MONICA Lennon and Anas Sarwar have rebuffed an invitation from Douglas Ross to form a Better Together-style electoral pact ahead of next May’s vote.

The Scottish Tory chief took to Twitter to ask the two candidates vying to replace Richard Leonard if they would join him in a “Unionist coalition” to stop “the SNP and their push for indyref2”.

He added: “The last Scottish Labour leader wouldn’t work with us. Will you @AnasSarwar @MonicaLennon7?”

Neither of the Labour MSPs were keen.

Sarwar wrote: “No, I won’t. A quarter of Scottish kids are growing up in poverty while you and the SNP divide our country.

“Instead I will focus on bringing people together and rebuilding our country – not a return to the divisive politics of old.”

Lennon replied: “That’s very flattering Douglas … but it’s a red card from me.

“See you on the campaign trail where we’ll be fighting for radical social and economic change, not a political agenda that looks after the wealthy few.”

Ross wrote: “It’s taken the Scottish Labour candidates less than half an hour to rule out working with Unionists against the SNP. They’ll always put tribal loyalties before the future of the United Kingdom.”

The two were confirmed as candidates yesterday, with both managing to secure enough support from MSPs to be on the ballot paper.

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Sarwar was, by some distance, the clear favourite with colleagues in Holyrood, with 15 of the party’s 23 Scottish parliamentarians backing him. He also won over the support of Labour’s sole Scottish MP, shadow Scottish secretary Ian Murray.

Lennon was nominated by just five MSPs, though in a boost to her campaign, Unite Scotland have endorsed her bid.

In a statement, it said it has “worked closely with Monica Lennon on various issues including the world-leading Period Products (Free Provision) (Scotland) Act and protecting the nation’s toxicology unit based at the University of Glasgow”.

The Scottish Labour leadership contest has been fast-tracked ahead of the May election, with voting due to begin on February 9, and run until February 26.

The winner will be announced at a special online event on Saturday, February 27.

Meanwhile, the two candidates split over indyref2 during their first head to head.

Speaking to the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland, they both said they were opposed to a second independence referendum, though Lennon said she wasn’t “against democracy.”

She said: “I think the Labour Party in Scotland need to listen more carefully to what people are actually saying and what their priorities are.

“I don’t believe that the people’s priority is to have another referendum. I think right now the economy and sorting that out, we are leaving through the worst economic crisis, what will Labour do about that for them and their families.

“They also want to know what we are going to do to rebuild the NHS because we have had to focus on Covid at the expense of everything else.”

Speaking to The Herald, she called on her party to push for a devo max option on any future indyref.

She insisted that the public should not face a “binary choice between someone’s version of independence, and someone’s version of the Union”.

Sarwar told the BBC that Scotland needed a “period of calm, a period of healing”.

In a Daily Record interview, he predicted he could become first minister in five years.

The Glasgow MSP said securing second place at the election would be a “staging post” to Labour entering government in 2026.