RISHI Sunak dismissed concerns that the election date clashes with Scottish school holidays with an attack on the SNP’s education record.
The Prime Minister announced earlier this week that the election will take place on July 4 – when much of Scotland will be enjoying the school holidays.
Following the announcement, Swinney accused Downing Street of showing “contempt” for the Scottish people.
NEW: @RishiSunak says the SNP have “let down Scottish schoolchildren for years and years.” While visiting the Port of Nigg with @Douglas4Moray, he was questioned on how @JohnSwinney said the July 4th election date was disrespectful as many Scottish schools are on summer break. pic.twitter.com/l0dbUjb8WZ
— MFR News and Sport (@MFRNews) May 23, 2024
Asked about the First Minister’s frustration during a visit to Port of Nigg, Sunak said: “I’d say a couple of things. If John Swinney and the SNP want to talk about Scottish schools, what they should be focused on is the fact that they’ve let down Scottish schoolchildren for years and years.
“Scottish schools used to be the envy, not just of the United Kingdom but the envy of the world, and under the SNP’s leadership, Scottish schools have plummeted down international league tables, letting down a generation of schoolchildren.
“That’s what we should be focused on but the SNP aren’t focused on that because they’re focused on independence.
“It just shows they’ve got absolutely the wrong priorities and when it comes to election timing it was only on Wednesday I think in Parliament that Stephen Flynn was saying that we should call an election and then when we do have an election, what do the SNP do, suddenly decide that they didn’t think that was the right thing to do and focus on process and distract from their failures and the fact that they’ve let down Scottish schoolchildren.”
Douglas Ross (below) then added that children in Stephen Flynn’s constituency would still be in school but failed to acknowledge that the majority of schoolchildren would already have started their holidays by the time the election is held.
Critics have already taken aim at an error-strewn first 24 hours for Sunak on the campaign trail.
During a visit to William West and Sons distribution centre in Derbyshire, Sunak took questions from several Tory councillors instead of workers.
One man, wearing a hi-vis jacket and standing amongst all the others, was singled out by Sunak to ask a question in front of broadcasters.
