Scottish Conservatives to announce management contest winner

The Scottish Conservatives are to unveil the winner of the competition to succeed Ruth Davidson as occasion chief.

The 2 candidates are MSPs Jackson Carlaw and Michelle Ballantyne, with occasion members electing the winner.

Mr Carlaw has been interim chief since Ms Davidson’s resignation in August, and is seen because the clear favorite to win the poll.

The competition has been bad-tempered, with the 2 candidates buying and selling insults forward of the end result being introduced.

Ms Ballantyne, who believes she has robust grassroots assist however has not gained public backing from any MPs or MSPs, accused Mr Carlaw of working a normal election marketing campaign that “lacked vision and ambition”, with the occasion shedding seven of its 13 MPs.

Mr Carlaw hit again by claiming his opponent was the one member of the Tory frontbench crew at Holyrood never to submit a “single policy proposal”.

The winner shall be introduced at an occasion in Edinburgh at about 10:00.

• Ruth Davidson quits as Scottish Tory leader
• Profile: Ruth Davidson

The Scottish Conservatives are at the moment the second greatest occasion at Holyrood, with Ms Davidson extensively credited with turning round its electoral fortunes in her eight years as chief.

However she stop shortly after getting back from maternity depart, saying that “a lot had modified” each politically and personally in latest months.

In addition to the delivery of her son, Ms Davidson had been a vocal critic of Prime Minister Boris Johnson – significantly over his method to Brexit.

Her successor should put together the occasion for subsequent yr’s Scottish Parliament election, with opinion polls suggesting that the SNP stays on the right track to win a fourth successive time period in authorities.

Who’re the management candidates?

Jackson Carlaw labored as a automobile salesman within the west of Scotland for 25 years earlier than being elected as an MSP, however has been concerned in politics since becoming a member of the Conservatives as teenager within the late 1970s.

He first stood as a candidate within the 1982 Queen’s Park by-election, and after a number of different unsuccessful makes an attempt was ultimately elected as an inventory MSP for the West of Scotland area within the 2007 and once more in 2011 – when he additionally turned Ms Davidson’s deputy chief.

Mr Carlaw, who’s married with two kids, was elected because the MSP for Eastwood in 2016, and served as appearing chief when Ms Davidson went on maternity depart forward of the delivery of her son in Could of final yr.

When Ms Davidson resigned as party leader in August, Mr Carlaw was instantly appointed as interim chief – with a few of his supporters hoping he can be given the position on a everlasting foundation and not using a management contest being required.

The 60-year-old says he needs the occasion to enchantment to “center Scotland” forward of subsequent yr’s Scottish Parliament election, when he says his purpose is to “take down” Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP.

Amongst his key coverage proposals are growing the variety of academics in Scotland by 2,000, bringing revenue taxes into line with the remainder of the UK, and scrapping the Scottish authorities’s plan to introduce a so-called parking tax.

He instructed his official marketing campaign launch final month that he stands for “a good, generous-spirited, ‘aspirational conservatism’ that promotes the values and ambitions of center Scotland”.

Mr Carlaw has already secured assist from a majority of MSPs, all the Conservative Social gathering’s native council leaders in Scotland and a few MPs.

He says the expertise he has constructed up in his prolonged stint as appearing chief – which noticed him go head-to-head with Ms Sturgeon throughout first minister’s questions each week – imply he would have the ability to hit the bottom working if he wins the race to do the job full time.

However critics level out that Mr Carlaw’s tenure included final month’s normal election, when the Scottish Conservatives misplaced seven of the 13 seats they’d gained below Ms Davidson in 2017 regardless of the Tories profitable a majority throughout the UK as a complete.