Meeting of the Parliament 29 November 2022
I make no apology for starting my speech by expressing my on-going dismay and anger at the position that Scotland finds itself in with regard to EU membership. We have made it crystal clear at every poll and election before and since 2016 that we choose to be an EU nation. Brexit must surely rank as one of the most deceitful and self-destructive policies ever to be visited on the population of a country.
Of course, it does not matter whether people voted for it or against it. The on-going and worsening consequences of withdrawing from the world’s most successful trading block with nothing to replace it were entirely predictable. Pursuing Brexit at all costs was a feckless and dishonest thing to do, but pursuing the hardest of Brexits, as Tory Government after Tory Government has done, is an on-going scandal.
What of Labour? I do not agree that Labour and the Tories are two sides of the same coin on every policy and debate that is brought to this Parliament. However, on Brexit, Labour seems to have no more interest than the Tories in representing Scotland’s democratically expressed choice.
Whether or not we have given up on Scotland being a European nation, as the pro-Brexit Tories, Labour and the Lib Dems have, we should all be deeply concerned by what the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill would mean for workers, employers, consumers and the viability of businesses around the country.