Ruth Davidson: The Scottish Tories are much more than just the anti-independence party
3 min read
At the general election, Scottish Conservatives showed that we have the same priorities as the people of Scotland. Now we must show we have the answers to the huge challenges we face.
These last few weeks, MPs have noticed something of a novelty on the floor of the House of Commons. It is the regular sighting of a fellow MP with a Scottish accent who holds a different view to the SNP.
Setting out a positive vision for the UK and challenging the assertions on the SNP benches, the 12 new Scottish Conservative MPs have added a new flavour to parliament.
An election that didn’t go entirely to plan for my party has at least had one upside. We are seeing Scottish MPs who do not view everything through the constitutional prism and who want to play a constructive role in building a stronger society across the UK, instead of every question being the basis for another push to break up Britain.
That election was one of the most extraordinary in recent Scottish history. Two years earlier, the SNP had swept the board in all but three Scottish seats. Yet, in June, it lost 21 of those seats and clung on to a dozen more by its fingertips. Why the huge change? In our analysis, it was down to Nicola Sturgeon’s demand for a second referendum on independence, made in March.
This one huge call by the SNP ensured that the question of a second referendum was front and centre of the campaign when the prime minister announced the election in April. It immediately was clear to us – from the countless doorstep conversations and phone calls we had undertaken – that it was a huge miscalculation.
It swept aside the SNP’s promise in 2014 that the referendum would be “once in a generation”. It ignored the votes of hundreds of thousands of SNP supporters who had backed Brexit and wanted to see it given a chance. The offer of yet more division and uncertainty to a country tired of five years of constitutional division was tin-eared. It pushed people away from the SNP in their droves.
We still had to earn the trust of these people if they were to vote for us. We did so not just by being the principal party of the union but also by showing our priorities were aligned with majority opinion in Scotland. Both pro- and anti-independence voters agreed that – as the prime minister and I set out – now was not the time for a second referendum.
Most people agreed with us that, after 20 years after devolution in Scotland, it was now time to debate some of our pressing domestic concerns that have been neglected in Scotland for far too long: declining standards in Scottish schools; the faltering state of our economy; and the new tax powers our parliament now holds.
We won support this year because, as a party, we showed we wanted to focus on those issues instead. As proof, I would point to the fact that Nicola Sturgeon has now played down all talk of the referendum that earlier this year was deemed inevitable. She, too, is having to shift her party’s stance to catch up with the public mood.
In this year’s election, we showed that we have the same priorities as people in Scotland. As we move forward, our challenge is to convince more Scots that the Scottish Conservatives have the answer to their priorities too. At Holyrood – and now at Westminster – I’m confident we can do just that.
Ruth Davidson is the leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party, and a MSP for Glasgow
PoliticsHome Newsletters
Get the inside track on what MPs and Peers are talking about. Sign up to The House's morning email for the latest insight and reaction from Parliamentarians, policy-makers and organisations.
