Boris Johnson’s attempts to deny the SNP a second independence referendum is like Donald Trump denying he has lost the US election, a leading Scottish MP has claimed.
Pete Wishart compared Alister Jack’s Scotland Office to the Trump White House as the Scottish Secretary found himself on the rack over his handling of the referendum issue.
Jack was slammed for ruling out a second referendum for 40 years, although he later revised that down to 25 years after claiming the higher figure was a “jocular” remark.
But the Scottish Secretary found himself the butt of the jokes at Scottish Question in the Commons as he fended off barbs from the SNP.
Wishart told the Scottish Secretary: “Saying no to a majority in Scotland is only going to drive support for independence even higher.”
The veteran SNP MP added: “The Scottish people are not finding this democracy denial funny any more, so what’s the difference between denying a majority at the Trump White House and denying a majority in the Scotland Office?”
Jack replied that all sides should respect the result from the 2014 referendum.
He said: “It was very clear the SNP said at the time it was once-in-a-generation. I don’t believe we should go into a process of ‘neverendums’ which are divisive, unsettling, bad for jobs in Scotland.
“We should respect democracy and that’s what I’m doing, democracy that was handed out by the Scottish people in 2014.”
The SNP’s Scotland spokeswoman Mhairi Black pressed Jack over the legal basis for refusing a referendum.
She said: “Now of course the Edinburgh Agreement, signed by a Tory prime minister, provided the legal framework for the 2014 referendum. So I’m wondering, can he quote where it says in that agreement that there cannot be another referendum?”
Jack said that in the middle of a pandemic “it beggars belief that the SNP carry on talking about independence referendums and about separation”.
He added: “I find it really quite disappointing, but the answer to her question, it was mentioned many times in the White Paper that the SNP Government produced in advance of that referendum, once in a generation was mentioned on a number of pages.”
But the nationalists weren't finished with him as Philippa Whitford compared Scotland to a wife trapped in a marriage.
She said: “I hope the Secretary of State isn’t suggesting there won’t be another referendum for 40 years."
“On that basis, does he think the best recipe for a happy marriage is to lock up the wife, take away her chequebook and just keep refusing a divorce?”
Jack answered: “I think it’s quite straightforward, I think people should respect democracy. A generation, by any calculation, is 25 years and frankly, you just have to accept that and focus on what matters, which is recovering from this pandemic and us all pulling together.”
