NICOLA Sturgeon accused the Tories of “exploiting independence to avoid hard questions on Brexit”.
The SNP leader made the claim at First Minister’s Questions yesterday in a heated exchange on fishing with Scottish Tory interim leader Jackson Carlaw.
He said Sturgeon wanted the Prime Minister’s Brexit deal defeated because the “chaos” would be good for independence.
Jackson urged the First Minister to get behind Theresa May’s plan saying it would result in “an orderly exit” and protect jobs and deliver “more control of our waters than we have had for half a century”.
The agreement, Carlaw pointed out, was supported by the fishing industry.
“The Scottish Fishermen’s Federation has been absolutely clear. It says that under the Prime Minister’s Brexit deal, the UK will be out of the common fisheries policy (CFP) and will become an independent coastal state.
“More than that, just yesterday, in an email to every member of this Parliament, it confirmed its backing for the Prime Minister’s Withdrawal Agreement and the Political Declaration. That is the SFF’s position.
“Is the First Minister seriously trying to tell us that she knows more about fish than the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation?”
Sturgeon claimed the Tories were “rewriting history”.
She added: “The commitment was never just about being an independent coastal state. That is the bare minimum. What the Tories promised was annual negotiations.
“Now we know that there will be an overall agreement. They promised no link between access to waters and access to markets.
“The Political Declaration makes it clear that there will be that link, and the statement issued by the European Union makes it clear that the EU will demand an arrangement that builds upon the CFP.
“No amount of bluff and bluster from Jackson Carlaw takes away from this fact. Yet again, the Scottish Tories have sold out Scottish fishermen.”
But Carlaw said the Sturgeon wanted her MPs to vote down the deal “in the hope that it will deliver on her obsession with a second independence referendum. That is not in Scotland’s interests”.
The First Minister replied: “He talks about the SNP using Brexit to advance the case for independence – let me say to him Brexit does that all by itself, it doesn’t need any help from the SNP.”
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