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Johnson Heads Into Storm as Popular Scottish Leader Deserts Him

Scottish Tory Leader Quits in Blow to Johnson’s Election Chances

(Bloomberg) --

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson was faced with multiple political storms after the Scottish leader credited with rescuing his Conservative Party at the last election resigned and opponents turned to the courts to try and block his suspension of parliament.

Ruth Davidson, who ran the party in Scotland for almost eight years and ranked among the U.K.’s most popular politicians, said the pressures of family life prompted her decision, but her differences with Johnson over Britain’s protracted departure from the European Union loomed large.

“Having led our party through seven national elections and two referenda, I know the efforts, hours and travel required to fight such campaigns successfully,” Davidson wrote in her letter she published on Twitter. “The threat of spending hundreds of hours away from my home and family now fills me with dread.”

Johnson Heads Into Storm as Popular Scottish Leader Deserts Him

While Davidson’s departure removes one of Johnson’s high-profile internal critics, it also increases the risks to him should he end up having to fight an election to break the impasse over Brexit. Davidson also was a key bulwark against the nationalists gunning for another vote on Scottish independence.

Former Prime Minister Theresa May’s government only held on after the 2017 election because of Davidson’s campaigning in Scotland. While the Conservatives lost seats in England and Wales, they went from having one seat in Scotland to 13, clipping the wings of the Scottish National Party and giving May just enough seats to stay in power.

Johnson has repeatedly said he has no plans to fight an election, but the crisis over Brexit may force him into one. On Wednesday, he moved to suspend Parliament in two weeks time and caused an uproar among lawmakers.

Legal battles over the plan escalated on Thursday, with lawyers in Edinburgh and Belfast attacking the move as an “unprecedented” affront to democracy. A group of lawmakers asked a Scottish court to issue an injunction to block the so-called prorogation of parliament.

Johnson’s gambit also prompted George Young, who had been a minister in three previous Conservative administrations, to resign as a key government official in the House of Lords, saying he was “very unhappy” about the move.

While Davidson said her decision was personal -- she had her first child last year -- her resignation letter offered no endorsement of Johnson, and acknowledged that Brexit had led to “conflict” for her. She has made no secret of her past differences with Johnson.

Davidson opposed Johnson during the campaign for the Tory leadership and has criticized him since he became prime minister over his refusal to rule out a no-deal Brexit, and also for firing Scottish Secretary David Mundell and replacing him with an English -- rather than Scottish -- member of Parliament.

Speaking at a press conference after her resignation, Davidson offered support for the prime minister, but only in his efforts to secure a Brexit deal, which she said she believed to be sincere.

“I went down to Downing Street to meet him last week in a private meeting,” she said. “I stared him right in the eye. I asked him outright, look, I need to know are you actually trying to get a deal or not? And he categorically assured me that he was.”

For his part, Johnson acknowledged that Davidson had been instrumental in the revival of his party’s electoral fortunes in Scotland and credited her for her “pivotal role” in the referendum on Scottish independence in 2014.

Thatcher’s Legacy

Davidson joined the Scottish Conservative Party in 2008 after spells as a TV journalist and in the Army reserves. Three years later, at the age of 32, she was leader. The job, Davidson was told, was “to resuscitate a corpse.” The party was still suffering from the legacy of Margaret Thatcher, whose de-industrialization hammered Scotland’s coalfields and shipyards.

She set about it with vigor, meeting voters to reinforce her can-do image. She allowed herself to be photographed straddling the barrel of a tank and riding a bull. She posed for a newspaper flicking a V-sign -- the British equivalent of giving someone the finger.

Her success wasn’t simply in the 2017 U.K.-wide election. She took the Scottish Tories from the political margins to being the main opposition party in the Scottish Parliament. Her departure is likely to be a relief to Scottish National Party leader and First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who is vehemently opposed to Brexit and Johnson’s leadership.

Davidson was also seen as crucial to the Tories’ plans to hold together the U.K. in any future referendum on Scottish independence. Scotland voted to remain in the EU and Brexit has increased calls for a break away. Sturgeon is demanding another vote and her government is preparing legislation for one, though it’s up to the U.K. to endorse it.

--With assistance from Jessica Shankleman and Jonathan Browning.

To contact the reporters on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.net;Thomas Penny in London at tpenny@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Rodney Jefferson

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