Kezia Dugdale: New Scottish Labour leader attacks former colleagues for not listening to electorate

Ms Dugdale will tell the conference that her party 'got the balance wrong' between listening and acting

‘Balance is wrong’ says Kezia Dugdale (Getty)

Labour’s new Scottish leader will attack her recent predecessors, telling the party’s conference in Brighton that they knew what the people of Scotland wanted, but failed to provide it.

In her first conference speech since being elected to lead Scottish Labour, Kezia Dugdale will promise to break with the pattern of pledges offered by her party’s leaders since 2007.

Her speech will be seen as a critical attack on Jack McConnell, Wendy Alexander, Iain Gray, Johann Lamont and Jim Murphy – the six leaders of Scottish Labour in the past eight years, who lost control of Holyrood to become a weak opposition to the SNP. Scottish Labour’s dominance of Westminster seats ended in May when it lost all but one of its MPs. Mr Murphy, a former cabinet minister, lost his seat and later resigned the leadership.

Ms Dugdale will tell the conference that her party “got the balance wrong” between listening and acting. She will say the Scottish electorate had repeatedly offered warnings that Labour needed to change.