22/03/2017 Reporting Scotland

have been injured. There will be continuing coverage of this

developing story on the BBC News Channel.

Welcome to the Scottish Parliament, where today's debate on a second

independence referendum was suspended after this afternoon's

The fact our sister Parliament has had a serious incident is affecting

this debate and is affecting the contribution of members, so it is

for that reason we have decided to suspend the sitting.

We'll have the latest from Westminster, where a major

security operation is still going on at the Houses of Parliament.

And security has also been increased here at Holyrood, with a heavy

Holyrood is tonight reeling from the terrorist

attack on its sister parliament at Westminster.

News of the attack came as MSPs debated asking for powers to hold

That debate was halted just before 4pm this afternoon as news

from London filtered into the chamber.

Our political editor Brian Taylor reports.

A normal comic indeed smiling star, to what turned out to be a hideously

abnormal day. Nicola Sturgeon announcing ?2 million support for

children. She is doing the day job alongside the referendum debate.

Questions to the Prime Minister. alongside the referendum debate.

noon, at Westminster, business seemed as usual. She has delayed and

blocked... The SNP's Angus Robertson pressing the Prime Minister over a

special EU deal for Scotland. Theresa May setting Scotland was in

her thoughts, but firmly within the UK. At heart we are one people. In

the afternoon back at Holyrood First Minister and Deputy arrived four-day

two of the debate, but steadily the grim news filtered through from

Westminster. The decision was taken to close down the debate for the

day. The fact our sister Parliament has had a serious incident is

affecting this debate and the contribution of members. It is for

that reason we have decided to suspend the sitting. As MSP is

streamed out, most backed the decision. Everyone is really worried

about what is happening at Westminster and it seems more

appropriate to suspended until we know more details. Some things are

bigger than day-to-day politics? Absolutely, many things are bigger.

This is an attack on us all and until there is clarity, the sensible

thing is to suspend. I do not think it looks good, given what we are

discussing just now, to press ahead with that in the face of a

disturbing, alarming and potentially very tragic situation down south.

The situation is of deep concern to all of us and democracy is precious,

it is important it is protected. It is terrible news, but I take the

strong view we should never give in to terrorism and it was a mistake to

suspend the business of Parliament today on a really important issue

for Scotland. We really have to send a message to people out there that

we do not react to terrorism and we should continue with our normal

business. I have huge sympathy for what has happened in Westminster

naturally, but we should not be giving in to terrorism. At the

Palace of Westminster, a crisis, a lockdown. At Hollywood's silent

chamber and safety first security, democracy requiring vigilance.

As you intimated, this was an attack on democracy and a place you know

very well. I worked for many years at the House of Commond and my other

son was born in Saint Thomas' hospital where many of the wounded

were taken. Alongside the concern for the Palace of Westminster and

the concern for the political and security implications, one cannot

help thinking as an analyst of the individual people unwittingly and

unwillingly caught up in this tragedy. There is heightened

security here and I understand the First Minister is involved in talks?

There is heightened security, but there is no direct evidence of an

actual threat to Scotland. The Scottish government met this

afternoon and ministers in that committee will meet this evening to

review the situation. Of course in the light of an event like this

everyone thinks whether it might happen again and where it might

strike. To go back briefly to the events in the chamber, I understand

there was some opposition to the debate being halted. There was. It

was confirmed that Roseanna debate being halted. There was. It

Cunningham, the Cabinet minister, was unhappy about the proposal to

suspend. Initially it was thought the debate would carry on. But she

realised it and then was able to get the full seriousness of it. I am

certain she is backing the decision to suspend. It is because of the

energy and the anxiety that arises because of events that we have no

control over. They will either hold the debate again tomorrow or next

week. Whatever happens, political and Parliamentary debate will

continue here at Holyrood and at Westminster.

Our political correspondent Nick Eardley was on the streets

of Westminster as the terror attack began.

Here is his report into how events unfolded.

