WATCH: Russell Findlay’s first major speech

📺 WATCH: Russell Findlay’s first major speech in Scotland 👇

Or read the full speech below:

Many people across Scotland believe that our politics is rotten.

With a lack of trust in politicians deep-rooted and unlike anything I’ve known in my lifetime.

Rebuilding the bond of trust with people is the job and the duty of every single politician.

A starting point must be integrity.

When promises are made, they must be kept.

When mistakes are made, they should be admitted.

Where we fall short, we must be honest and upfront.

But rebuilding trust is about more than just character.

We need to get back to a point where politicians and the public are part of the same conversation.

Talking with each other, not past each other.

When I was a journalist, I earned trust by listening to people’s concerns.

But the SNP Government would rather just pretend to listen.

In the few years since I became an MSP, they’ve published almost three hundred public consultations.

Three hundred.

But these so-called consultations are often a sham, mere acts of performance.

A government that goes through the motions of pretending to listen, with minds closed and decisions already made.

For politicians to rebuild public trust, we must strive for meaningful discussion — not the SNP’s ‘we know best’ attitude.

And this means that we also need to understand what people want to talk about.

We do this by identifying where the common-sense political centre ground really lies.

Those in power at Holyrood believe it lies in so-called progressive issues such as gender self-ID.

They collectively think the centre ground means ever higher taxes.

And they’re convinced that constantly rising public spending guarantees better services.

No, no and no.

The fact is, almost two decades of SNP rule has dragged the Scottish Parliament far off the centre ground.

Many in Holyrood have lost sight of what’s truly important in homes across Scotland.

Obsessed with being on the right side of history, they don’t understand what matters to people in the present.

Holyrood must reconnect with the people it is meant to serve.

But the search for shared ground doesn’t mean casting aside our principles.

It has been argued that ‘the middle ground is a compromise between politicians, unrelated to the aspirations of the public’.

Instead, I believe that our search should be for the common ground of people’s hopes, concerns, and aspirations.

That’s the shared ground where practical solutions can be reached and ambitions realised.

In my life before politics, building that understanding with people was fundamental.

All of us at Holyrood need to see the world through the eyes of the working people who make our country tick – not through the eyes of a detached political class.

And we must focus on the issues of relevance to mainstream Scotland.

Not be consumed by the extreme positions we often see in the Scottish Parliament.

Holyrood has become so disconnected, it no longer grasps where the majority of Scotland stands.

Enric Miralles might as well have built the place on the dark side of the moon.

In the first month of my leadership, I’ve already heard shrill accusations that my party is ‘lurching to the right’.

Left-wing parties point to our opposition to the mass early release of hundreds of prisoners.

When our concerns are perfectly normal around most kitchen tables.

Some criticise our supposed right-wing view that the Scottish Government should fix Scotland’s schools before sending millions for education in other countries.

That’s not right wing, it’s simply right for parents and pupils in Scotland.

We’ve also been criticised because we don’t think asylum seekers should be given free bus travel — especially when pensioners are losing lifeline winter fuel payments.

To most families in Scotland, that view is right, not right wing.

It’s common sense to mainstream Scotland.

So, we have not lurched right. And we won’t in the future.

But we must be alert to the false allure of unchecked individualism.

We need to make, proudly make, the Scottish Conservative case for a decent society.

One where the effort you put in is fairly rewarded.

One where those who play by the rules have the freedom to get on in life.

One where government recognises its limits, but where we also acknowledge what it can do well.

It can keep us safe, create opportunity, and provide a safety net when things get tough.

Where we can get this balance right, we all stand to benefit.

We can use our share of the greater freedom this brings to chart our own course as individuals, families and communities.

We can seize new opportunities that don’t only benefit ourselves as individuals, but our country.

We can build a stronger Scotland.

I believe there is common ground to be found – because those of us in the sensible centre share the same values.

We believe prisoners should serve the sentences they’re given by the independent judiciary.

We believe the Scottish Government should spend your money on schools in Scotland, not overseas.

We believe pensioners who’ve worked hard all their days should be able to afford winter heating before asylum seekers are gifted free travel.

Those are all mainstream views. They’re common-sense views.

And I’ll never be shy to say they’re my views too.

But there is more that unites mainstream Scotland than just some of these specific issues.

Our shared ground is more fundamental than that.

