Starmer says ‘heavy duty’ on Labour to deliver change for Scotland

Katrine Bussey, PA Scotland Political Editor

Sir Keir Starmer has said there is a “heavy duty” on his Labour Government to deliver change for Scotland.

Almost a decade on from the referendum on Scottish independence Sir Keir insisted he had “long understood why so many people in Scotland want change”.

But he insisted that election of his Labour Government was the way that Scots could have “meaningful, impactful and immediate change”.

His comments came after Labour had its most successful election in Scotland since the 2014 independence referendum, with the general election seeing the party win 37 seats north of the border.

But for many years after the referendum – in which Labour campaigned jointly with Conservative politicians in the Better Together campaign – it struggled to win votes in Scotland.

Sir Keir, speaking to Scottish political journalists inside Downing Street, said in the July general election Labour had made the “right argument which is Scotland needs change”.

The Prime Minister added: “That change can be brought about by a Labour Government.

“That’s the most meaningful, impactful and immediate change that people could vote for and they did.

“That was the message we carried into the election, we now have 37 Labour MPs.”

Asked if the result of the recent general election, which saw the SNP return its smallest group of MPs to Westminster since 2010, showed that Scotland had moved on from the constitutional debate, Sir Keir said: “I actually long understood why so many people in Scotland want change.”

Stephen Flynn has called on politicians on both sides of the debate to try to break the ‘impasse’ over Scotland’s constitutional future (Stefan Rousseau/PA)
Stephen Flynn has called on politicians on both sides of the debate to try to break the ‘impasse’ over Scotland’s constitutional future (Stefan Rousseau/PA)

However, he said to deal with this desire for change, Labour has to “deliver in the future” by “making sure we deliver a changed Scotland”.

The Prime Minister said: “I think that is the change with this general election. That puts a heavy duty on this Labour Government to deliver the change that we promised and that is why we are doing the difficult work now.”

However, Stephen Flynn, the SNP leader at Westminster, has called for leading figures from both sides of Scotland’s constitutional divide to come together with civic Scotland to consider how the resolve the “impasse” over the country’s future.

He said there needs to be a “grown up discussion” about the path to a second referendum, with Mr Flynn suggesting: “Maybe with the new Government in London and an SNP government in Edinburgh we can do that now.”

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