Go! Terror at the heart of British democracy. Get down! One of London's

busiest tourist spots. At the moment it is not clear what is going on

behind me. We have just seen the police darting along there and what

looked like ministerial car is being rushed away. An incident the police

are treating as a terror attack. Within minutes of reported gunshots

sitting outside the BBC's Westminster office. There are

reports that someone has been shot. Armed police flooding into

Parliament, Westminster going into lockdown. On the other side of this

iconic building a car hit members of the public and police officers, a

man armed with a knife tried to enter parliament. Four were killed,

among them a police officer. A guide to the police by surprise and ran

through and took one policeman down and as another one approached he got

up and he had a knife and that is when I heard gunfire. Parliament was

suspended. In order, order, I am now going to suspend the house. The

SNP's Westminster leader sits on the joint intelligence committee. In

these circumstances it is important to reflect that whether they were

police officers or security staff from the Palace of Westminster, they

were there to help everybody and that is what they were doing and

when everybody else is being told to run away from danger, those are the

people running into the face of danger and it is humbling to think

people would be prepared to put their lives on the line to save

people they do not know. Tonight Westminster remains in lockdown, a

year to the day after attacks on the European Parliament in Brussels. It

appears democracy is the target of terrorism once again.

And we can cross to David Porter now in Westminster.

David, what did you witness? Jackie, an extraordinary day at Westminster

and a very harrowing one in which you saw raw panic on the faces of

people who work in Parliament, who think they are saved in Parliament.

I am about 200 yards away from where the attack took place and that is

the closest we can get because the area is in what police are calling a

lockdown. Everything has been shut off and there are police cordon is

lockdown. Everything has been shut everywhere. I was outside one for

some time and it was pretty obvious from very early on that the police

were treating this extremely seriously. A huge number of police

involved and we are used to armed police here at Westminster on the

gates of the houses of parliament, but this was a very serious incident

which the police realised had the potential to be extremely serious.

Four people have been killed, 20 people have been injured. Today here

at Westminster I think Westminster and the family fears this is an

attack upon itself. Describe for us if you would the situation right

now. What is it like to be there? It is still an immense police operation

under way. You can probably hear the sirens behind me and see the blue

lights across the river and things like that. It is now just over a

four hours since the incident began. The police are still conducting a

very tight sweep of the area. They are looking very closely at various

places in the House of Commond. At one point MPs were in effect blocked

in the chamber in the House of Commond when the Commons was

suspended. Data on this afternoon MPs and their staff were moved over

to Westminster Abbey so the police could actually look closely at what

was happening in the Palace of Westminster, but also to interview

all those people who had been involved in this dreadful incident.

Here at Holyrood security has been tightened, although it's

being emphasised that there's no intelligence to suggest

Glenn Campbell reports now on how parliament's are protected.

Whether it is Westminster or here at Holyrood, Parliaments in the UK do

take security really seriously. When this building was going up a changed

the design to curb in this massive blast wall of solid concrete and

that change was made following the terrorist attacks on the United

States on 9/11. In the years since then security has been kept under

constant review. For instance, these bonfires have been added to the

defence of architecture on the Parliamentary estate. That happened

following the attack on Glasgow Airport. The most recent change,

though, it is the addition of a new, public entrance to the Scottish

Parliament. This block has been added on, taking airport style

security screening away from the main building. There is talk to

somebody who knows about security, a man in charge of policing this area

of Edinburgh at one point. How hard is it for police and the security

services to keep ahead of those who would do us harm? It is constantly

evolving and the plan has to be refined literally week after week,

gathering information about what is happening in the UK and in Europe

and other parts of the world. The plan will be refined and rehearsed

constantly. Will today's incident make a difference? Will it change

the way Parliaments and other public buildings are protected? Yes, it

will. Once we find that what has happened and analyse it, there will

be changes to the plan. But it is not just policing that evolves,

politicians and their staff keep personal security under review.

