SCOTLAND has become the word that must not be mentioned by the leaders of the UK’s political parties.
Less than a week after Jeremy Corbyn was warned off mentioning the S-word during his trip to Edinburgh in case it played to a “nationalist agenda”, David Cameron said it just the once in his 6,722 word, 50-minute speech to the Conservative Party conference.
“I love every part of our country,” Cameron said. “England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland. I will defend our Union with everything I have got.” And that was it.
Stewart Hosie MP, SNP deputy leader, said Cameron’s rhetoric was “fatally undermined by the reality of his Government’s policies”.
“Scotland barely merited a mention in the Prime Minister’s speech,” Hosie said.
“But he did have one pledge for Scotland when he made clear that he is determined to press ahead with the obscenity of spending £100 billion on a new generation of nuclear weapons on the Clyde by pledging to renew Trident. Before parliament has even had one vote on its renewal, Mr Cameron wants Scotland to continue as Westminster’s nuclear dumping ground for the next 50 years.”
Hosie also said Cameron’s commitment to an “all-out assault on poverty” was impossible at the same time as he was cutting tax credits.
“Those cuts will hit over three million families, with each due to lose an average of £1,300. The Prime Minister is burying his head in the sand about the impact of these cuts – despite warnings from the Institute for Fiscal Studies and some of his own colleagues who, unlike him, will have to face the electorate in 2020.”
The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament said Cameron, with his commitment to ordering four new Trident submarines, had clearly forgotten that Scotland “has said no to nuclear weapons”.
Kate Hudson, the campaign group’s general secretary, said the Prime Minister was showing “contempt for parliament”.
“This is a crucial matter for this country, with economic, security, moral and legal implications. The views of our elected representatives – and indeed the population as a whole – cannot be ignored,” Hudson said.
“Mr Cameron would also do well to recall that the country he wishes to physically impose these weapons upon – Scotland – has said no to nuclear weapons.
“To proceed without parliamentary discussion, including Scottish MPs, would throw the legitimacy of any decision into serious question.”
In reply to Cameron’s speech, Labour’s Jon Ashworth MP said the Tories were “failing working people”.
“You can’t claim to be in the common ground of British politics when you’re cutting the tax credits working families rely on, leaving three million of them on average £1,300 a year worse off.”
A spokesman for Jeremy Corbyn said Cameron’s claim that the Labour leader hated Britain showed he was
“rattled”.
“The fact that David Cameron used his speech to make personal attacks on Jeremy Corbyn is a sure sign that he is rattled by the re-energisation of the Labour Party.”
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