IN a diatribe clearly intended to heap maximum embarrassment on Scottish Labour and its leader Kezia Dugdale ahead of this weekend’s Party Conference, Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson has claimed that Labour and Conservatives “formed friendships” during the Better Together campaign.
In a new column for the Conservative Home website, she added that Labour “seems embarrassed” by its role in the referendum, and claims that the Conservatives are now attracting “3,000 people a week” from Labour.
Davidson wrote: “I am often asked how, during the independence referendum campaign last year, Conservatives got on with our Labour opponents.
“My answer is always the same: they might always have squabbled with each other like proverbial rats in a sack, but Conservative and Labour rubbed along fine.
"Behind the scenes, friendships were formed across the no-man’s land that usually separates us. And, in front of house, we complemented each other well.
“Working with people from such wildly different political standpoints was often testing (like much of the Better Together campaign). But I remain convinced that in showing our cause was above politics – in demonstrating that it united rivals as bitter as Conservative and Labour – the sweat and the effort was worth it.”
Davidson said that Scottish Labour is “struggling for relevance” ahead of its conference, and added: “Rather than celebrate last year’s referendum win, Scottish Labour nowadays seems embarrassed by its role in keeping the United Kingdom together – regularly trying to distance itself from our cross-party effort. And seeking to find any distinctiveness in the face of the opportunistic and quick-witted nationalists, it is casting itself into irrelevance.
Admitting that “Scottish Conservatives are in no position to crow over the difficulties of a rival party” Davidson claimed that 3,000 people a week are “leaving the Labour party and deciding to back the Scottish Conservatives.”
She added: “I hope more will follow, and I expect to see them doing so. For thousands of ordinary families across Scotland, the reasons for voting Labour are fast diminishing. Jeremy Corbyn is turning a party of power into one of protest; a machine designed for raging, not leading.
“And whatever comes out of Scottish Labour’s latest internal review of its own structures, it will have the same old Labour traits: chaotic, disunited, discoloured by ancient personal feuds that make the MacDonalds and Campbells look like a match on Tinder.
"People of whatever political party allegiance can vote Scottish Conservative in the knowledge that it will be a vote which declares our wish to remain within the UK family of nations.
"We will base our campaign in the centre-ground of Scottish politics, based around the principles of an old-fashioned blue-collar Conservatism.
In reply, A Scottish Labour Spokesperson said: "The Tories are desperate to talk about the constitution to avoid talking about the record of the Tory Government. Ruth Davidson can pretend to be a compassionate Conservative but we all know she's just another Tory."
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