The Scotsman Bulletin Friday September 27 2024 #Politics
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00:00Hello and welcome to the Scotsman's daily video bulletin for this Friday. My name is Dale Miller. I'm deputy editor of the Scotsman and I'm joined by our Westminster correspondent, Alexander Brown.
00:12Good morning, Alex. We're going to get into everything about Starmer and his UN visit and his meeting with Trump.
00:19But firstly, the front page of today's Scotsman and we're leading on a compelling image coming out of Lebanon as Israel continued more strikes like yesterday.
00:32Benjamin Netanyahu talking down the prospects of a ceasefire, a worrying situation that continues to develop in the Middle East.
00:40You can track all the latest on that at Scotsman.com.
00:46We also led and splashed on a couple from North Lanarkshire, also backed, interestingly, by Alex Salmond.
00:55But they are suing the two governments, the Scottish and the UK governments, over the winter fuel payment cuts.
01:03And the government law centre is taking on that case. They're trying to win it on grounds of the Equality Act 2010.
01:12Basically, a decision being made without referencing and adhering to that Act.
01:17It will be interesting to see about whether that case gets any traction.
01:20Alex, I know you've reported on the winter fuel payment. We can get around to that and Labor conference.
01:26It is a very important issue.
01:28But Starmer meeting with Trump for the first time, possibly trying not to say the word sausages.
01:35But how did things go overnight?
01:39It seems to go well. Former President Trump said that Starmer was a good guy.
01:43He said that he was popular. It was still early, but he was very popular and that he seemed nice.
01:50This is about building relationships. I think polls show that Trump is still a favourite.
01:55Despite Kamala Harris's resurgence and some really good polling for her, showing improvement, Trump is still a favourite in some of the swing states.
02:02So this is an important meeting.
02:04I think the UK government and the prime minister are keen to stress the importance of UK-US relations and the fact they can work together.
02:12Something which made slightly more difficult by the fact David Lammy was also at the meeting,
02:16who has previously called Trump a sycophantic fascist sympathiser, a neo-Nazi sympathiser.
02:24So all in all, I mean, I would have loved to be in that room when that conversation happened.
02:28Or, you know, if Trump's advisers are googling, well, what they said before about us, what do we know about them?
02:33So it just seems like one of those important things that we've got to do.
02:36There's no vitriol. There's no negative briefings.
02:39It's two people meeting, knowing they might have to work together so they can't say what they really think.
02:44We have seen previously with Donald Trump, though, he can be critical of someone like Kim Jong-un even,
02:50and then heralded for meeting with the North Korean leader when he was president as well.
02:54So swings and roundabouts.
02:57I'm sure Trump was very happy to move on and talk about other things.
03:02The UN speech. Do you think the trip has been a success for Starmer to date?
03:08Is he trying to just be seen in that form at this early stage of his premiership?
03:13I don't know if it's about being seen. I think it's just about, you know, the UK's diplomatic obligations.
03:19The UK is a member of the UN and it's right that he speaks there and reiterates his calls for a ceasefire in Lebanon.
03:24That's something that he stressed in his own speech at a conference just a few days ago.
03:30And then I suppose doing it at the UN, not to besmirch Labour conference,
03:34but it's probably a larger stage where he can influence more people despite the impact of Brexit,
03:39which has undoubtedly damaged the UK standing on the global stage.
03:43UK politics and UK government is still a huge voice internationally.
03:48And speaking at the UN about this sort of issue is how you get people around the table and bring people in.
03:53So I don't know if it's important politically for how he's seen or how he's perceived.
03:58It's just the right thing to do. And any prime minister of any party in the UK would have done the same.
04:04Alex, you were out and covered all of Labour conference.
04:08What were your takeaways at the end of it? A lot of focus on his speech in the end of the conference.
04:13But the party went in talking about things like gifts and not the agenda moving forward.
04:22And the crucial budget that's coming up on October 30th.
04:25How do you think Stammer and the party actually exhibit the conference?
04:30Well, it's it's it's complicated. So traditionally, party conference has loads of policies being announced because,
04:37you know, it's where all the government's been settled and they're saying, well, this is what we would do in power.
04:41This is how we're going to change things. But with the budget happening on October 30th and having just had a general election,
04:47there was no opportunity or at least no inclination from the Labour Party to announce policies.