It’s a belief in what I’ve fought for throughout my life – justice and fairness.

Most people feel that they’re holding up their end of the bargain – working hard, paying their taxes, respecting the rules.

But they believe that the scales don’t balance.

They’re tilted against the common man and woman.

And the political class at Holyrood just don’t get it.

They don’t even see why the trust between the public and politicians has broken down.

Here’s why:

Because people pay more tax every year for services that only get worse.

Because people only ever hear Holyrood talk about how much more they should pay, never how much less they could pay if government was more efficient.

People bust a gut to make a better life for their family, only to be told by politicians earning twice the average wage they need to cough up even more.

And with the Scottish budget fast approaching, what questions do we hear from the left-wing parties at Holyrood?

Should tax rates increase?

Should we tax supermarkets?

Should we further tax alcohol?

Should it cost even more to drive?

Listen to the Greens, the SNP’s most likely budget partners.

They say devolution should be ‘stretched to the limit’ in order to levy yet more taxes on working people.

The only thing being stretched to the limit is the patience of taxpayers.

It’s time that we changed the conversation.

And moved it to the common ground, where most people stand.

Taxpayers are willing to paying a fair share, but not more than they can bear.

The case for reducing the tax burden is not only economic. It’s moral.

Continually squeezing more cash out of people is not righteous or progressive.

It leaves folk worse off, and it fuels that disconnect between people and politicians.

27 years ago, business figures warned that devolution could cost the average wage-earner more than £300 a year.

That warning was rejected by then Secretary of State Donald Dewar.

He said that it would be for “a grown-up Parliament with grown-up responsibilities to decide how it will use these powers”.

A quarter of a century later and those warnings have been proven true.

In fact, £300 sounds like a bargain compared to the crippling reality.

And this has happened because the grown-ups are not in charge.

Holyrood has not lived up to its potential.

It has become an echo chamber for posturing and preening student politics.

At the root of the problem is the attitude that levying further charges on tortured taxpayers is somehow an act of virtue.

This needs to change.

The tax gap between Scotland and the rest of the UK has grown over the course of the last six SNP budgets and it can’t all be undone in one go.

But the gap must now begin to narrow, with the ultimate aim of closing it altogether.

So that working people in Scotland are no longer worse off than those elsewhere on these islands.

As part of that, we need to simplify the confused tax landscape.

As the convener of the Scottish Parliament’s finance committee recently said: “Having rates of 19%, 20% and 21% just seems daft to most people.”

He’s right. And he’s an SNP politician.

So shouldn’t the government at least consider removing that 21p burden on middle earners?

The SNP will try to claim that this unfair mess of a tax system is ‘progressive’.

But it’s not progress to pick the pockets of Scotland’s teachers, nurses and police officers – leaving them worse off than colleagues elsewhere in the UK.

We need fairness and justice for Scotland’s taxpayers.

Because they won’t get it from Labour’s upcoming budget this week. 

They’ll harm businesses who we rely on for economic growth.

Punish the job creators in our North Sea industry.

And impose sleekit tax rises on workers which blatantly contradict the spirit of their manifesto promises. 

Making exactly the same mistakes the SNP make at Holyrood.

It’s time to go in a different direction than tax and spend.

That places a responsibility on my party to show where savings can be made.

Going forward, we will not only make the case for tax cuts, but for a smaller state that better serves the public.

It’s a markedly different approach to the left-wing consensus in the Scottish Parliament that favours the big state, expanding both its size and reach into our lives.

Since devolution, Scotland’s block grant has grown by nearly 70%.

Public spending compared to gross domestic product has hit a historic high of 51%.

Yesterday we learned that the size of the devolved civil service has almost doubled in a decade.

Given that huge state expansion, it’s reasonable to ask:

Are public services in better shape?

Do we get better and quicker treatment in our hospitals?

Do our children receive a better education?

Are our streets safer?

The answer to all of these questions is ‘no’.

The SNP have not met cancer treatment targets in a decade.

Scottish schools have plummeted down international rankings.

The number of police officers are at their lowest level in 17 years.

Maybe we’re expected not to worry, because the number of genders is up, with dozens of exciting options to choose from.

When we call for a smaller state, I can already hear the shrill voices of the SNP, Labour, Lib Dems and Greens.

“You just want to cut public services.”

Utterly wrong.

