CONSERVATIVE MP Andrew Bowie has seen his attack on the SNP-Green deal backfire after he claimed the Scottish Government had “abandoned Aberdeenshire”.

The MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine tweeted on Tuesday to claim that the co-operation agreement showed Nicola Sturgeon’s party does not “care about the North East, its people or their priorities”.

However, the shared policy programme announced by the SNP and Greens contains an explicit pledge to bring forward a “£500 million Just Transition Fund for the North East and Moray”.

It says this money will “support and accelerate the transition of the region and support the role of Aberdeen and the wider north east as one of Scotland’s centres of excellence for the transition to a net-zero economy”.

READ MORE: SNP MPs send scathing letter to Andrew Bowie over Green deal claims

In contrast, the UK Government’s “levelling up fund”, for which it is currently facing a High Court battle over allegations of misuse for political gain, has ranked Aberdeenshire on the lowest priority level.

The UK Government has also ranked the Highland region as being one of the least in-need areas in the UK.

Commenting on Twitter, SNP MP Richard Thomson, who represents Gordon, said it was “rather bold” for Bowie to claim it was the Scottish Government who had abandoned Aberdeenshire.

Thomson later told The National: “If anyone ever wants to see the priority the Conservatives really place on the North East of Scotland, all they need to do is look at the UK Government’s ‘levelling up fund’, which leaves Aberdeenshire in the lowest possible category with little chance of funding success.

“The Conservatives in the North East have a track record of bending the truth about the Scottish Government, and they’ve gone into overdrive following an SNP/Green deal which delivers strongly for the North East on transport investment and energy transition.

“They know that this deal means the game’s up for their strategy of trying to defeat an administration at Holyrood which now has a majority. With nothing good to say for themselves or a Government in Westminster which couldn’t care less about any part of Scotland, they are left with nothing except bad mouthing a Scottish Government which consistently delivers.”

He added: “If it wasn’t for the constant stream of #SNPBad and their opposition to indyref2, Scottish Conservative election leaflets these days would just be blank sheets of paper.”

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It is not the first time the two MPs have clashed over funding for the North East of Scotland.

Speaking in the House of Commons in September 2020, Bowie claimed that by voting against the “power grab” Internal Market Bill (now an Act), the SNP were directly denying Aberdeenshire “more funds to spend on specific projects”.

The levelling up fund represents one of the sources of cash to which Bowie was referring. Allocated by the UK Government, it bypasses devolution and has Westminster deal directly with Scottish local authorities. However, Aberdeenshire’s low ranking means it has “little chance of funding success”.

At the time, Thomson responded that “the amount of money available to spend on frontline services in the Aberdeenshire Council area is only £11 below the Scottish average, which includes the high-spending island authorities”.

He added: “To help [Bowie] with that, 11 is nearly twice six, which is double the number of chips that he had in his dinner the other night”, a quip in reference to a now-infamous insult levelled at the Tory after he tweeted a picture of a fancy fish and chips.

The Scottish Tories have been approached for comment. 

The National: