SCOTTISH Tory leader Annabel Goldie is due to raise the stakes in the debate on tackling knife crime when she addresses her party conference in Perth today.
Ms Goldie was expected to call for a mandatory minimum sentence of two years for people caught carrying knives on Scotland's streets in a bid to reduce the spiralling numbers of incidents involving the weapons.
She appears to have trumped a Labou
r proposal which was issued yesterday just hours after her speech was trailed to members of the press.
Labour's proposals would give the courts the ability to give jail terms of up to a year in the Summary Courts and up to five years in the Sheriff Court.
Both would have exemptions for special circumstances.
The proposals come in response to a campaign by John Muir of Inverclyde whose son Damian was murdered in Greenock in July 2007 by Barry Gavin, who was out on remand for other knife crimes.
Mr Muir had wanted mandatory prison sentences to help start to tackle the problem.
Today there appeared to be some political consensus on the issue. Labour's justice spokesman, Richard Baker, said: "In the last set of statistics, 54 people were murdered with knives and 1170 people were admitted to hospital with knife wounds.
"These are not just statistics but real people and that's why Labour is pushing forward proposals to make it clear that carrying a knife is not acceptable.
"The message is simple. Carry a knife and go to jail."
In her speech Ms Goldie will say: "Too many criminals carry and use knives completely undeterred by the law, safe in the knowledge that the consequences for doing so are not what they should be.
"It is time to send a clear message that just carrying a knife means prison. Go out with a blade and you'll be going inside."
However, it is still unclear whether the Scottish Government will back mandatory sentences.
SNP justice secretary Kenny MacAskill is still looking at the issue.
A Scottish Government spokesman said: "We need to convince people that knives are lethal weapons. That means pursuing a twin approach of education and enforcement.
"Those who think that carrying a knife brings with it protection should realise that instead it is likely to bring a prison sentence – and a lengthy one at that."
Ms Goldie will also use her conference speech today to call upon voters to judge the Conservative Party on the achievements of today rather than "perception of the echoes of the past".
Privately she and her advisors are worried that the recent furore over expenses, with Westminster Tory MPs claiming for moats and horse manure, has brought back memories of the Conservatives of the past.
She also wants to take advantage of strong Conservative showings in recent polls, which have put them in the low 20s in Scotland.
While still a distant third to Labour and the SNP it shows a marked recovery from the lows of the late 1990s. She hopes that Tory changes to the Scottish budgets such as extra police officers and reduced business rates will show the party's policies are having a positive effect in Scotland.
She will say: "I know for many people voting Conservative in Scotland is a big ask. Some have never done it, some last did it a long time ago.
"So I say to you judge us not on your perception of the echoes of the past but rather on what we are now and what in the Scottish Parliament we are achieving."
Fight for Euro seats gets serious as SNP launches campaignTHE fight for the six Scottish seats in the European Parliament got serious yesterday when the SNP launched its campaign.
First Minister Alex Salmond claimed his party was the only one that could provide a strong voice in Europe for new energy and fishery policies.
But with Labour's Scottish campaign to be launched on Monday, there were claims made by the party's Scottish leader Iain Gray that the SNP and the Tories were, in effect, forming an alliance that would be "bad for Scotland".
Quoting from the Conservatives' conference agenda, he said: "It is clear the Tories and SNP are eager to get into bed with each other. The Tories are already boasting in their conference agenda 'For the first time in more than a decade Conservative policies are being enacted – and it is here in Scotland'.
"The Tories have been desperate to get a foothold in Scotland and Alex Salmond and the SNP are all too happy to play along with them."
Mr Salmond launched the SNP campaign at Pelamis Wave Power, the Scottish company behind the world's first commercial wave farm, currently constructing generators to be used off Orkney.
He said: "The SNP is the only party offering a strong voice for Scotland in Europe."
He said that as the government in Holyrood the party is accelerating European funding, with £70 million of regional development funding just announced, supporting 8,000 Scottish jobs.
"And we will use a further £190 million of European funding to do even more to protect jobs and help communities," he added.
However, he has come under fire from the Liberal Democrats. Their finance spokesman Jeremy Purvis has claimed that Scotland has lost out on tens of millions of pounds available for businesses which the SNP has ignored.
Voting for the European election will take place on 4 June.
The number of Scottish seats has been reduced from seven to six.
QUESTIONS REMAIN OVER DEFECTORTHE political history of a recent Tory convert has been questioned ahead of the Scottish Conservative Party conference.
Leading QC Paul McBride is due make one of the keynote speeches at the conference's justice debate tomorrow after recently declaring
his support for the Conservatives, claiming he had abandoned Labour, the party he had supported for most of his life. Labour officials have questioned whether Mr McBride was a member and it has been revealed that he never declared his alleged party allegiance as a member of the Legal Aid Board. If he had been a supporter, he should have put it down as an interest.
Mr McBride has insisted he was a member until the late 1990s.