There's talk about personal safety with two newly elected MSP 's. Ross

Thomson, what has your experience been like since becoming an MSP? I

was a new MSP in May and it has been a learning curve and you do not

expect to think about your own personal security. You expect to

learn everything else about the building, but not about keeping

yourself safe. We have had some incidents and I am quite happy to

deal with that, but for the staff who work in my office it is not

fair. We have to be accessible, but you also have to take into account

personal security. You have served at Westminster, have you ever felt

unsafe doing your job? You have to accept it as part of the job. I have

had several death threats over the years, I had a shooting threat

against me at my office previously. Like Ross said, it is important to

reflect on the security risks, but also the risks to all the staff and

the staff who work in and around the Parliament on the front line. There

is a balance to be struck between the security and accessibility of

our politics. The debate about that will intensify following today's

attack. Scottish Parliament's Presiding

Officer Ken McIntosh announced that the debate in Holyrood

was being suspended around How did you learn of what was

happening in London? Can I first of all say on behalf of all my

colleagues here in Parliament house sorry and sad we are at the loss of

life and those affected today. It is very tragic to think of the lives

cut short and the families who will be inconsolable tonight that this

cruel and senseless violence. You work in the chamber. Yes, as you can

imagine in this day of modern media, reports were beginning to circulate

almost immediately. I was in the chair, my clerks began to pass me a

note immediately saying there was an incident. Then I could tell because

members in the Chambers caught my eye at which point the chief

executive was sitting next to me and he left to assess the situation and

came back with an update. But as these events unfold it can be quite

chaotic in terms of news and hard information. What happened was there

was a very strong feeling, and I have a strong belief in not giving

into terror, so there was a strong feeling at that stage that we should

continue to maintain Parliamentary business, particularly with a lack

of information. At that stage we were in the middle of a

full-blooded, passionate debate on an issue of intense interest to the

people of Scotland, so there was no prospect of suspending business.

However, as more information became available, it became clear that

members were elsewhere. It was beginning to affect the

debate itself? Our members have friends and colleagues in relation

that work at Westminster. We were debating something about the

relationship with our sister Parliament at Westminster. It became

clear it would be inappropriate to continue the debate. It was a

reluctant decision, but we had to suspend business. We have just been

Billy Maka seen the report on the levels of security here, are you

satisfied with the security? We have a duty to be publicly accessible and

engage with the people of Scotland. We have two protect the public and

the Parliament and the people who attend this Parliament. We have

upgraded our security and number of times. Right beside you, we have the

steel bollards that external I security to protect the Parliament

and those who work there. I think we realise that one thing that stopped

events within Westminster getting worse, was the quick response of

armed police officers. We don't have armed police officers here on a

routine basis? I am not going to speculate about the levels of

security. We take our security and the security of the public and the

staff here very seriously. I wouldn't want to speculate. Is it

perhaps time to think about that? Armed police are available in

Scotland when they are needed. It is not a case that I think people in

public should discuss where and when they are deployed. But I can see

you, security here for the sake of everybody who uses this building,

who believes in a practising and engaged democracy, we take security

very seriously and we will be reviewing matters.

We can go to our reporter Andrew Black, who's

Andrew, any response from Police Scotland

And perhaps the ramifications? Behind me you can see Govan police

station and this is part of Police Scotland's anti-terrorism

operations. We have had an updated statement. Police Scotland said

following the incident in London, Police Scotland is reviewing its

security plans and operations. Part of that review they say in clue 's

issues like the deployment of armed police officers and other specialist

officers. They have urged the public to remain vigilant and report any

suspicious activity to the police. They continue to liaise with UK

authorities. Police Scotland and UK anti-terrorist maintain close links

with the matter. We saw that ten years ago during the terrorist

attack on Glasgow Airport. Michael Matheson has been briefed by the

Chief Constable and both Scottish Government officials and Police

Scotland officials have met this afternoon as part of their

resilience team and will continue to meet tonight again as the situation

continues to unfold. The Daily Record's Westminster

editor Torquil Crichton Torquil, tell me where you are,

what is the current position? You are under lockdown? Democracy is

under lockdown the night. We have been here since 2:40pm when we heard

gunshots just below the offices of the journalists at Westminster. We

gunshots just below the offices of look down, we swept away the

bombproof curtains that save us from Bob and fragments, should they come

in. We looked down and there where two down on the cobbled yard. I

rushed down with others to see what was happened to be met by armed

police rushing out of their armoury in the underground car park, taking

up point like you would see on armed patrol. They locked MPs back in the

chamber and swept the Prime Minister out of here as quickly as they

could. She is back in Downing Street and chairing a meeting of 1-0. There

is a show of defiance that terrorism will not stop democracy. What have

you been told about what is happening now and why you are still

under lockdown? Hundreds of people come in and out of Westminster every

day. This is the busiest day of the week with PMQs. Some of my

colleagues, saw the event happen. Others captured it on their phones.

