Scottish election 2021: Tories propose new laws to boost Covid recovery

The Scottish Conservatives have proposed 15 new pieces of legislation for the next Holyrood term in the party's manifesto for May's election.

These include plans for retraining grants for workers, rates relief for shops, and reforms to council funding.

The party also wants to recruit 3,000 extra teachers and put more police officers on Scotland's streets.

Leader Douglas Ross said Holyrood's focus should be on recovery from Covid-19, not a new independence referendum.

He said the manifesto was a plan to "secure and accelerate our recovery from coronavirus", and which would "use the strong foundations of the UK to rebuild Scotland".

Holyrood's other parties accused the Conservatives of having little to offer beyond opposition to independence, saying they had shown no ambition or leadership.

SCOTLAND ALERTS: Get extra updates on BBC election coverage

The Tory manifesto includes plans for 15 "major" bills across the five-year Scottish Parliament term.

They include the £500 "retrain to rebuild" grant proposed by the party when it launched its Holyrood campaign, alongside a range of other employment measures including the creation of "job security councils" which would help people re-skill and change careers.

The party wants to see an Enterprise Bill tabled within the first 100 days of the new term to establish economic development agencies in each region of the country, along with a "Scotland first" approach to public procurement.

• Scottish Conservatives manifesto at-a-glance

• A simple guide to the Scottish Conservatives

Plans are also included for a Communities Bill which would redraw the way local authorities are funded, via a "Barnett formula for councils" similar to the way Holyrood's finances work.

The Conservatives want to cut taxes for house-buyers and business owners, with a rates relief package that the party said would save the average shop £3,000, and scrap public car parking charges to revive town centres. The party also wants to bring Scotland's income tax regime back in line with that of the rest of the UK.

Douglas Ross knows he is unlikely to become first minister at this election - that is not his primary goal.

Instead his priority is to stop the SNP winning a majority of seats at Holyrood to prevent indyref2.

Party leaflets claim that if SNP politicians have a majority "they'll hold another independence referendum". Not that they might but that they WILL.

The trouble with that argument is it appears to contradict the UK government's line that it would not agree to indyref2.

Either Boris Johnson would block a referendum or he would not.

When I put this to Mr Ross he said the SNP was planning to hold an illegal referendum without UK consent.

The nationalists have said they would defend Holyrood legislation for indyref2 against any legal challenge but that the vote would only go ahead if the court ruled in their favour.

SCOTLAND'S ELECTION: THE BASICS

What's happening? On 6 May, people across Scotland will vote to elect 129 Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs). The party that wins the most seats will form the government. Find out more here.

What powers do they have? MSPs pass laws on aspects of life in Scotland such as health, education and transport - and have some powers over tax and welfare benefits.

Who can vote? Anyone who lives in Scotland, is registered to vote and aged 16 or over on 6 May is eligible. You can register to vote online.

The party's first bill in the new parliamentary term would be a justice bill - dubbed a "victim's law" to strengthen the rights of victims and their families - which would abolish the not proven verdict, end automatic early release, introduce whole-life sentences and remove the right of prisoners to vote.

And the Tories want to recruit 3,000 more teachers to "restore local schools" - with a dedicated science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) teacher in every primary school.

The manifesto also proposes:

• a £2bn funding boost for the NHS across the next parliament

• £2.5bn to improve energy efficiency in homes

• repealing the Hate Crime Act passed in the previous parliamentary term

• £200m to fill in potholes

• funding for residential rehabilitation services to tackle the drugs death crisis

• rolling out full fibre broadband across Scotland by 2027

• changes to planning laws to give local residents the final say over major developments

Launching the manifesto, Mr Ross said Scotland's place in the UK had already helped it through the Covid-19 pandemic - pointing to the furlough scheme and the vaccine programme - and said his party would would build on this.

However he said none of this would be possible if the next parliament was focused on a new referendum, saying that would be "the height of recklessness".

He said: "This is a manifesto that, at its heart, secures and accelerates our recovery from coronavirus. That uses the strong foundations and support of the UK to rebuild Scotland.

"But we cannot rebuild Scotland while we are crippled by the threat of an independence referendum. So we need to take that threat off the table.

"We need to ensure the Scottish Parliament is laser-focused on our national interest right now, not party-political priorities."

The Conservatives want Scotland's focus to be on recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic

The SNP said the Conservatives had little to offer beyond opposition to independence, which the party's deputy leader Keith Brown said was "utterly undemocratic".

He added: "It's clear that Douglas Ross and his party have no route through the pandemic, no vision for recovery, no ambition, no intention of setting out a detailed plan on how they would run Scotland, and offer no leadership."

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said the Tories had "nothing positive to say or offer the people of Scotland".

He said: "Douglas Ross' Tories are not interested in uniting the country - they are deliberately talking up division for their own political purposes.

"The Tory government's record in power is one of shame - they are responsible for so many of the structural inequalities that we faced pre-Covid and that have since been exacerbated by the pandemic."

• BASICS: A really simple guide to the election

• POLICIES: Who should I vote for?

• CANDIDATES: Who can I vote for in my area?

• PODLITICAL: Updates from the campaign