Keir Starmer: Scotland deserves real change and genuine hope. Now Labour can deliver both

Keir Starmer will today tell Scotland that Labour is “the change the country needs”.

His second speech to Scottish Labour’s conference as UK Leader will focus on how the party can deliver “change with purpose” and predict the political tide turning against the SNP and Tories.

Speaking at Edinburgh’s Assembly Rooms, he will say the party will fight for every vote as he paid tribute to Scottish leader Anas Sarwar for “giving Labour its confidence back”.

He is expected to say: “We won’t change any hearts or minds by sitting back and watching a battle for power within the SNP. We have to go out there and earn it. Prove that Labour can be the change that Scotland needs. It’s not about change at the top of other parties, it’s about the changes we’ve made – from top to bottom – to our own, and the change we can now offer the Scottish people.

He will pledge a “bold, reforming Labour government” to answer what he will call the “growing impatience for change.” He is expected to say: “For too long we’ve been stuck in a brace position, buffeted from crisis to crisis. People want decisive leadership. They want a bold reforming government and change that is a credible response to the challenges they face.

“Working people are tired of an economy that only works for those at the top. They want public services that can provide security and a springboard for opportunity. They despair of a broken politics, which can’t provide their community with the tools to control its destiny. This is the change Scotland needs, that Britain needs, and Labour will rise to the moment and provide it.”

The UK Labour leader will explain why he still believes in the UK by saying: “I don’t believe in our union just because of our history, I believe in it because of our future. Look at the challenges we face, the cost of living crisis, climate change, standing up to Putin, they’re common across our nations.

“I want to address those who had given up on Labour directly. And, yes, those who had given up on Britain. I know the people of Scotland want change and hope. Not a showy, grandiose hope.

“What I mean is the basic, ordinary hope, we used to take for granted. The sort of hope you can build your future around. That aspirations are made of. That was shared by working people across our four nations in good times and bad. The hope that people in Scotland are once again looking to see if Labour can offer.”

He will accuse the SNP of ‘inertia’ while outlining how Labour’s ambitious Green Prosperity Plan will “create the jobs, the industries, the opportunities of the future” for Scotland.