Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has lashed out at the “cosy left-wing consensus” in Scottish politics.
Speaking at the Scottish Conservative Party’s spring conference, Mrs Badenoch looked to position herself as the opposition to the Scottish National Party, Labour, Liberal Democrats and Green Party north of the border.
She said: “This cosy left-wing consensus has stayed silent and Scotland has declined, and the people of Scotland have got poorer.
“And instead of growing the economy and bringing down people’s bills, they’ve been working together on their left-wing ideological obsessions.
“Allowing rapists into women’s prisons, pursuing nurses through the courts for wanting private changing spaces.”
Mrs Badenoch added: “This left-wing consensus has been attacking free speech, wasting millions on failed projects like ferries that don’t float.
“The only people at Holyrood who have the backbone to stand up to this madness are the Scottish Conservatives.”
However, recent polling from north of the border suggests the Tories have slumped down to just 10 per cent of the vote share.
Kemi Badenoch Speaking at the Scottish Conservative Party’s spring conference
|
PA
Mrs Badenoch was referring to the case of Isla Bryson, who was convicted of raping two women before she changed her gender in 2020.
She was remanded to a female-only prison, HMP Cornton Vale, under Scottish Prison Service SPS guidance.
The decision triggered widespread backlash over safety concerns, prompting then First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, to intervene and approve Bryson’s transfer to HMP Edinburgh.
The leader of the opposition was also making reference to the transgender doctor caught up in a changing room row, which led to an employment tribunal.
Isla Bryson, formerly known as Adam Graham, is now housed in an all-male prison in Scotland
|
PASandie Peggie, a nurse who has worked for the NHS for 30 years, brought Dr Beth Upton and NHS Fife to an employment tribunal after she was suspended over an incident in a female changing room in Victoria Hospital, Kirkcaldy, Scotland.
Ms Peggie, refused to share a women-only changing room with Dr Upton, a biological male who identifies as a woman, at the hospital and was consequently suspended from work after the doctor made a complaint against her at the beginning of 2024.
The tribunal ruled that NHS Fife should have stopped Dr Upton using the female changing rooms on an interim basis.
Scottish voters will be heading to the polling stations on May 7, 2026 for their Parliament election.
Voters will be choosing all 129 Members of Scottish Parliament (MSPs) in what will be the seventh national content since devolution in 1999.
Six parties are currently represented at Holyrood, though only five secured seats at the 2021 election: the Scottish National Party, now led by First Minister John Swinney; the Scottish Conservatives under Russell Findlay; Scottish Labour led by Anas Sarwar; the Scottish Greens, co-led by Gillian Mackay and Ross Greer; and the Scottish Liberal Democrats led by Alex Cole-Hamilton.
Since 2021, four of the five main parties have undergone leadership changes.
Reform UK is also represented at Holyrood after a former Conservative MSP defected.
The vote will be the first Holyrood election since the 2024 UK general election, which delivered a landslide victory for Labour.
Malcolm Offord was appointed as the leader of Reform UK in Scotland in January 2026, succeeding Michelle Ballantyne.
A former Conservative peer and UK government minister, he defected from the Tories to lead Reform UK’s campaign for the Scottish Parliament elections.
A Norstat poll put the SNP in the lead on 35 per cent, with Reform UK leapfrogging Labour into second on 19 per cent.