’re allowed in a room with, or doing it virtually, or doing it some other way, that’s still got to be discussed and decided upon.

"I’m just trying to be as upfront as I can be in this very uncertain election where nothing is playing by the normal rules.”

Asked about Ms Davidson cropping up on election leaflets and whether he was being eclipsed by her as his predecessor Jackson Carlaw was, Mr Ross said he had “no problem” working with a former leader, unlike, he suggested, Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond.

He said: “In terms of Ruth being party of this campaign, she has been our most successful Scottish Conservative leader to date. She is someone I think is absolutely right to have as part of the campaign, in the same way it was absolutely right to have her taking on Nicola Sturgeon in the Scottish Parliament at First Minister’s Questions. 

“There is a role for her top play as leader of the MSP group.”

Despite urging Labour and the Liberal Democrats in vain to work with him as part of a unionist coalition to defeat Indyref2, Mr Ross’s rejected any alliance with George Gallloway’s list-only All For Unity.

He said the former parties were part of the Better Together in the 2014 referendum, not one of the “smaller fringe party” which might benefit the Nationalists on the list system.

He said he would remain an MSP if the Tories came third in May, but did not explicitly say he would remain leader.