PEACE CAMPAIGNER BRUCE KENT BACKS SNP

Veteran peace campaigner Bruce Kent today gave public backing to the SNP and said he wanted to see it win power. He told the SNP conference that Labour must be made to pay the price for the "foolish and dangerous" decision to replace Trident.

"Come May, I want an administration in Edinburgh in which your party, the SNP, either has a controlling voice or an absolute majority," he said.

The veteran anti-nuclear campaigner, who stood unsuccessfully as a Labour parliamentary candidate in 1992, told the conference he was brought up to understand Britain was England with the other component parts of the UK attached by "some sort of umbilical cord".

But he told the conference that recent trips to Scotland opened his eyes and his mind and that Scottish independence was "not a bad price to pay" for having another "peaceful and peace-minded and nuclear weapon-free" country in the world.

The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament vice-president went on to urge politicians to use Holyrood's devolved powers to make the anti-nuclear case. He said Holyrood could invite governments and other bodies to take part in talks on a nuclear weapons abolition treaty which already existed in draft form.

"Put such consultations under your education budget, or your citizenship budget, or call it part of the festival," he said. "There is more than one way of belling this cat.

"What is needed now is some practical evidence that we could eliminate these weapons. "Gorbachev might well be willing to chair such a consultation.

"If governments do not want to participate, then ask the most active NGOs from their country."