Exclusive:Labour would welcome SNP defections just like Natalie Elphicke, shadow Cabinet minister says

Labour would welcome defections from the Scottish National Party, a shadow Cabinet minister has said.

Ian Murray, the party’s Shadow Scotland Secretary, said he would encourage nationalists to switch parties, provided they signed up to Labour values to keep the United Kingdom intact. It comes after ultra-Brexiteer Dover MP Natalie Elphicke dramatically crossed the House of Commons ahead of Prime Minister’s Questions, only a week after Dr Dan Poulter made the same switch.

Last year, Dr Lisa Cameron dramatically defected from the SNP to the Tories, claiming she had been the victim of “toxic and bullying treatment”.

‘We would welcome anyone to defect to the Labour Party’

Murray told NationalWorld that Labour would accept SNP politicians if they signed up to the party’s policies. “There’s a lot of SNP MPs who share the same values as the Labour Party but believe in independence,” Murray said. “If they decided they wanted to join the Labour Party they’d have to sign up to our policy and our values.

“Our policy is to keep the United Kingdom together, our values don’t change to attract defections - it’s those that are defecting who have to change. If an SNP politician wants to defect to the Labour Party they have to sign up to our policy platform to keep the United Kingdom together.

“We would welcome anyone to defect to the Labour Party as that means they become Labour voters, Labour members and Labour parliamentarians if they’re elected members. We wouldn’t turn down that kind of defection from the SNP to the Labour Party, like Natalie Elphicke, like Dr Dan Poulter, like Christian Wakeford they’ve got to sign up to our values and our policies otherwise they can’t be members.”

‘Nobody knew’ Elphicke was going to defect

Elphicke, the latest defector, has attracted particular criticism from Labour MPs and members over comments she made about her husband Charlie, the previous MP for Dover, after he was found guilty of sexual assault against two women.

Elphicke said her husband had been punished for being “attractive and attracted to women”, adding that he was “an easy target for dirty politics and false allegations”. She was among a group of Tory MPs who were admonished by the most senior judge in England and Wales for seeking “to influence a judge” presiding over Charlie Elphicke’s case.

Murray said it was important for the Labour Party to “attract a broad church of voters” to win the next general election. Speaking about the defection at PMQs, he told NationalWorld: “Nobody knew - I was sitting on the front bench about six people along from Keir [Starmer], between Pat McFadden and Jonathan Ashworth.

“We saw this person coming in and sitting down behind Keir, and we all said ‘who’s that?’. So it was kept very, very quiet. Defections are difficult, and the important point to make is that defections are incredibly, incredibly rare.”

Ruling SNP is in ‘complete chaos’

In a wide-ranging interview with NationalWorld, Murray hit out at the chaos of the SNP. John Swinney became the party’s latest leader last week after the ignominious resignation of Humza Yousaf and the police investigation dogging Nicola Sturgeon.

New polling from Savanta for NationalWorld’s sister site the Scotsman found that the SNP is set to lose 25 MPs in the upcoming general election, leaving the party on just 18, while Scottish Labour would dramatically increase its haul from two to 28.

Murray said: “One of the things that I think needs to continue being highlighted is we’ve had three Prime Ministers in as many years and that’s created complete chaos and a zombie government in Westminster.

“Now we’ve had three First Ministers in as many years and that’s created a zombie government in Scotland. At a time when the public are going through their worst set of economic and cost of living circumstances in generations, both governments are looking inwards.

“There was a really interesting scene at First Minister’s questions when John Swinney said: ‘I’m here I am the change’. He couldn’t be any less of the change if he tried, indeed his reshuffle for his Cabinet is no change. 

“It’s quite striking when John Swinney was doing the tours of the TV studios and talking about independence, and that’s the last thing anyone wants to hear about at the moment. So it’s all change, but no change.” Swinney has promised to provide “fresh leadership” amongst the nationalists following the dramatic downfall of Yousaf.

Ralph Blackburn is NationalWorld’s politics editor based in Westminster, where he gets special access to Parliament, MPs and government briefings. If you liked this article you can follow Ralph on X (Twitter) here and sign up to his free weekly newsletter Politics Uncovered, which brings you the latest analysis and gossip from Westminster every Sunday morning.