INDEPENDENT candidate Paul Mack has pledged to fight hard to save the children’s ward at the Royal Alexandra Hospital if he is elected as MP for Paisley and Renfrewshire South.

Mr Mack, who retained his seat on Renfrewshire Council at the local authority elections earlier this month, stood in the General Election in 2010 but lost to Labour’s Douglas Alexander.

This time around, he has pledged that preventing the closure of the children’s ward at Paisley’s hospital would be a priority if he was chosen to represent the area at Westminster.

Mr Mack said: “My family has lived in Paisley since the Pope visited Dumbarton.

“We Macks have many faults but ingratitude isn’t one of them. I owe this town everything.

“I couldn’t look my neighbour in the eye if I didn’t stretch every sinew and every fibre of my being to prevent the closure of our sick children’s unit. Save one child and you save humanity.”

Mr Mack also hit out at the SNP and First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s determination to hold a second referendum on Scottish independence.

He said: “Ms Sturgeon and friends have an absolute fidelity to referenda and the sanctity of the ‘will of the people’.

“Send those who wish to close our most prized possession, something that is genuinely revered in this town, the dictum Save Ward 15.”