Tory voters should vote Labour at the next election if their candidate is best placed to beat the SNP, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives has suggested. Douglas Ross risked a split with Tory leader Rishi Sunak as he said people should “do what’s best for the country” to help loosen the nationalists’ grip on Scotland.
A Tory spokesman in Westminster insisted tactical voting was “emphatically not the view of the Conservative Party” and that voters should support the Tories “wherever they are standing”. Mr Ross’s remarks, in an interview with the Telegraph, came at a time of crisis for the SNP in the wake of Nicola Sturgeon’s resignation as first minister and party leader.
Her husband, former SNP chief executive Peter Murrell, was arrested in the investigation into the spending of around £600,000 that was earmarked for an independence campaign. In her first public comments since the arrest on Wednesday, Ms Sturgeon said she would “fully cooperate” with the police if they ask to interview her.
