BREXIT Secretary Michael Russell today embarks on a campaign tour with less than a month to go until the General Election– warning that only a vote for the SNP will see Scotland escape the chaos of Britain’s exit from the EU.

His nationwide tour starts at the end of a week in which outgoing European Council president Donald Tusk warned that post-Brexit, the UK will become “an outsider, a second-rate player”, and told people across the UK not to give up in stopping it.

Russell said Scotland had a pivotal part to play in the election and efforts to halt Brexit.

“With just 24 days to go till the General Election only a vote for the SNP is a vote to escape Brexit, lock the Tories out of Downing St, reject austerity and put Scotland’s future into Scotland’s hands,” he said.

“Scotland is a crucial battleground in this election and the battle to stop Brexit, and as Scotland’s party of remain the SNP is the number one challenger in every single Tory seat in Scotland. With Boris Johnson now in the pocket of Nigel Farage and Donald Trump, it is all the more important that we stop the Tories in their tracks.”

Russell said that over the next four weeks, he would be holding town hall meetings across the country to take his party’s message to every corner of Scotland.

“With less than one month to go till polling day, Donald Tusk’s comment serves as a reminder of the danger of the Tory government’s reckless plans to drag Scotland out of the EU against our will - an outcome which we know will roll back on environmental rights, cost thousands of jobs, hit the economy, and harm people’s livelihoods.

“That is a price that the people of Scotland must not be forced to pay.

“Only the SNP offers a real opportunity for Scotland to escape from Brexit once and for all and choose a better future as an independent European country – rather than the bleak and broken Westminster system that has time and time again failed Scotland.”