THE Bank of England’s chief economist told people in the UK earlier this week to just accept they are poorer. A historic drop in living standards and the advice is to just get over it.

For an extremely well-paid former banker to lecture people on our declining standard of living is the perfect example of exactly what is wrong with the UK.

People in Scotland continue to suffer as a result of a hard Brexit we never voted for and a Tory-made cost of living crisis driven by nothing but greed. The answer to solving Scotland’s financial burdens does not, and will not, start with any Westminster government. It will begin with us gaining the full powers of an independent nation.

The already unrealistically high food prices people are experiencing in the UK are predicted to continue to soar due to both Brexit and a UK Government which ensures records are smashed every year when it comes to food bank usage.

Whether it is a Tory government or a Labour one, this will continue to be the case because to put it simply both of the main UK parties believe Brexit, austerity and closing our borders are the answer to all of our problems.

The Labour Party would have you believe that the problems the Tories have been facing with Brexit for the last eight years are suddenly going to spontaneously combust and Keir Starmer is the one who will make Brexit Britain thrive. Will Keir Starmer and the Labour Party end food poverty? I don’t think so. Let’s not forget Labour were in power when the first food banks in the UK were introduced.

The Labour Party look like a Tory photocopy from a dodgy printer.

The Labour leader wants to keep things just as they are. He likes the broken Westminster voting system just as it is. Whether it’s red or blue Tories in Westminster, the neglect we are experiencing in Scotland from the UK Government will remain regardless.

The Scottish Conservatives are having their conference this weekend with both Rishi Sunak and Douglas Ross urging the Tories to use Scotland as a battleground at the next General Election.

It will be of no surprise that our super rich and super ignorant Prime Minister Rishi Sunak could not give a monkey’s about Scotland. He certainly had no issue a couple of weeks ago when Douglas Ross was urging Tory supporters to vote Labour instead. Driven of course by a desire to oust the SNP. It’s interesting to know just how much we get under their skin.

I have emphasised previously how the UK has been straying dangerously right in recent years. The Tories are cracking down on the right to protest through their anti-strike laws, laws which have been noticed and rightly condemned internationally.

We have seen figures this week on voter ID for the local elections in England and Wales. They showed that just 63,000 people have registered to allow them to vote in the election. That’s a measly 3% of more than two million people who do not have the correct documents to be able to cast a vote as set out by these new laws.

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As we move closer and closer towards the Hunger Games, it is essential that we stay vigilant of the underhanded tactics at play as we approach a General Election in the coming year.

To go back to my original point, we should never accept being poorer or being worse off due to the incompetence of the people running the show. What the UK Government should accept is the will of the people of Scotland. They should accept the democratic mandate that we possess to hold an independence referendum. They should accept that we want a choice to make life better for ourselves. That choice that we do not currently possess – to never accept being poor or worse off.