Kezia Dugdale: Holyrood under SNP is ‘a conveyor belt for Tory cuts’. What do you think?

Last Updated: March 20, 2016By

Kezia Dugdale, the Scottish Labour leader speaks to the spring conference in Glasgow [Image: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images].

Shall we try to have a debate about this?

I know This Blog has a few pro-SNP readers; I’d like to hear from supporters of other parties in Scotland as well.

Does Ms Dugdale make a good point? Has Nicola Sturgeon supported Tory cuts? What has the SNP done to ameliorate them, if not?

Let’s tease out the facts if we can – and please, let’s be civil about it.

SNP Party annual conference 2014

Scottish Labour is to promise voters it would never cut taxes at the same time as cutting spending, in an effort to step up attacks on Nicola Sturgeon’s record as first minister.

Kezia Dugdale, the Scottish Labour leader, told her party’s spring conference in Glasgow she would introduce strict fiscal rules to stop Holyrood from cutting taxes and spending at the same time, as a poll highlighted her party’s dire popularity rating.

In a direct challenge to the Scottish National party leader, Dugdale accused Sturgeon of hypocrisy for rejecting Labour’s proposal for a 1p increase in Scottish income tax rates while allowing Holyrood to become “a conveyor belt for Tory cuts” in her government’s recent budget.

Dugdale said many Scots were excited when Sturgeon promised she would be “the great anti-austerity alternative” in last year’s general election television debates, which established the first minister’s reputation.

But Sturgeon then “came home to force through the Tories’ cuts in Scotland. Because we don’t get Nicola the socialist who says let’s change things, we get Nicola the nationalist who says we can’t,” Dugdale said.

Source: Kezia Dugdale: Holyrood under SNP is ‘a conveyor belt for Tory cuts’ | Politics | The Guardian

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10 Comments

  1. David March 21, 2016 at 9:05 am - Reply

    Never trust a nationalist of any sort.

  2. Barry Davies March 21, 2016 at 10:18 am - Reply

    One has to wonder why so much time is given to the leader of an area of Britain that is smaller population wise than London, surely they should give as much time to Boris if not slightly more than sturgeon. They should give the whole of Britain a vote on whether scotland should become totally independent then she would get her way.

  3. Joan Edington March 21, 2016 at 1:49 pm - Reply

    I think my views of Kezia Dugdale are well known on this blog but are shared by many, many people in Scotland. She only gets her opinions in print because of the Labour-leaning press in Scotland. In Holyrood she is often more of a laughing stock. She asks questions then, when having had a perfectly reasonable answer, asks the same again numerous times. She sounds like she is talking from a script and, if the answer isn’t the exact wording she expects, she is lost for her next response.

    Labour happily tell us all the great things they will do when in power, secure in the knowledge that they will not have to action their promises, certainly in the near future, and never with Kezia at the helm. They and the Tories continually complain about the cuts made by the SNP without ever pointing out any of the good outcomes of government spending. Just this week it has been announced that the 2 steelworks in Scotland, closed by Tata, are being bought, saving all jobs. Jobs that have been fought for and kept alive in the meantime by Scottish Government funding. That will never appear in the Daily Record, The Herald or their ilk.

    I am honest enough to know that the SNP are far from perfect but, after the previous Labour administrations here, most people agree they are a vast improvement.

    I’m not saying Labour will never be back but it will take a while for a great number of voters to forget both those early administrations and the referendum.

    • Mike Sivier March 21, 2016 at 3:18 pm - Reply

      And for the other side?

      • Mark Waters March 21, 2016 at 4:08 pm - Reply

        sorry Mike no…..As an ex Labour party supporter ,It is interesting to be an English person living in Scotland for the past 14 years….(There is so much that the the UK Political classes do not understand.)
        Ms.Dugdale cannot do what she has been promising us.The main problem for all of the “Scottish” Political Party’s is that our budget is controlled by Westminster and we have to implement most of the savage cuts dictated to us by HMG. The SNP like any political party has its faults….but as Joan rightly says they do govern and they govern reasonably well mitigating at least some of the Cuts for poor people.
        .if only Ms Dugdale can stop shouting and work to improve the governance of Scotland…and the U.K..I may start believing in the Labour party again.

        • Mike Sivier March 21, 2016 at 6:27 pm - Reply

          Is it possible to have a balancing view?

      • Joan Edington March 21, 2016 at 8:28 pm - Reply

        I suspect not on this blog Mike. Your readers are those of a left-leaning, compassionate nature. In Scotland, those are mostly SNP supporters. Your vastly larger bulk of English readers take no interest in Scottish matters unless, like Barry Davies, they just wish we would crawl into a hole and shut up.

        • Mike Sivier March 22, 2016 at 1:11 pm - Reply

          That’s a challenge, if ever I read one!
          Will anyone (please) take it up?

      • Barry Davies March 22, 2016 at 8:44 pm - Reply

        Not at all Joan, I just wish the SNP would be a little more honest with the Scottish people, and not pretend that they could just join the EU if we decide to leave for example, the polls showed Scots living in England wanted independence for Scotland but of course they had no vote and the Scots living there were more sensible.

  4. Terry Davies March 21, 2016 at 8:28 pm - Reply

    Is sturgeon trying to create conditions for a yes vote to scottish independence. by using the NHS cuts etc scottish voters are affected by westminster in ways not palletable for scottish voters.
    thus if brexit prevails sturgeon is well placed to get a yes vote for scottish independence. scotland can rejoin as a nstion in its own right and not as part of the UK.
    Accepting the euro will probably then be a preference for businesses and the scottish people.

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