GE15: Penultimate Weekend Campaigning

Activists are out canvassing for votes on the second last weekend before May's general election.

Labour are pledging to create 100 thousand high quality jobs to replace 80 thousand zero-contract ones.

Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown will argue the priority Jim Murphy’s Scottish Labour Party gives to full employment in Scotland, using the resources of the whole of the UK, shows the difference between Labour’s broad patriotic vision of Scotland’s future and the narrow nationalist objectives of the SNP.

During a joint event with Douglas Alexander at Elderslie Village Hall, Mr Brown will say:

“It is remarkable that throughout this general election campaign neither the Conservative Party, nor the Liberal Democrats or SNP have said anything of significance on where Scotland’s future jobs will come from.
 
“As, day after day, jobs are cut from the North Sea oil industries and as the oil revenues fall to £700million this year – rather than the £7billion projected by Alex Salmond – the SNP have no answers when challenged on where the jobs will arise in the post-oil economy.
 
“Tories, Lib Dems and nationalists have been unable to show how they would get the shockingly-high numbers of out-of-work young people in Scotland – 29,000 unemployed under 19s and 61,000 unemployed under 25s - into jobs.  And so they do not even want to talk about it.
 
“And in the campaign there has sadly been more talk about the job prospects of a few nationalist would-be MPs than about the job prospects of hundreds of thousands of Scots who will need new employment opportunities in the future.
 
“So when the most important task ahead of us is to replace or upgrade the 80,000 zero-hour contracts in Scotland and create thousands of high-quality jobs in the new technologies, built on our research and development genius, the question is: who will do most to secure economic opportunities and high-quality jobs for Scots?
 
“When one of the greatest priorities is to open up new opportunities for young people and unemployed adults to secure these jobs, I want to explain the urgent attention Labour will give to measures restoring full, fulfilling and quality employment as a goal for the Scottish economy and Scottish people.

Women

SNP Leader Nicola Sturgeon will join female SNP activists and actor and actress Elaine C Smith in Glasgow to launch the SNP’s women’s pledge, committing the SNP and its members to delivering policies that promote equality. She said:

"No young girl should grow up in 2015 with the prospect of facing a glass ceiling that limits their ambitions. We all owe it to future generations to end gender inequality once and for all – which is why I am launching the SNP’s women’s pledge today.
 
“Westminster’s austerity cuts have hit women the hardest of all, with 85 per cent of cuts to social security and pensions affecting the incomes of women."

Meanwhile, the Scottish Conservative leader is at a falconry in Cluny, near Kirkcaldy.

Scottish Green co-convener and Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie are taking part in 'pedal to parliament', a campaign to invest in more cycling routes across Scotland.

Mr Harvie said: "The failure to invest flies in the face of the evidence which shows how cycling and walking boosts health, the economy and reduces the cost pressures on the health service.

"The Scottish Greens have a longstanding commitment to spend at least 10 per cent of the transport budget on infrastructure and training to make cycling and walking the easy option. Scotland must catch up with countries with high levels of cycling where investment has been sustained over many years."