Scott: Bring curtain down on 'independence pantomime'

LIBERAL Democrat leader Tavish Scott yesterday demanded that the "independence panto" should end and politicians concentrate on getting Scotland out of the recession.

In his first speech to the Scottish Liberal Democrats as party leader, Mr Scott claimed there should be just three priorities – "jobs, jobs and jobs."

He told delegates in Perth that any discussion of referendums on independence should be put aside until the crisis was over – and attacked Labour and the SNP for allowing the constitutional arguments of "North versus South" to get in the way of what was important to ordinary people.

Mr Scott branded Labour's Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy and SNP First Minister Alex Salmond the "Itchy and Scratchy" of Scottish politics, and pointed to the fact that unemployment in Scotland was outstripping the rest of the UK.

To Mr Salmond and the SNP, he added: "You cannot waste taxpayers' money, government time and parliamentary debates on a cause that the country doesn't want and the economy can't bear. Ditch the referendum. Forget the spin and politics of the independence panto. Put the needs of Scotland before the interests of the SNP."

His speech was criticised by opponents as being "policy light," but Mr Scott hailed the controversial deal he struck with the SNP in the second round of budget negotiations earlier this year, after the original budget was voted down.

"We got the Scottish Government to change its mind and to adopt our economic rescue plan," he said. "The plan will boost jobs now and build for the long term."

Mr Scott also used his keynote address to voice concern about a loss of values in society. His first target was "greedy" bankers who brought down the economy, as he reminded delegates of fictional financier Gordon Gekko, played by Michael Douglas, who said: "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works."

Mr Scott added: "It should have been a warning, a fiction, a parody, but a few greedy bankers took it as an instruction." Mr Scott then turned on social problems and parents who neglect their children.

Having thanked delegates for their good wishes over his forthcoming child due in July, he praised UK leader Nick Clegg for putting his family and new baby before coming to Perth and raised the issue of toddler Brandon Muir's death in Dundee.

"No government can be indifferent to a 23-month-old boy left by his mother at a drug-crazed party, sick and dying, while she works the street as a prostitute to earn money, not for that small life but to feed her heroin habit," he said. "Thousands of young Scottish children grow up in drug-fuelled families. We need to do better."

And he added his voice to calls for more children to be removed from their parents. He said: "We need a Scotland where those children are given a new beginning. A drug-fuelled start to life is no start. That must change."

ETHICS VOTE

A REVOLUTION in medical ethics was voted for at the Liberal Democrat conference yesterday after delegates ignored the pleas of party leaders and experts.

Delegates in Perth backed a motion calling for the introduction of presumed consent for organ donation where people have to opt out of being donors rather than opt in. They also backed a review of blood transfusion services to potentially lift the ban on men who have gay sex from giving blood.

The motion on organ donation was backed despite objections by party health spokesman Ross Finney and Holyrood chief whip Mike Rumbles.

On blood they also ignored Tim Brett, former Director of Health Protection Scotland, who told them: "We have to acknowledge that there is a potential risk from the gay community."