Kezia Dugdale: Corbyn, Sturgeon and May all need Loony Dook

IN the freezing waters of the Firth of Forth, a group of hardened revellers will today take part in the celebrated Loony Dook at Queensferry. Jumping into ice-cold water awakens the senses, so perhaps the organisers should have sent out last-minute invites to Theresa May, Jeremy Corbyn and Nicola Sturgeon as we mark the end of 2018.

IN the freezing waters of the Firth of Forth, a group of hardened revellers will today take part in the celebrated Loony Dook at Queensferry. Jumping into ice-cold water awakens the senses, so perhaps the organisers should have sent out last-minute invites to Theresa May, Jeremy Corbyn and Nicola Sturgeon as we mark the end of 2018.

For different reasons, they can’t look back on the past year with much pride.

As now appears to be the norm, the last 12 months have witnessed incredible political drama that even Armando Iannucci couldn’t script.

It was almost as unpredictable as the weather, which brought us both the ‘Beast from the East’ and a glorious summer of sun.

If there was an award for ‘Survivor of the Year’, it should clearly go to Theresa May.

It is quite remarkable that she is still in office, after a year of high-profile resignations and a leadership challenge. But there she is, still in Number Ten, still blindly pressing on with a Brexit deal that will devastate our economy and cause the poorest in society to suffer.

My views on Brexit have not changed over the past 12 months.

There can never be such a thing as a good Brexit deal, and that is as clear today as it was on New Year’s Day 2018.

This time last year, I argued that people should be offered a final say on Brexit – a view that wasn’t politically popular. But a People’s Vote is now supported by a majority of the country, according to opinion polls. What a difference a year makes.

At the start of 2018, no political pundit would have given that a snowball’s chance in hell of happening.

Theresa May still refuses to get on board, however, and is clinging on to a deal that we know can’t get through parliament. You need a New Year’s dook in the Forth to come to your senses, Theresa.

Hogmanay also marks another year with Labour out of power, with Jeremy Corbyn seemingly as determined as the Prime Minister to steamroll through Brexit. It is my passionate belief that this country needs a Labour government, but that isn’t going to happen if we are prepared to abandon the views of the party membership and sacrifice so many livelihoods by pressing ahead with a reckless Brexit.

Closer to home, constitutional chaos is Nicola Sturgeon’s specialist subject. What isn’t in her armoury, however, is how to successfully deliver public services.

The SNP has utterly failed in its commitment to end the attainment gap in education, while teachers are now in open revolt with the Government.

As for the NHS, it has been one failure after another – and nowhere is the impact felt more than here in the Lothians.

Waiting-time targets are nowhere near to being met, ‘delayed discharge’ remains a huge problem, and health boards are being starved of cash.

The same can be said of our councils, which are being short-changed by the Scottish Government. In Edinburgh, the consequences have been dire.