Richard Leonard has warned his party not to seek a pact with the SNP, telling the Labour conference in Brighton that there is “no shortcut to a Jeremy Corbyn government through the SNP”.
The Scottish Labour leader told party members that Mr Corbyn would reform the “creaking and out of date” British constitution and hand Holyrood a raft of new powers around employment and land management.
Mr Leonard also recommitted Labour to abolishing the House of Lords and setting up a “senate of nations and regions” in order to create a truly federal United Kingdom.
He said: “The next Labour government will deliver a new Scotland Act that will provide for the devolution of employment law with a UK-wide floor.
“It is not just more powers coming to Scotland that we need, it is a fundamental rebuilding of the broken British state that is required.
“So that is why we are proposing, at last, the abolition of the House of Lords. I believe that its replacement with an elected Senate of the Nations and Regions, built on a federal settlement, would begin the process of reshaping our whole political system.
“These changes will have to be worked for and people won over, but we must be confident; confident in the democratic tradition which we inherit, confident in the socialist ideal that drives us, confident in these practical ideas for radical reform.”
Mr Leonard said his aim in Scotland was “not simply to lead a better management team than the SNP”.
He said: “My aim is to lead a Scottish Labour government worthy of the name. It is to go forward winning Scotland back to Labour, because that is the only way to deliver a Labour government.
“That is the only way: by electing Scottish Labour MPs. For the avoidance of doubt, there is no shortcut to a Jeremy Corbyn government through the SNP.”