There are strict rules about taking photographs within the Palace of

There are strict rules about taking Westminster, so we haven't been able

to broadcast them. Everybody has to be processed. Who are you, what did

you see and what did you hear? Thank you very much. Let's stay with

Westminster and let's hear from Nick again. Where exactly are you and

what can you tell us about the current situation? I am over the

road from Parliament as well. The street outside is normally busy with

traffic at this time of night with people heading home, it is deserted.

The only people are police and police vehicles. Central London is

still in a state of lockdown. In the next while, we expect the Prime

Minister chair a meeting of the COBRA resilience committee. They

will be discussing the next moves and we have heard from the

Metropolitan Police, there will be extra police, both armed and unarmed

on the streets over the next few days. We have had a statement from

Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary saying, in many cents, this is an

ongoing investigation. But we are hearing from MPs, many of them are

holed up in Westminster Abbey. They will definitely sit tomorrow, they

may even sit tonight if some get their way. The people I have been

speaking to, MPs, friends and relatives down here, they feel

defiant. London has seen a situation like this before and perhaps it'll

see it again. But there is a sense like this before and perhaps it'll

of Westminster and the city in the whole, life goes on and people will

not be cowed by what they have seen. Thank you very much. Let's go back

to Glasgow and get the weather. Some sunshine around the West, but

very damp as we have seen it Edinburgh. But the low pressure goes

south towards the Bega Biscay and it was replaced by high pressure and

that means a change to fine, dry and bright and increasingly warm

conditions. Now, here is the rain across central and southern parts of

the country easing away. Wet in the capital over the next few hours. To

the north of that, largely dry and clear with frosty conditions in the

north-west. Temperatures overnight where it is clear, it is cold, below

zero and perhaps minus eight in a few sheltered blends. Tomorrow, a

cloudy start the central, southern and eastern parts. Elsewhere, bright

and sunny and as we head through the course of the afternoon it will

improve. If you stop the data are cloudy and damp, it will improve the

something a little like this. Temperatures much higher than today,

the part of Perthshire, Dumfries Galloway, south Lanarkshire, maybe

12 Celsius. Further east, eight or nine Celsius. Cloud around. The best

of any prolonged sunshine across the Highlands and Islands. Winds

generally lied. South-westerly wind the Shetland with a few outbreaks

are patchy rain at times. As we head through the afternoon and evening it

is largely dry and clear and it will be cold. That is the high pressure

sitting overhead exerting its influence. Friday will be largely

dry but cloud across the mainland and perhaps the odd spot of rain.

Temperatures for most, into double digits. Into the weekend with high

pressure in charge, it should be dry for most. Sunshine around and

looking increasingly warm, perhaps by the weekend, temperatures for

some into the mid-teens. Now I will hand you back to Jackie at

Edinburgh. I'm joined by Brian Taylor

and Glenn Campbell. This is your workplace, the attack

happened in its sister Parliament. Your thoughts must be

with those like you who work It is a terrorist Billy Mac cerebral

a high-profile location. It is a terrorist Billy Mac cerebral

incident and it makes you reflect. We go about our business. As I was

saying earlier in my report, there is a careful balance to be struck

between the accessibility of our politics and politicians and

security of those who stand for elected office and those who support

them. Do you think there will have to be big changes behind me here? I

think they will upgrade the security, but they will be reluctant

to go down the road as Ken Macintosh said, of closing the building of an

crouching and cowering behind a concrete wall. Very unlikely to do

that. Couple of developments in the last few minutes, a statement from

the Prime Minister saying she will chair COBRA, and a statement from

Amber Rudd saying, urging vigilance but saying the values of democracy,

tolerance and the rule of law will be respected and it will prevail.

There seems to be an air of defiance and merging, even at this early

stage? There does, it is gloriously complimentary of democracy that

there is honourable discourse over the nature of whether the debate

should have been suspended. It ultimately was and that was right.

Now a reminder of tonight's main news.

Four people, including an armed police officer and a man

believed to be the attacker, have died in a terrorist incident

A woman was among several pedestrians struck by a car

on Westminster Bridge before it crashed into railings.

The officer was stabbed in the Houses of Parliament by

At least 20 people were injured, including three other officers.

The Metropolitan Police said a major terrorism investigation was

underway. This was happening while there was a debate happening in the

Scottish Parliament. It was asking for powers to ask for another

independence referendum and it was halted as the news came into the

chamber. That is all from Reporting Scotland. From all of us here, good

night.