Douglas Ross interview: ‘Out of this virus mess, there will be a ray of hope’

It was just over a month ago that the junior Scotland Office minister Douglas Ross last took questions in the House of Commons. Coronavirus was an item buried deep in news bulletins, with reporting from foreign correspondents.

Douglas Ross hopes there will be an enduring legacy of cooperation with England. Picture: Craig Foy/SNS

“Let us look at the real world in Scotland where the SNP is in power,” Ross told MPs on 12 February. “We have bridges that people cannot get across; we have hospitals that it cannot open; and we have an education system that is failing. That is the record that the Scottish Government and the SNP will have to go to the people in a little over 15 months’ time.”

Fast forward to the present day and Ross is full of praise for the Scottish Health Secretary Jeane Freeman; he echoes his Scottish party leader’s endorsement of Nicola Sturgeon as “eminently capable” of handling the current crisis.

Coronavirus has utterly changed our society, so why shouldn’t it have changed our politics?

At this week’s Prime Minister’s Questions, Boris Johnson nodded along as John McDonnell demanded he pay the wages of every worker in Britain. On Friday, former Goldman Sachs banker Rishi Sunak promised unlimited state spending and is about to nationalise the UK’s airlines. And now, the sense that Scotland’s constitutional debate was about to consume the nation’s politics a second time has evaporated.

Relations between the UK and Scottish governments had badly deteriorated over Brexit, to the point of name-calling. Now Sturgeon – allegedly dubbed “that bloody Wee Jimmy Crankie woman” by the Prime Minister in a row over the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow – takes part in regular emergency Cobra meetings on coronavirus.

“Nothing in the immediate past has happened like this before,” Ross says over a conference call from his Moray constituency – another signal of our changed times.

“I was involved in farming at the time of the foot and mouth outbreak… obviously devolved government was fairly new at the time in 2001.

“But we’ve seen nothing on the scale of Covid-19, and nothing that can really match what the governments are doing together now. We’ve never had a problem like this before where we’ve had to work in quite the same way.

“And it just shows, when it’s necessary, the four governments around the United Kingdom can work together for the benefit of everyone we represent.”

There has been “pretty much constant contact” at all levels, from the Prime Minister and First Minister, through the health secretaries of the four UK governments, to civil servants.

Next week’s emergency powers bill, allowing authorities to close any venue and force anyone, adult or child, to submit to coronavirus testing and isolation in their homes, will be nodded through – “but there has still been scrutiny,” Ross insists.

“I’ve been in some meetings where issues have been highlighted, from the devolved administrations or at a UK parliament level, and we have worked together to develop this piece of legislation at breakneck speed,” he says.

“What I take from it is that we can put our political differences aside when it comes to a matter of such significant importance to the entire country… this is about ensuring we share the resources, we share best practice to work together and get through this battle, because if we are divided, then the virus will win.”

Barnett consequentials have been a frequent source of conflict between Edinburgh and London, and a regular blockage in the institutional plumbing. This month, billions in coronavirus relief for Scotland has been paid out in advance of money being drawn down in England, to ensure businesses in devolved nations get the help they need swiftly.

“This is the fastest that this money has ever flowed,” Ross says. “And again, it’s another sign that instead of picking fights over this, that and the other, we’re actually all concentrated on just directing the resources.”

It’s something that Ross hopes can be an enduring legacy of the emergency response once the battle against the virus is won. “If, as a result of this pandemic, we actually in future see improvements in the way we do things and how we work together, then somewhere out of this terrible mess, there will be a ray of hope.”

Politicians from every party have abandoned partisanship in favour of cooperation, and one of the most striking – and reassuring – moments last week was Scottish Conservative leader Jackson Carlaw’s remarks to the First Minister that he had “every confidence in her to lead the country’s response to this crisis”.

Ross agrees. “I think Nicola Sturgeon is eminently capable of dealing with this,” he says. “I think Jeane Freeman is clearly capable, we’ve seen Kate Forbes and Fiona Hyslop at finance and the economy. In the same way, we’ve seen the Prime Minister and the scientific advisers leading at a UK level with Matt Hancock, keeping the country constantly updated on what we’re doing on health issues. We’ve seen Rishi Sunak as Chancellor – someone only in post for a matter of weeks – rising to the challenge.

“I think in every department in every government, across the country, we’re seeing people up their game, because that’s what people expect at these times of crisis.”

None the less, some in Downing Street complained about Sturgeon revealing details on Cobra discussions before the Prime Minister. With millions glued to 24-hour news channels like never before, that has meant an English audience hearing about the possibility of school closures and stricter shutdowns in London from the First Minister of Scotland. A list of “key workers” whose children could continue at school was released by the UK government at midnight on Thursday, leaving Scottish parents in the dark until the Scottish Government published details of its approach on Friday afternoon. Likewise, ministers in Edinburgh were unimpressed with the way details of social shielding for the over-70s trickled out in the press last weekend.

“I think generally people want as much information as they can get,” Ross says, rejecting the suggestion that viewers don’t know which leader to listen to – Sturgeon or Johnson. “When the Chancellor makes an announcement at a UK level, it takes a short amount of time to understand how that will be implemented at a devolved level, and that’s understandable... I think that lessons have been learned that have influenced our performance.”

Ultimately, the message everywhere is the same: staying at home will save lives. “When people are reading this article I’ll be probably outside my parents’ house with our one year-old, so that my parents can see their grandchild on Mother’s Day,” Ross says. “And that’s going to be difficult for a lot of people.

“But it’s so that next year on Mother’s Day, we can enjoy it all together.”