New leader of the Scottish Conservatives to be announced
The new leader of the Scottish Conservatives is expected to be announced at 10am. Russell Findlay, Murdo Fraser and Meghan Gallacher are the three options on the ballot paper to take over from Douglas Ross.
The Conservatives are currently the second largest group in the Scottish parliament with 31 MSPs. The Conservatives returned five MPs from Scotland in July’s general election.
Brian Whittle, Jamie Greene and Liam Kerr previously dropped their bids to lead the party at Holyrood.
Almost immediately whoever wins will be taking part in a ceremony to mark the 25th anniversary of devolution being on Saturday, before heading to the Conservative conference in Birmingham which begins on Sunday.
Key events
Robert Jenrick, who is still favourite at the moment for the Conservative party UK leadership, has been campaigning on immigration again this morning, posting a two minute video to social media.
In the video he says “I’d like to think of myself as a reasonable, pragmatic guy, but on this issue [immigration], what I saw [when I was in government] made me realise we need radical action.”
He said “When I became minister for immigration, I saw terrorists coming into our country and hundreds of known criminals in Dover.”
Under his watch, murals were painted over in a reception centre for asylum-seeking children who had entered the country.
Looking beyond the current leadership contest, Jenrick says “If I became Conservative leader and one day prime minister, I will end the madness.”
He says he will leave the ECHR, stop international aid to countries that refuse to accept deportations, restrict visas, and “pass legislation to declare evidently safe countries as safe,” naming Turkey, Brazil and Vietnam.
Referring to what he terms “asylum shoppers on the continent” he says he will end what he rermed “soft touch Britain.”
We must end the madness.
Anyone who comes here illegally should be automatically deported.
I increased deportations of those here illegally by 50%. But we need to go much further. pic.twitter.com/JPySCBUdKd
— Robert Jenrick (@RobertJenrick) September 27, 2024
If the quality of water in England is of interest to you, then Phoebe Weston has an interesting piece today worth a read here …
Read more here: How drug pollution flooded England’s national parks – and put human health at risk
The press pack in the US have asked Keir Starmer about his conference speech gaffe where he initially referred to “sausages” rather than “hostages”. The prime minister said “I just mangled the beginning of the word,” adding – in what appears to be a meat-related pun – “These things are there to give you all the opportunity to rib me.”
Thornberry: Trump ‘styles out’ allegations that he is racist but ‘important to have meetings with him’
Labour MP Emily Thornberry, asked about the prime minister meeting potential future US president, has said that Donald Trump “styles it out somewhat” with alleged racism.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee chair said:
If he’s president and he starts caging Mexican children, then that needs to be called out. We are actually in a really strong position now, in that if you think about all the other G7 countries, we are a country that we have just had an election, we have a progressive Government with a large majority and stability in front of us – a good five years of the same leader. And if you look at the other G7 countries, they don’t necessarily have that.
PA Media reports askedwhether Mr Trump should be labelled a “racist”, Thornberry said: “It depends how he is behaving. I mean, he seems – he styles it out somewhat, doesn’t he, these allegations? I mean, you know, we hear about the dogs and cats and so on just a few weeks ago. If I was at dinner with someone who said things like that, then I would call it out.”
Thornberry was referring to the Trump campaign recently claiming, without evidence, that immigrants were stealing and eating pets, an oft-repeated racist trope.
She went on to say:
Donald Trump may be the president of the United States in a couple of months’ time so of course, it’s important to have meetings with him and to build a relationship with him.
Whatever criticisms one may have of Donald Trump, the point is that the office of president is one that needs to be properly respected and the Americans are very close friends of ours.
I think that this is an initial meeting, so there needs to be a certain amount of relationship building and we take it from there [but] I do think that if there are things the American president does or says that we disagree with, then we shouldn’t pull our punches.
We might be about to find out who the new Scottish leader of the Conservatives is, but we are still some distance away from finding out who the next UK-wide leader of the opposition will be, as the Conservative party leadership election continues until the end of October.
Frances Ryan has written for us today, suggesting there is “little sign that the Conservatives have any real understanding of what got them” to electoral defeat in July.
Read more here: Frances Ryan – Of course the wannabe Tory leaders have regrets. They think they weren’t toxic or nasty enough
New leader of the Scottish Conservatives to be announced
The new leader of the Scottish Conservatives is expected to be announced at 10am. Russell Findlay, Murdo Fraser and Meghan Gallacher are the three options on the ballot paper to take over from Douglas Ross.
The Conservatives are currently the second largest group in the Scottish parliament with 31 MSPs. The Conservatives returned five MPs from Scotland in July’s general election.
Brian Whittle, Jamie Greene and Liam Kerr previously dropped their bids to lead the party at Holyrood.
Almost immediately whoever wins will be taking part in a ceremony to mark the 25th anniversary of devolution being on Saturday, before heading to the Conservative conference in Birmingham which begins on Sunday.
Welcome and opening summary …
Good morning, and welcome to Friday’s UK politics live blog. We are expecting to find out who will be the new leader of the Conservatives in Scotland at 10am. Here are your headlines …
Aside from the Scottish Conservative leadership election, there is not a great deal in the political diary today, with the House of Lords the only legislature sitting today, and Amanda Burton and Sir Martin Donnelly appearing at the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry the most notable other things scheduled.
It is Martin Belam with you today – do drop me a line at martin.belam@theguardian.com if you spot typos, errors or omissions.
