Race for Holyrood: Your Scottish election briefing for Monday, April 5

A lighter look at the Scottish election campaign trail.

GLASGOW, SCOTLAND - APRIL 02: Douglas Ross, Leader of the Scottish Conservatives, is seen on a Hawkeye vehicle during a visit to Thales Optronics on April 2, 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland. Mr Ross was setting out the Scottish Conservative proposals for demand-led apprenticeships and expanding on the party's plans for a skills revolution. (Photo by Peter Summers/Getty Images)

Soapbox

@georgegalloway

Come on @AlexSalmond @AlbaParty, what are you waiting for... Let's get it on. #SalmondVGalloway

George Galloway, the leader of another new political party for the May elections, All for Unity, said the party was set to launch legal action against broadcasters due to perceived “exclusion” from the leader debates. George Galloway’s party was not invited to take part in the debate hosted by the BBC last week and alongside Alex Salmond’s new Alba Party, is yet to receive an invitation to any future debate.

In response, Mr Galloway has written to Mr Salmond to urge him to take up an offer by broadcaster Andrew Neil to host an on-air debate between the two men. In the letter, he wrote: “This is the debate that the public have been longing for. Box office, TV gold. The heavyweights of Scottish politics.”

Caption This

Can you suggest a caption for this picture of Scottish Conservatives leader Douglas Ross, as he climbed onto a Hawkeye vehicle during a visit to Thales Optronics in Glasgow?

#FakeNews?

Is it fake news or not? We expose a political comment or claim to proper scrutiny

Speaking in a virtual speech from Glasgow today, Humza Yousaf insisted that the crime, including violent crime, has fallen over the last decade with the SNP in government. He said that in 2008 around one in five adults experienced a crime, but that that figure had now dropped to one in eight. However, the claims were rubbished hours later by the Scottish Conservatives, who accused him of “cherry picking” justice statistics.

Scottish Conservative justice spokesman Liam Kerr said: “Humza Yousaf had to cherry-pick statistics on violent crime because for the last five years, it’s been rising under the SNP.”

He pointed to the Scottish Government’s own Recorded Crime in Scotland 2019-20 document, which was published in September and shows that non-sexual crimes of violence have risen by nearly 50 per cent since 2014-15, from 6,272 to 9,316 in 2019-20 and have increased every year since 2014-15. However, the report clearly states that this increase is due to the recording of 1,681 new crimes under the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018 in 2019-20, following its enactment on 1 April 2019, while all other non-sexual crimes of violence collectively decreased by 5 per cent between 2018-19 and 2019-20.

Mr Yousaf is also right, in that recorded violent crime has seen a 23 per cent decrease over the past ten years, while the report states that the recording of crime remains at one of the lowest levels seen since 1974.

Some other types of crime, such as fraud have also seen an increase, rising by 33 per cent since 2010-11, including a 23 per cent increase between 2018-19 and 2019-20.

Campaign Trail

We summarise key developments on the campaign trail from today

- The SNP’s Humza Yousaf announced major new policy changes in justice, if the party is re-elected. In response to campaigners, who have long warned that jurors are confused by Scotland’s three verdicts, the SNP finally said it would open a consultation into scrapping the ‘non proven’ verdict. He also pledged to create a “Bairn’s Hoose’ for youngsters who are witnesses or victims of crime to make their experience easier and said that the SNP would create a Victims Commissioner for Scotland.

- During his first visit to the barber in months, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie warned of “a mountain of delays” for mental health treatment and called for action on mental health to be the first priority of the recovery. He pointed to official statistics from Public Health Scotland which show a record 1,892 children and 5,452 adults waiting more than a year for mental health treatment.

- Scottish Conservatives leader Douglas Ross visited a park in Edinburgh to explain the party’s plans for a Nature Bill aimed at reducing the threat of species extinction, expanding green spaces in towns and cities, and protecting marine life. The bill will also tackle invasive non-native species, increase tree planting, end peat extraction for use in compost, create a third national park and review Marine Protected Areas with a view to expansion.

- The Scottish Greens have pledged to completely ban fox hunting in Scotland, saying that despite an apparent ban being introduced in 2002, fox hunts continue in Scotland by exploiting loopholes.

Battleground

We look at a minority seat or constituency battleground each day. Today it is:

Orkney

Winning party (2016): Liberal Democrats

Second place (2016): SNP

Swing to lose: 32 per cent

The seat has been held by the Liberal Democrats since the beginning of the Scottish Parliament with current incumbent Liam McArthur, the party’s justice spokesman, holding the seat since 2007. Former Deputy First Minister Jim Wallace represented the constituency for the party from 1999 to 2007.

Voting stats from the last election in 2016 show the Lib Dems with a huge majority, 7,096 to 2,562 to the SNP. The three other candidates: Conservative, Labour and Independent all lost their deposits in 2016. The SNP candidate in May is Robert Leslie, a fuel poverty charity manager and former journalist.

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