An MSP has told Labour leadership hopeful Andy Burnham that the relationship between the parties north and south of the border is “dysfunctional”.
The UK shadow health secretary and MP for Leigh was in Holyrood meeting his Scottish counterparts as part of a charm offensive on Thursday.
He said he wanted to break away from the “Westminster bubble” and begin speaking to ordinary voters across the whole of the country, with an added focus on listening to local members ahead of next year’s Scottish Parliamentary election.
Asked what he had taken out of the meeting, Mr Burnham said: “It’s about the relationship. We need to get the relationship right. It was described by one MSP as ‘dysfunctional’. That is not a description I would disagree with.”
It came as a series of senior Labour figures tried to diagnose why the party was mauled in May’s general election.
Former foreign secretary Jack Straw said separate parties may have to be set up, similar to the arrangement of the Christian Democratic Union and the Christian Social Union in Germany.
However, former minister Tom Harris, who lost his Glasgow South seat in the SNP landslide, said he would either be a member of the UK Labour party or tear up his membership.
“That’s just another concession to nationalism,” he told The Times.
Labour’s election campaign chief and ousted Paisley MP Douglas Alexander also expressed scepticism about such a move, while former prime minister Tony Blair warned the party against trying to beat the SNP by shifting to the left.
Better Together leader Alistair Darling said working with the Tories over the referendum was not to blame.
Meanwhile, Mr Blair’s ex-spin doctor, Alistair Campbell, said he would “happily lead the charge” to get rid of the next Labour leader should they fail to make an impact.