SNP Leader John Swinney has said it is a “democratic outrage” that some people in Scotland are now on holiday without having received their postal vote. He himself was due to go on a family holiday from tomorrow but has put those plans on hold.
This morning he took a spin up Calton Hill in the party’s campaign bus emblazoned with a new photo of him on the side. The bus will now be travelling from Edinburgh North and Leith where Deidre Brock has been MP for the last two terms all over Scotland until polling day.
With six days to go until votes are cast and counted, the campaign bus tour aims to help voters focus on the SNP’s message of delivering a “future made in Scotland” and protecting Scotland’s values from Labour and the Tories at Westminster.
But he is worried that the school holidays in Scotland will lead to some voters being disenfranchised. He told The Edinburgh Reporter: “I am very worried about the arrangements for the election. I warned when the prime minister called this election that it was happening in the Scottish school summer holidays and Edinburgh schools have now closed for the for the summer break. And some people are now away on holiday having not received the postal votes that they properly applied for within the deadline.
“And that’s ridiculous. It’s a democratic outrage because people should be able to take part in the election, regardless of the circumstances and the timing of the election. So I’m concerned that Scotland’s interests were ignored because of school holidays. People go off on their holidays right away. I know that, we all appreciate that, understandably, and we’re in a situation where some people are disenfranchised because they’ve not got their postal votes in time.
“We were supposed to go on holiday on Saturday, we always go away the minute the schools rise, the minute parliament rises – we go away for our annual holidays. So we’ve had to cancel our holiday because of the timing of the election – I am not complaining. That’s life and I have to accept that but what I’m worried about is members of the public who applied for postal votes and have gone on their holidays and their votes haven’t arrived. That’s not good democracy.”
Mr Swinney continued:“With less than a week to go until Scotland goes to the polls, the SNP are out campaigning across the country for every vote. The SNP are standing against £18 billion of further Westminster cuts to public services that are already baked into Labour and Tory spending plans.
“We’re fighting to protect the NHS from privatisation from Starmer and Sunak and pass a law that keeps our health service safe in public hands, where it belongs. We are the only major party focused on giving the people of Scotland their democratic right to choose their own future and rejoin the European Union as an independent nation. Scotland’s values are the SNP’s values and only the SNP can be trusted to stand up for Scotland in Westminster.
“On 4th July, vote SNP for a future made in Scotland, for Scotland.”
Founding Editor of The Edinburgh Reporter.
Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
