Lucy Beattie General Election 2024 Interview 1
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00:00Lucy Beattie, tell us, first of all, why you wanted to run for Westminster.
00:06I've been a lifelong supporter for independence, and active within the cause, active within my community,
00:14and I think, post-2020, I mean, things happened in my life where I became a student again,
00:20I started studying for a PhD, and...
00:23What did you study?
00:24I... science communication, so predominantly looking at the connections between research, teaching, public engagement,
00:31in specific STEM sectors, so chemistry, physics, maths, engineering, actually.
00:37But, being a student, I straightaway decided to join SMP students, because in my working life I couldn't have been quite so politically active before,
00:46and, really, what motivated me to stand was I had a conversation with Jeremy Vine, in fact, on the radio,
00:53and, believe it or not, some of the delivery folks from Paddy's Home Store in Dingwall were delivering carpets up about a week after that,
01:01and they said, oh, we heard you on that Jeremy Vine show, you gave him a cracking show there,
01:06but, really, I'd been listening to the show in the tractor cab, actually, we were in the middle of lambing in a small town,
01:13and I was working on the farm, and he made some assertions about England subsidising Scotland per head,
01:21and, you know, sort of almost implying that we were burdensome in some kind of way,
01:26and he had Douglas Ross on the show as well, so I sent a text message opinion, and they asked did I want to speak to him,
01:32and I was really concerned, you know, that with Brexit, not only had the majority of Scottish people not actually voted to leave,
01:40but we had a situation where, in Scottish agriculture, we had projected a certain output over the next few years,
01:48but then things became so uncertain with Brexit, the internal markets building up, things like that, I just wanted to point that out,
01:54and I don't know whether I silenced Jeremy or whatever I did, but there was a good reaction locally,
02:00so people came back and said, that was amazing, you should stand for politics, and I really wasn't sure about that,
02:07so I thought about it for about six months, and then the branch that I'm with in the SNP came forward and said,
02:13you should consider putting yourself forward for the council elections, and I couldn't do that at that time,
02:18because I was still studying, and, you know, you need to devote your time, but I put my name forward for vetting for the Westminster elections,
02:25and then I was selected, so that's why I'm here, really.
02:28So, boggling that down, some of the issues that came up there was certainly an attitude from south of the border towards Scotland being a burden,
02:37the idea that Brexit is harmful, and agriculture, these are just three of the things that came up there.
02:44Which of those are you seeing reflected back at you, when you're going round the doors,
02:49I accompanied you a moment ago, I certainly heard some of it myself, but, which, even when I'm not present, which has mentioned most often to you?
02:58Oh, the cost of living crisis is actually mentioned most often, so that's across the board, east coast, west coast, the north coast, central,
03:07and as far down as Bewley, that is the predominant thing in people's mind, whether that's domestic or running a business.
03:14Here on the west, there's a strong loss for the, you know, after the Brexit referendum,
03:20because there were a lot of people who came to the area, lived and worked in the area, brought up family,
03:25so we have a strong European contingent, for example, living in Liverpool, many of whom can't actually vote at these next elections,
03:31although they are allowed to vote in the Scottish Parliament elections.
03:35But the impact that that's had on business is a lack of staff, a lack of infrastructure funding,
03:4262% of the funding has effectively vanished, there's been very little comfort from Westminster or south of the border as to how that levelling up actually works.
03:53Of course, there's been a period where people have been more abundant in terms of activity and economic activity with the COVID-19 pandemic,
04:00but it's just kind of one thing's piled on top of another, and I think people really miss being European.
04:05I mean, I've been, I was born in 1976, so I've pretty much known myself as being a European all my life, and that's how I identify.