SNP candidate Robert Leslie says voters in Orkney and Shetland have an opportunity on 4th July to break the habit of being tied to a Westminster system that isn’t delivering for the islands and set a course for a new Scotland with a fairer, greener and more equal future for all.

The UK Prime Minister has announced that the next general election will take place on 4 July 2024.

Speaking after Wednesday’s announcement of a summer General Election, Mr Leslie said that more of the same would not do amid the ongoing cost-of-living crisis largely driven by Tory mismanagement of the UK economy and the emerging cost of Brexit.

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Mr Leslie said:

“My campaign in Orkney and Shetland will have winning independence at its core, with public ownership of energy, a route back into the EU, and more powers for the islands at the heart of that case.

“As someone who has worked in the energy sector for almost 14 years now, I am standing on a platform of taking energy into public ownership, so that we can make Scotland’s energy work for Scotland’s people, not shareholders. Folk should not be rationing energy – going cold in their homes and without hot meals – in this energy-rich country. The UK’s broken privatised energy system is damaging lives across these islands, with the Scottish Government having provided over £30 million of energy support to struggling households to mitigate unsustainably high energy costs.

“Renewable technologies generated the equivalent of 113% of Scotland’s overall electricity consumption in 2022, and I don’t need to tell anyone in these islands about our capacity to add to that total. However, fuel poverty rates in Orkney and Shetland remain unacceptably high due to an energy system governed by the Tories at Westminster that is long past being fit for purpose. The status quo is indefensible.

“Similarly, the damage of Brexit continues to be felt in the Northern Isles, and the only route back into Europe for our communities is with an independent Scotland rejoining the EU.

Comparable nations like Ireland, Denmark and Norway are all wealthier and fairer than the UK – and are all independent countries either in the EU or, in the case of Norway, with strong co-operation agreements with the EU.

“The SNP stands for rejoining the EU. A vote for the SNP is a vote to reverse this damaging policy for Scotland and to really tackle the cost-of-living crisis and repair the economy.

“If folk across Orkney and Shetland want to escape Brexit and return to the largest single economic market in the world, then I am the candidate to vote for.”

Mr Leslie said that Scotland’s route back into the EU would also be the opportunity for the islands to win more powers.

“Talk of more autonomy has been on the agenda in these islands in some shape or form for decades, with Shetland having debated the issue in the recent past, and Orkney actively looking at alternative models of governance at the moment. I firmly believe that, as was set out by the late Jean-Didier Hache – then Executive Secretary of the CPMR Islands Commission – at the Our Islands Our Future conference in 2013, the time for these islands to seek more powers will be as Scotland negotiates a new relationship with the EU.

“I was at the conference in Kirkwall in September 2013, and recall Mr Hache describe how many European islands already enjoy special status with the EU and that the demands of Our Islands Our Future were reasonable and legitimate.

“Indeed, from what he said, the majority of island regions in Europe already had some kind of special status or autonomy with the Scottish Islands being the exception.

“Seven of the European Union’s island regions already had legislative autonomy, and in eight EU member states there were special provisions for islands in the national constitution, or in the structure of national government, parliament or administration.

“I recall how Mr Hache said that in the event of a ‘Yes’ vote in September 2014 there would be a tremendous opportunity for Scotland to negotiate a special deal for the islands as part of an Accession Treaty.

“The phrase I remember him using was that these negotiations were best made when ‘the cement is still wet’ on such a treaty. That is the way Orkney and Shetland will gain whatever additional powers they feel they need. The alternative is to continue to tie ourselves to the insular British Nationalist state that the dysfunctional UK is becoming under the Tories – with no sign that a Labour government would do anything different.

“Meanwhile First Minister John Swinney has set out his priorities for the Scottish Government as part of his vision to deliver for all of Scotland. The Scottish Government will focus on four areas targeted to have the most immediate benefits for people in their everyday lives – eradicating child poverty, growing the economy, tackling the climate emergency, and improving public services.

“The SNP is lifting an estimated 100,000 children out of poverty this year due to their actions as the Scottish Government.

“But mitigating against the worst of the policies of the Tories at Westminster isn’t enough. Only with the full powers of independence can we really make the positive changes required to make Scotland the fairer, greener and more equal country we know it can be, with Orkney and Shetland playing key roles in that.”

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