Penny Mordaunt: Scots will not stand for SNP's block on their freedom of speech and debate

‘We know movements based on hate and division always want to curtail freedom and debate’

Give the SNP credit where it’s due – they have realised the game is up. They can no longer disguise the fact that they have been an unmitigated disaster for Scotland.

Drug deaths in Scotland are the worst in Europe and have more than doubled since the SNP came to power. Violent crime is at its highest level since 2014. Emergency response times are increasing. Educational standards for maths, science and literacy are at an all-time low. Transport infrastructure, from roads to ferries, has been delayed. Basic services the public rely upon are collapsing. All despite record levels of funding from the UK Government.

Might the SNP now change their policies? Might they start to reverse some of this damage? No, because they are not a party interested in governing for the benefit of their citizens. That is not the reason they get out of bed in the morning. But they do at least attempt to head off criticism.

A free speech campaigner pictured during a protest outside the Scottish Parliament (Picture: Lesley Martin/PA)

They have tried to do this by accusing those who dare to point out their failings as anti-Scots. Indeed, I’m accused of harbouring a ‘hatred’ towards Scotland every week on the floor of the House. Why I should feel such animosity towards my Scottish countrymen, or the earth upon which they stand, is never explained by my accusers. But it must be true, because I do not agree with the SNP.

The public have long seen through this tactic. So, the SNP have now thought up new ways to demonise their critics and anyone who does not share their world view. Speaking your mind, whether at Holyrood, or around the family dinner table, may now be a criminal offence via the Hate Crime Act.

So how does this new law work? By outlining a myriad of new contexts in which ‘stirring up hatred’ can be punishable by up to seven years in jail. Critics have rightly pointed out that the law could be ‘weaponized’ against people holding different political views, for example, gender-critical women. Conservative MSP Murdo Fraser was investigated and harangued for challenging the SNP’s transgender policies.

This weaponizing of hate speech to shut down political discourse is truly worrying. I’m proud that Scottish Conservatives are the only opposition party to have consistently opposed this law from day one. Labour and the Lib Dems are willing architects of this doublespeak dystopia.

The Nats have constructed a vast network of snitch centres in all sorts of strange places, making it easier to report people who disagree with the SNP’s views. These include a sex shop, campervan sites, and a mushroom farm.

I’m going to stick my neck out here, but I don’t think this new law will be around for very long.

I don’t think the Scottish people, who are practical, tolerant, and grounded, will stand for it. Just as they rose up against the SNP’s push for gender self-identification, and breeches of the equality act, they will push back against this block on their freedom of speech and debate.

They may also, in the wake of the rising rates of violent crime across Scotland, demand that their hard-pressed police force be allowed to focus on attending burglaries and stopping knife crime. Police Scotland will have to investigate every single report of hate under the new law, whilst also admitting that budget cuts have forced them to downscale investigations into 24,000 ‘low level crimes’, such as theft.

Their own ministers have been tying themselves in knots to try and explain this new law and its impact. The Scottish Victims minister, Siobhian Brown, has been called out for making repeated incorrect statements about the law whilst trying to explain it to radio listeners.

But there is perhaps an even more profound reason why this new law is set to fail. And that is the blatant irony of it being led by the SNP - a movement based on hate.

This is a party who’s calls for independence have reduced a fierce and powerful nation to a narrative of victimhood. It’s all about the oppressive English, not the go-getting Scots. They are out of ideas, and so they turn their hate towards the Union.

First Minister Humza Yousaf has already been reported to the police under his own new law for a speech he made in 2020 lambasting white people in high office. 4,000 such reports are believed to have been made. Supporters of the Free Speech Union are rightly drawing attention to this rank hypocrisy. I doubt that the good people of Scotland will tolerate this farce for long.

Freedom of speech and the freedom to debate ideas is not a “nice to have’. It is fundamental to progress. It is a necessity for good decision making, and for the social contract which binds us all. My party gets this because it values every voice.

In England and Wales, we’ve passed laws to protect freedom of speech at our universities. We value open debate, freedom of expression, and equality before the law - the SNP, and their Labour apologists, do not.

The SNP might think they have silenced their critics on Scottish soil. Limited themselves perhaps to a weekly bashing from me and the Prime Minister across the Despatch Box. Not so. Scottish Conservatives and the people they represent will continue to take the fight to them. That opposition must be heard. Conservatives know this latest lunacy must be fought.

We know movements based on hate and division always want to curtail freedom and debate.

We also know that in the end such movements always fail.

Penny Mordaunt is a Conservative MP and Leader of the House of Commons