Politics / Labour announces election candidate
SCOTTISH Labour has named its candidate for the Northern Isles seat in the upcoming general election.
The party has selected Conor Savage, a sustainable finance expert based in Edinburgh who works as an environmental, social, and governance programme manager for Sainsbury’s.
The 30-year-old previously worked as a climate reporting manager for NatWest Group.
Savage is also an early career polar and marine scientist, specialising in the impacts of climate change on the Arctic, and volunteers with many organisations involved in the polar and marine fields.
He said: “It is an honour to be selected as Scottish Labour’s candidate for Orkney and Shetland at the coming election.
“People here, across Scotland, and all over the UK are demanding change. We are being let down by two failing governments.
“Only a Labour government, with Labour MPs here in Scotland, can deliver the change our country needs.”
His priorities for Orkney and Shetland will include tackling the cost of living crisis, improving transport links between Orkney, Shetland and the mainland via “ferries, fixed links, and flights” and ensuring affordable housing in Orkney and Shetland “so that young people are not forced out of their communities by rising prices”.
Other priorities would include campaigning for greater support to the NHS locally to tackle problems such as GP recruitment for remote communities, balancing the development of offshore wind with safeguarding Orkney and Shetland’s fishing industry and securing skilled and sustainable jobs for local people.
Already confirmed for the Orkney and Shetland region are the incumbent Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrats), Robert Leslie (SNP), Shane Painter (Conservatives) and Alex Armitage (Greens).
The general election is expected to take place later this year, but a date is not yet known.
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