04:51The only things that were announced were breakfast clubs, which only apply to England,
04:56and GB Energy being based in Aberdeen, which we already knew.
04:59So it was a difficult conference from us, from a political journalist standpoint, because we were looking for policies.
05:06I was looking for some economics to get our teeth into.
05:09And instead it was the party coping well enough with questions around freebies, questions around donations.
05:15Is the party doing enough to calm its members annoyed about the winter fuel, annoyed about the two child benefit cap,
05:22and annoyed about the lack of hope being offered? I think it probably is.
05:26I think the party's doing well to offer hope. And I was really interested by the responses to Keir's speech.
05:32He talked about not offering false hope, wanting to rebuild Britain.
05:35And it went down very well in the room. And lots of Scottish Labour MPs and Scottish Labour MSPs all told me they thought it was brilliant.
05:42Anas Sarwar, the leader of Scottish Labour, told me that he was really emotional and moved by it,
05:46because to hear a prime minister, a Labour prime minister, speaking at conference and speaking about equality and respect
05:53and the values that he holds so dear, he found it really moving. Others told me it was the best speech they'd ever heard.
05:58I think some people are just a bit excited about being in government.
06:02I think there was a general sense that this was a party. It didn't have to be these sweeping announcements.
06:06They were just thrilled to be there. But there are still a few smaller voices, quieter and playing privately.
06:12They like the rhetoric. But what's that actually going to look like in terms of policy?
06:16Or rather simply saying, I'm not going to be, I'm not going to react to it too much until I hear what my constituents think.
06:21Because, you know, I love the Labour Party. I want to do well.
06:24So I think it was good. But what do those people who lent me votes in the SNP think?
06:28So I don't think we can make any sweeping judgments, but I think the party did enough.
06:33But the problem is everything goes into the budget. The party was right.
06:37We'll know come the budget where it really is going to be a government that can rebuild Britain.
06:42And if that short term pain can be justified to have the long term benefits, the Labour Party is wrong.
06:50Joyce Macmillan has written a column as well about Sir Keir Starmer's speech and just how he dealt with hecklers
06:58or a couple of mentions in the audience. You can read that at Scotsman.com.
07:02Alex, lastly, Tory conference is this weekend. It's probably going under the radar.
07:07They're not in government anymore. They don't currently have a leader, although that will be announced over the coming weeks.
07:13What's your, if you had to pick one key takeaway that we should look for from the conference, what will it be?
07:19Will this just be a platform for those running for the leadership?
07:23No, because it never, ever is. I've been going to Tory conference since I think 2018.
07:29And every time it's been the most rewarding news line, heavy extravaganza simply because the party constantly eats, eats itself.
07:38Even when they're in power, they love to fight. They love to brief against each other and they love to channel and challenge each other's positions.
07:45So at a time with so many leadership candidates who will all be doing speeches at the closing.
07:49This is not your traditional, you know, the prime minister, Rishi Sunak,
07:52we're delivering a speech to close the conference and everyone will say how good it is.
07:56The conference is being closed by speeches from all the candidates,
08:00all of whom will have their supporters in the room and all of whom will have people who hate the other candidates in the room.
08:05So it's going to be leaky. It's going to be aggressive.
08:09I think it's going to be tremendous fun. And I think we'll get an insight as well into what the membership thinks.
08:14So far, we've, you know, we've seen the leadership talk, the leadership candidates talk about their policies.
08:19We've seen them do a few hustings, but nothing really in the broader public domain.
08:23This is speaking to the base. This is speaking to the diehards.
08:26Those people who are happy to take time off work and part with a hard earned cash to go to see the party they support
08:33and be assured that actually there is a plan to get them back into government. There is a plan to challenge the Labour Party.
08:38So I think it's going to be really interesting.
08:41I think it's going to be really aggressive and I think everyone will be leaking like an absolute sieve.
08:47You can read about all the latest from what we've discussed at Scotsman.com.
08:53And please follow along on the politics navigation bar.
08:57We've got the new leader of the Scottish Tories, Russell Findlay, who's also been announced.
09:02We have full analysis of that.
09:05That will be up on the site this afternoon, as well as you being able to recap through our live blog.
09:10Follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Alex, thank you for joining us.
09:14Thank you to all our viewers and readers for joining us as well.
09:17And have a great day.