McDONNELL SPARKS SCOTTISH BACKLASH

John McDonnell chose the Edinburgh Comedy Festival to announce that Labour would not block another Scottish independence referendum.  However, Scottish Labour were not amused.  Scottish leader Richard Leonard publicly told McDonnell today that the Scottish people do not want another referendum (aka IndyRef2) and that it was not even party policy.  Edinburgh South MP Ian Murray was furious and slammed the shadow chancellor in a series of media interviews today, demanding that he apologises to Leonard.  Murray also took exception to McDonnell's use of the term 'English Parliament', which he said was language that pandered to the SNP.

As pointed out by the interviewer, Murray's stance on IndyRef2 is a little hypocritical given that he is such a vociferous supporter of a second EU referendum.  Murray is also a signatory to the latest legal action to stop Boris Johnson proroguing Parliament.

In 2014 Scots rejected independence by a 10% margin, more than twice that of the UK's Leave mandate.  Both these votes were 'once in a generation' referenda and should be put to bed.  However, the national Labour party is eyeing up coalition partners should there be a general election and will happily accommodate SNP demands for IndyRef2 as part of the bargain.  Richard Leonard, Ian Murray and co won't be happy about that.