Scotsman Editor Alan Young talks to Political Editor Alistair Grant
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00:00Hello, I'm Alan Young. I'm editor of the Scotsman and I'm joined today by our political editor
00:08Alistair Grant to reflect on the death of former First Minister Alex Salmond, a towering
00:16figure in Scottish and UK politics. Alistair, and this has been a complete shock.
00:23Yeah, it's come as a complete shock and like you say, a complete titan of Scottish politics,
00:29someone who was incredibly important to both the political debate in Scotland, but also
00:33the SNP, the independence movement, someone who very much shaped modern Scottish politics
00:38actually over the last couple of decades. I mean, when Alex Salmond was elected to Westminster
00:44first at the end of the 1980s, I think I'm right in saying he was one of only three SNP
00:49MPs. He then became leader in the 90s, became leader again after 2004, and was absolutely
00:56pivotal in making the SNP the election winning force that it became. Pivotal in making them,
01:03in pushing them to the mainstream of Scottish politics and in making independence a mainstream
01:07issue. I mean, when he was first elected, it was very much a fringe issue in Scottish
01:10politics. It was not something that was talked of seriously, and he was absolutely pivotal
01:15in changing that and making it a mainstream issue, as I say, and obviously he led the
01:21SNP to their election victory in 2007, and then subsequently after that to their astonishing
01:26majority in the Scottish parliament, which was then unheard of at the time, still hasn't
01:30happened since. That led to the independence referendum, which although the yes side lost,
01:37it completely changed the debate in Scottish politics. It changed the way the Scottish
01:41politics operated, and we're still living in that post-referendum world, notwithstanding
01:45the result of the recent general election. It still completely dominates how many people
01:49vote in Scotland. The country is still very much divided down the middle on the question
01:55of independence, on whether they support it or not. So I think, yeah, very much a titan
01:59of Scottish politics, and it's impossible to really overestimate the impact he had as
02:05a politician.
02:06And you're right, it just can't be understated just what a turnaround in public opinion there
02:17was ahead of that referendum. At the start of the campaign, you'll know better than me,
02:22but it was maybe 20% for yes, and then by the end, obviously the days before, polls
02:31were predicting yes had won.
02:33Yeah, I think at the start it was around, I think I'm writing around 30%, and then we
02:38obviously had that astonishing poll that I think came out about 10 days before the referendum
02:43day in 2014, which had yes in the lead. It caused shockwaves throughout Scotland and
02:48the rest of the UK, it caused shockwaves in Westminster. You know, you speak to people
02:52who were in the Better Together team at the time, people like Blair MacDougall, they still
02:55remember it very well, where they were when that poll dropped and the impact it had on
03:00them.
03:01And we then saw those scenes of, you know, politicians coming up from England to Scotland,
03:05this kind of frantic last minute bid to increase campaigning. We saw interventions from Gordon
03:10Brown, we saw the famous vow in the front page of the Daily Record. And so yeah, I mean,
03:15he was absolutely pivotal in driving that change. And I think, you know, the debate
03:19over Scotland's constitutional future has been going on for decades. I mean, we obviously
03:23had the 1979 devolution referendum, we had papers like the Scotsman and the Herald that
03:28were very central at driving that debate about Scotland's constitutional future during the
03:331980s, for example.
03:35But I think Alex Salmond played such a key role in taking the kind of independence debate,
03:40shaping it, making it a mainstream issue, taking the SNP, and as I say, making them
03:45that astonishing election winning force, professionalising them to a degree. He wasn't the only one that
03:50was in the SNP that was part of this process, but he was certainly one of the pivotal figures.
03:55And I think it's fair to say that the SNP's trajectory would not have happened without
03:58him. So yeah, just a very, very consequential figure.
04:03And I think it's also important to say a very charismatic and magnetic figure. I mean,
04:07he was one of these people that you just want to listen to as a politician. When he came
04:11on the radio in the morning, you paused what you were doing and you wanted to hear what
04:15he had to say, which the same can't be said, to be honest, of all politicians. I think
04:20no matter what your view was on Alex Salmond, and he was divisive, you know, people either
04:24really liked him or they really didn't. He was, you know, incredibly charismatic and
04:29just someone that you, he had a kind of populist touch, I think, as well, and very much someone
04:33who liked speaking to people. And to be frank, liked the limelight. He liked the limelight
04:37of being a senior politician, of being the most important person in the room. And that
04:41was very much part of who he was as well. But it was also part of what made him so successful,
04:45I think.
04:46Indeed, and we've had a lot of tributes since the news broke on Saturday evening to his
04:53skill as a politician, indeed, possibly the foremost Scottish politician of his age, really.
05:02But then there's also Alex Salmond, the man as well, which is more complicated. You spoke
05:09to him recently.
05:10Yeah, I last interviewed him back in August, actually. We met up at a restaurant on Elm
05:18Row in Edinburgh, a jolly restaurant, the Italian restaurant. I think it's actually
05:21a favourite haunt of his. And he was talking, he was on good form, you know, from a journalist
05:27point of view. He made a lot of comments that became news stories, for example, talking
05:33about the SNP's response to the recent general election result being brain dead. He calls
05:36Angus Robertson, the constitution secretary, a thud. So he was very much not mincing his
05:42words about what he thought were the problems within the SNP. But I think it is a complicated
05:46legacy and I think it's important to acknowledge that. He was a flawed human being in some
05:52ways. We obviously saw the criminal trial against him, those allegations of sexual harassment.
05:57He was acquitted of all those criminal charges. But during that trial, his lawyer did admit
06:02that some of his behaviour was not appropriate. And I think that tarnished his legacy. We
06:07then had the spectacular falling out he had with Nicola Sturgeon in the aftermath of that,
06:12with many other senior figures in the SNP. He then obviously went on to set up the pro-independence
06:18Alaba party and was attempting to get back into the Scottish Parliament and to get back
06:23into kind of frontline politics. And there was also that decision to front that TV show
06:29on Russia Today on RT, which was hugely controversial within the SNP. So he had a difficult time
06:35of it in recent years. And I think it's important to acknowledge that it is a complicated legacy
06:41in some ways, but then taken as a round, that doesn't take away from his achievements as
06:45a politician, which were quite extraordinary.
06:48Indeed. Thanks very much for all that, Alistair. We will, of course, have continuing coverage
06:55at Scotsman.com and in tomorrow's paper. There's lots more to be written, I'm sure, in the
07:03coming days. But for now, from me and from Alistair, it's bye for now.