I don’t want to cut public services, I want to cut the cost of delivering services.

The only solution Holyrood ever seems to come up with is to pour more money in, as if that will fix the problem on its own.

Well, it hasn’t, and it won’t.

The left-wing parties in the Scottish Parliament spend all their time on inputs, never on outcomes.

Proper funding of public services is crucial, but it’s only part of the solution.

Public services must become more effective by being more efficient.

Taxpayers deserve this. They demand it.

It’s time to end the student politics of gimmicks and cheap headlines that come with costly price tags.

Like baby boxes. These have now cost £50m, without any hard evidence of their effectiveness.

Or the fact the SNP spends £9m a year on ‘foreign embassies’, despite international affairs being reserved.

And I think it’s agreed that almost everyone, but especially the wealthiest, can afford a 39p packet of paracetamol instead of getting it free on prescription.

Examples of unnecessary and wasteful spending could fill a book.

Maybe there could be a chapter in Nicola Sturgeon’s memoir – between ‘deleting Covid messages’ and ‘campervan holidays’.

But we need to think bigger to drive the efficiencies that would realise substantial savings for the taxpayer.

After 25 years of devolution, we need a complete overhaul of the architecture of government.

Local government needs to change.

Bold reforms could restructure, cut costs and improve services by reducing duplication and maximising collaboration.

And reform would not mean limiting the powers of councils – the opposite, in fact.

Councils should no longer be treated simply as delivery mechanisms for a centrally-set agenda.

Devolution has stopped at the doors of Holyrood.

We need to reverse the centralising trend of the past two decades and empower local communities.

But that’s not all.

NHS boards should be scrutinised and streamlined to ensure every penny reaches the frontline.

Cutting out middle managers and freeing staff to put patients before paperwork would help drive up standards and drive down costs.

Ten years ago, the NHS in Scotland treated 68,000 more patients despite having almost 25,000 fewer staff.

Shouldn’t that serve as a wake-up call that reform is necessary?

And we shouldn’t stop there.

Let’s look at the array of public bodies, quangos and commissioners which form much of Scotland’s governing class.

• Executive Agencies
• Arms-length External Organisations
• Non-Ministerial Offices
• Public Corporations
• Executive Non-Departmental Public Bodies
• Advisory Non-Departmental Public Bodies
• Commissioners
• Ombudsmen

The list goes on.

At least 131 of them.

With a collective budget of almost £20 billion.

Do we really need them all?

I very much doubt it.

We will set out proposals to reduce that number and make savings for taxpayers.

SEPA and NatureScot seem an obvious example to potentially merge.

Doesn’t it make sense that environmental protection and nature should go hand-in-hand?

Or the Scottish Land Commission could be scrapped altogether.

Scotland doesn’t need another yes-man like Mike Russell picking up a taxpayer-funded wage for chatting to his old pals in the SNP.

The bloated quango culture saddles the taxpayer with huge costs while reducing accountability and transparency.

It allows problems to go unchecked like water quango bosses billing taxpayers for £400 lunches and courses at elite US universities.

Or culture chiefs working from home … in New Zealand.

And the folly of public body chief executives across Scotland having their minimum salaries increased by 20% – a £23,000 hike.

Tens of millions of pounds are waiting to be saved if only politicians in Edinburgh were more concerned about ensuring best value for taxpayers.

This should be our mission over the years ahead.

Rebuild trust between politicians and the public by only promising what’s deliverable.

Rebuild trust by being ruthlessly efficient custodians of taxpayers’ money.

Rebuild trust around the common-sense and common-ground values that the majority of Scots share.

If we focus on providing value for money at all times, eliminating wasteful spending, and reducing the burden of tax on workers and businesses, then I do believe that trust can be rebuilt.

I’m well up for that challenge.

The Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party I lead is up for that challenge.

And I’m calling on all parties sitting in Holyrood to join us in meeting it.

We must reconnect with the common ground where mainstream Scotland stands.

Our politics and public trust depend on it.

Share this on X:

🔵 The @ScotTories believe prisoners should serve their full sentences.

🔵 Taxpayer funds should go to schools in Scotland, not overseas.

🔵 And pensioners should get help with their fuel bills, before asylum seekers are given free travel.

That’s just common sense 👇 pic.twitter.com/P4idpRDcbT

— Scottish Conservatives (@ScotTories) October 28, 2024