Douglas Ross: Local elections are fight between Conservatives and SNP

The Scottish local council elections will be a race between the Conservatives and the SNP, Tory leader Douglas Ross has said.

Speaking as he launched his party’s campaign ahead of the vote on May 5, Mr Ross said Labour had gone “backwards” in recent elections.

In central Edinburgh, he unveiled the Conservatives’ slogan for the campaign: “Your local priorities, not the SNP’s.”

At the last local elections in 2017, the Tories took 276 seats on 25% of the vote.

Asked what his target was for this election, Mr Ross told the PA news agency: “I’ve got no limit on my ambition because there is a lot of opportunities for the Scottish Conservatives.

“We’ve seen at election after election we are the main opposition to the SNP.

“Scottish Labour continue to go backwards. At every election to Holyrood since devolution they’ve lost votes and lost seats.

“In the last 12 months, in local council by-elections, we’ve been neck and neck with the SNP, in some cases Labour couldn’t even get a candidate and they’ve gone backwards.

“So it’s very clear this is between the Scottish Conservatives and the SNP and we are the ones that are fighting for local priorities to deliver for local people in local communities.”

Discussing the party’s slogan, he said: “What we’ve seen is the SNP agitating at every opportunity for another independence referendum, we know they want to hold a referendum as soon as next year.

“They will use this election and any votes for the SNP as a proxy for their obsession on independence.”

Miles Briggs, the Tories’ local government spokesman, was also at the launch in Edinburgh.

The capital’s city council is run by an SNP-Labour coalition.

Mr Briggs said: “Labour have failed to stand up to the SNP here in the capital.

“So a vote for the Conservatives will be a vote to stop the SNP.

“But also to focus on people’s priorities, on local services.”

He sad a key part of the Tories’ campaign in Edinburgh would be the council’s Spaces for People scheme, which has created new cycling lanes and walking areas.

It has divided opinion in the city, with some concerned about the impact the new lanes have on traffic, parking, disabled access.

Mr Briggs said: “It’s time to scrap Spaces for People.

“The millions of pounds which have gone into that could have gone into other ways of transporting people around the capital.”

He said the party would invest in new urban greenways for walking and cycling, saying a number of disuses railways could be used for this.