Scotsman Politics: FMQs Unpicked Thursday December 19 2024
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00:00Hello and welcome to today's Scotsman Politics Show. We're coming to you live from Holyrood.
00:07You can hear the bell ringing in the background. My name's Al Miller. I'm Deputy Editor of
00:12The Scotsman and I'm joined by Political Editor Alastair Graham. We're unpicking first in
00:17the questions. It's the final one of 2024. And Alastair, we know Russell Foley with the
00:25Scottish Tories. What did they go in on the attack about to finish the year?
00:30Yeah, sorry about that bell going off there. It doesn't usually go off at this time of
00:34day, but it's because obviously this is the last FMQs before the end of the year. This
00:39is the last sitting day of Holyrood. So Holyrood is finishing very early today and people are
00:43going off to do various kind of Christmas events. But yeah, it was Russell Finlay, the
00:48Scottish Tory leader, very much going in on a kind of justice amalgamation of all sorts
00:53of different issues within the kind of justice brief. So bringing up what he was calling
00:58kind of secret plea deals. These are plea deals that are made in cases that he says
01:02victims don't have enough of a say on and often don't know what's happening. Also bringing
01:07up very specific cases, a particular miscarriage of justice, a very tragic case in West Lothian
01:13as well, involving a baby that was abused and died and asking John Swinney to either
01:18intervene or to kind of make his views known on these issues. And John Swinney very much
01:24saying that they are, you know, the independent judicial system is separate from the Scottish
01:29government. He can't make these kind of interventions. So wasn't really a lot of movement in terms
01:35of getting answers out of John Swinney there, because he would just say that this is a kind
01:40of matter for the independent justice system. Anna Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, going
01:46in on the housing emergency. This is something that we've written about a lot in the Scotsman.
01:50The Scottish government declared a housing emergency, I think, earlier on this year.
01:54It feels like a very long time ago now. We've also had, I think, 13 councils across Scotland
01:59creating their own housing emergencies. This isn't something that triggers any automatic
02:04extra cash for councils or anything like that, but it is a kind of acknowledgement of the
02:09crisis and a kind of attempt to draw attention to it and to focus minds on it. Anna Sarwar
02:17very much bringing up the fact that he was saying 10,000 children without a home going
02:21into the Christmas period, calling on John Swinney to do more. John Swinney saying that,
02:27you know, there's an acceptance that not enough houses have been built, but the Scottish government
02:31has been taking action. They have been pushing forward of housing projects, but also saying
02:36that this is in the context of austerity. And he's, again, pointing to the UK government,
02:41blaming the UK government for that overall financial climate and saying that the Scottish
02:45government is working within that overall climate of austerity. And finally, just to
02:49complete this kind of trio of different issues that First Minister's questions today, Patrick
02:54Harvey, the Scottish Greens co-leader, was criticising the Scottish government's progress
02:59on climate issues, saying it's not going fast enough, it's not going far enough, calling
03:04on the Scottish government to do more. John Swinney, again, defending the Scottish government's
03:08records. So it's very much a kind of round up FMQs today, as you might expect at the
03:13end of the year. Russell Findlay going on something that's close to his heart, justice.
03:17He's a former crime journalist. It's something he knows a lot about. He's very close to some
03:21of these cases that he raises in terms of knowing a lot about them. Anna Sarwar going
03:25on housing, the homelessness crisis, again, an issue that Labour have brought up before
03:30at First Minister's questions, something they're quite strong on. And the Greens, of course,
03:34going on climate, which is, as everyone knows, one of the main issues that party is concerned
03:39with. Alistair, I thought while John Swinney responded
03:44pretty levelly throughout, he did sort of raise his voice and go on the attack against
03:48Anna Sarwar and he brought up the WASPI women's situation. And from my point of view, it was
03:54quite an effective blow landed. What did you make of it?
03:57Yeah, I think he was just waiting for the moment that he could bring up the WASPI women's
04:00situation. Of course, this comes after Prime Minister Keir Starmer made the announcement
04:05that the UK government isn't going to provide any compensation to the WASPI women. I think,
04:08you know, not unsurprising considering the amount of money we're talking about here.
