Truss and Sunak visit Perth on the campaign trail

Conservative leadership candidates Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss are on the campaign trail in Perth today, where they will face Scottish Conservative Party members in a hustings event.

The hustings will give local Tory members the chance to question the candidates on Scottish issues as well as other topics such as the cost of living. Both candidates have voiced their opposition to granting the Scottish Government a second independence referendum, which the SNP government plans to hold in October 2023.

Sunak has announced plans to reform a team of advisers in Downing Street known as “the union unit”, and has said his future reforms would ensure "every single" government department operated across the UK, despite devolution.

Meanwhile, Truss has said she would retain the “minister for the union” title which Prime Minister Boris Johnson currently holds.

Ahead of the leadership candidates’ visit to Perth, the SNP’s Westminster leader Ian Blackford said: “SNP Westminster Leader Ian Blackford MP said: "The only thing Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss should be coming to Scotland to do is to say sorry for their part in the spiralling Tory-made cost of living crisis which they have directly contributed to.

“But the fact that new polling evidence shows that both of them would boost support for independence, regardless of who becomes PM, should tell them all they need to know about how they are seen by the vast majority of people across Scotland.”