The Dunfermline by-election battle got dirty yesterday as Labour and the SNP sharpened their claws to attack one another.
With the majority in the seat just 590 in the 2011 Holyrood election, a tense contest is expected in the build-up to next month’s vote.
Labour’s candidate Cara Hilton called for her SNP counterpart Shirley-Anne Somerville to resign from her job as Yes Scotland’s director of communities and concentrate 100% on the people of Dunfermline.
Ms Sommerville set her stall out against proposed school closures in the constituency, targeting the Labour-run council in the process.
Ms Hilton said: “Shirley-Anne Somerville has been parachuted into Dunfermline by the SNP for this by-election, but it’s clear that her number one priority, like everyone else in the SNP, is still working to break up Britain.
“She’s publicly stating she’s still a senior member of the Yes campaign. Right now, her full-time job is spending every day campaigning to break up Britain.
“If she is elected to Parliament then that will remain her day job, not representing the people of Dunfermline.
“I represent residents in this constituency day in, day out. It’s time for the SNP candidate to finally make Dunfermline a priority if she thinks that people should vote for her.”
An SNP spokesman said: “Shirley-Anne’s full-time job is SNP Dunfermline by-election candidate fighting the Labour council’s cuts in Dunfermline,
particularly the school closure proposals which the Labour candidate has been quietly pushing through the council, despite claiming in public to be shocked by them.”
Ms Somerville said plans to close Pitcorthie, Wellwood and Crombie primary schools need to be halted.
She said she would seek an urgent meeting with Fife Council’s executive director for education and learning Kenneth Greer, to call for the closure plans to be ditched, if elected.
Ms Somerville added: “Labour candidate Cara Hilton said the proposal to close Pitcorthie came as ‘a real shock’ and that she hadn’t seen enough evidence for her to agree with it.
“No wonder Ms Hilton was shocked. There was no mention of these closures in Fife Labour’s manifesto for the 2012 council elections.
“If she was shocked, how does she think parents with children at the school felt?”
Cara Hilton responded by saying she had “seen no evidence to justify the closure of Pitcorthie School” and insisted she has been “working closely” with parents and would continue to do so.
The by-election is taking place following the resignation of former SNP member Bill Walker, who was expelled from the party after domestic abuse allegations were made publically.