04:13I think it's £10 billion or something like that for the overall costs. It always seemed
04:18quite unlikely that the UK government would ever provide that kind of money, given the
04:23current financial climate we live in. But the difficulty for Labour here is that they
04:28made the WASPI women, those campaigners, think that they were going to take action.
04:32They posed for photographs with the campaigners. They made various statements in public about
04:37this. It's a very tricky issue for Scottish Labour. Anna Sarwar yesterday saying that
04:42he didn't agree with the fact the UK government isn't providing any compensation. I think
04:46Jackie Bailey, his deputy, today saying the same thing, that she disagrees with that decision.
04:50This is an issue that Jackie Bailey has campaigned on for quite a while now. She's been photographed
04:55several times with those campaigners. So it is a very difficult issue for them. And
04:58I think the difficulty comes in that element of hypocrisy. You're seeing one thing when
05:02you're out of power, and then when you come into power, you're doing something very different.
05:05And as far as those campaigners are concerned, there's a real sense of betrayal that the
05:10Labour Party has betrayed them. Alistair, just lastly, before we wrap up,
05:15we've written a lot about Neil Gray and those chauffeur trips. We know he made a statement
05:20in Parliament even about it. And we were running a story on the site on Wednesday that the ministerial
05:27code has been tweaked off the back of this. But there's another minister in hot water,
05:31and you've spoken to her today. Yes, this is Angela Constance,
05:35the Justice Secretary. There's a story in the front page of another paper today
05:39saying that she had taken a ministerial car to an old firm game just a matter of days ago, really,
05:47including a family member accompanying her to that game as well. Myself and a number of other
05:54journalists doorstepped her as she was leaving the Scottish Parliament chamber today, just to
05:59ask her why, essentially, she felt the need to take a ministerial car to a football match.
06:05She's obviously the Justice Secretary. You wouldn't immediately think that it sits within
06:09her portfolio, and also why she felt the need to bring a family member along with her. I mean,
06:13the criticism from opposition politicians has always been that these are jollies. You know,
06:17there's something that ministers are just doing for enjoyment, and that they're kind of using
06:22meetings of people as a fig leaf to go on what are essentially, as I say, jollies.
06:26But Angela Constance very much saying that this was something that she was there as Justice
06:30Secretary. She had meetings with football bodies about things like pyrotechnics and ongoing issues
06:36with policing of fans, and saying that sometimes ministers do bring family members along to these
06:42events, that she's not in the habit of it. She's not a football fan, but she was very much defending
06:46her decision, or at least defending the fact that she'd taken a ministerial car to this event,
06:52that she'd been there in an official capacity. I think it's important to point out that this
06:57kind of thing has gone on since the dawn of devolution. It goes on down south as well,
07:02but obviously the climate around this has changed recently. On the back of those Neil Gray
07:08incidents you referred to earlier, Neil Gray apologised because a lot of the football matches
07:13he attended were Aberdeen games. He's an Aberdeen fan. He apologised for creating the
07:18perception, I think is how he put it, that he was acting more as a fan than a minister.
07:22There was then a later story that he had taken a ministerial car to a film premiere, the film
07:27The Outrun, at its UK premiere at the Edinburgh Film Festival. Again, not very clear why the Health
07:34Secretary felt the need to be at that event. So I think it's just this perception that they are
07:39taking the public for a ride, to use a bit of a pun, that they're kind of treating people like
07:45they're idiots and essentially they're going to these things because they're fun.
07:51If you're at all interested in any of the stories that we've spoken about, the situation with the
07:56WASPI women and the row that has developed within Labor about that, or Angela Constance and
08:02ultimately what she's got to say as well, you'll be able to read those at scottsman.com.
08:07Look for the politics tab in the navigation bar that takes you to all our latest coverage.
08:12Alistair, thanks for joining us and for bringing us that comprehensive wrap.
08:16You've done a fantastic job throughout 2024 and we're looking forward to what a year before the
08:22big Scottish election brings in 2025. Thanks everyone for tuning in.