Willie Rennie to urge Nicola Sturgeon to ‘get off the fence’ over Brexit

Willie Rennie - Image credit: David Anderson/Holyrood

Willie Rennie will today urge the First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, to “get off the fence” over Brexit.

In his speech at the Liberal Democrat party conference the Scottish Lib Dem leader will call on the First Minister to back a referendum on the final Brexit deal.

Rennie will also claim that the lessons of Brexit are the lessons for independence, saying “breaking up is hard to do”.

He is expected to say: “The lessons of Brexit are the lessons for independence.

"Everyone can see it. Except Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP.

"The rest of the world can see the lesson of the destruction of a single economic market.

"They can see the harm of making it harder for business to get goods and services to market, harder for individuals to get the benefits and opportunities that brings.

"But the SNP response to the break-up of the EU single market is to break up the UK single market.

"The SNP response to the break-up of the EU customs union is to break up the UK customs union.

"I cannot for the life of me see how the SNP can conclude from all this that the response to the break up from Europe should be the break-up of Britain.”

Rennie will also suggest that independence would not be an escape from Brexit, as the SNP would not guarantee an independent Scotland would rejoin the EU.

He will say: “For those who say that we need independence to escape Brexit I tell you quite frankly that the SNP will not put automatic EU membership on their independence ballot paper.

“That’s because they care first and foremost about independence.

"After all they supported independence even when they opposed Europe in the 1970s.

"They supported independence before North Sea oil.

"It always comes first.”