‘Sturgeon must resign NOW!’ Galloway warns SNP ‘wheels are coming off’ as pressure mounts

Nicola Sturgeon made ‘basic mistake’ says Tony Miklinski

Scotland’s Health Minister Jeane Freeman has apologised to Matt Hancock after her vaccine deployment plan mistakenly published “sensitive” details about supplies from manufacturers. Ms Freeman said she regrets publishing the figures for weekly supplies, information which UK Government ministers consider to be commercially confidential. The Scottish Conservatives accused the Health Minister of breaching the ministerial code, citing the figures in the deployment plan and her mention of a vaccine storage location in England.

Scotland’s vaccine deployment plan was temporarily suspended after serious concerns were raised by UK ministers, but has now been republished without the figures relating to expected weekly supplies from vaccine makers Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Moderna.

In addition, Scottish Conservative health spokesman Donald Cameron has warned the daily vaccination figure of 12,500 meant the Scottish Government would miss its target of giving the injection to 560,000 by the end of January.

Former Labour MP and founder of the Alliance4Unity political campaign group Mr Galloway, who has also been sharing the “#ResignSturgeon” hashtag at the end of tweets to his 360,000 Twitter followers, raged to Express.co.uk: “Nicola Sturgeon must resign now. She has presided over a catastrophic administration.

“They are up to their necks and responsible for a series of fiascos, some of which are fatal.

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“Her performance on the rollout of the coronavirus vaccine has ranged for tragic to being a complete farce.

“We were already 25 percent behind the rest of Britain in rolling out the programme and she had to suspend it because the Health Minister gave away the number of vaccines and location of these vaccines in England in a way that was both a security and commercial disaster.

“Britain has vaccinated five percent of the priority cases, and Germany only one percent. Anything that places that in jeopardy is a disaster.

“It’s one damn thing after the other. The wheels are coming off the SNP wagon.”

Commenting on the issues around the vaccine rollout plan, Ms Sturgeon told MSPs on Thursday: “It’s been temporarily taken off the website.

“The UK Government have raised concerns about the level of information we included in that on the projected supply of vaccine.

“I think it is important to be very transparent around all aspects of this, to be clear on the targets we are setting for the numbers of people vaccinated.”

“The UK Government has got some commercial confidentiality concerns about that so we’re having a discussion with them about what can be published.”

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Mr Galloway believes that while the recent disasters could be driving voters against Ms Sturgeon, the more fatal element could be a widening divide from within the SNP.

He added: “Scots will be turning against Sturgeon after all these disasters but the most deadly thing is the move against her within the SNP itself.

“It’s difficult to see how she survives it. The plates are shifting in the SNP and also across the country as well.”

Mr Galloway also reacted furiously to comments from Deputy First Minister John Swinney last weekend that a second Scottish independence referendum is a “critical response to Covid”.

He said independence is an “essential priority” for Scotland’s recovery from the deadly pandemic.

Political veteran Mr Galloway hit out: “In this sea of troubles, to still be pushing for an independence referendum in the middle of planning for the elections and suspending the rollout of the vaccine is laughable if it wasn’t so serious.

“They are making a fool of themselves by continuing to iterate that independence is currently a priority for Scots.

“If I was leader of the SNP, I would have said some months ago, we are putting absolutely everything on hold and to one side until we have defeated coronavirus and kept the Scottish people safe, but they haven’t done that.”

The SNP also sparked fury last weekend when Westminster leader Ian Blackford demanded Scotland be paid billions of pounds to repair the financial damage Brexit will inflict on the country.

But Ms Sturgeon’s party is facing a huge backlash after local fishermen quickly experienced export issues with the EU – despite Scotland being given £200 million by the UK Government to prepare for the end of the Brexit transition.

Mr Galloway raged: “The SNP want to turn the rest of the UK against us so Brit politicians will act in a mean way, and thus increase the tension that exists.

“They are following a strategy of tension, and it is a very dangerous one

“The rest of the UK has already given billions of pounds to Scotland for Brexit and for coronavirus “A big question is: Where is the money? Show us the money!

“There is no case for bellyaching about the support from the UK to Scotland in this difficult time.”

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