25/04/2012 Newsnight Scotland

Tonight on Newsnight Scotland, Donald Trump makes his progress

into the Scottish Parliament. He has made his arguments against win

power and the government. Might he actually have a point? Was a

tonight, automated electronic counting. Having got it right this

time? Good evening. The Donald Trump circus arrived at Holyrood

today. It was described as the most in but exciting thing ever seen at

He did not have this rump -- rap song playing in the back row, but

Donald Trump knows how to make next -- entrance. Think you for joining

us. The economy, energy and tourism committee has never been so popular.

The reason? The tycoon, his golf I am all for renewable energy.

believe in tide technology and I think you have great opportunities

for other things and other forms of energy. But wind turbines, made in

China, are going to be the destruction, and almost a total

destruction, of the tourism industry. The committee room could

not take everyone, so some reporters and photographers at be

accommodated elsewhere. If I spoke to people in your community, they

did not be happy. He has been given his evidence based on this document

but he has already submitted to the committee. We will see how it turns

out. Will he be calling the first minister mad Alex? I spend this

money, and now I might regret it. After I invested tremendous amount

of money in this, and completed it, then this starts to come. I think

it has a terrible way to treat a person investing tens of millions

of pounds in Scotland. When I first got involved, there were 10 miles

away, then they were three miles away, now they are one mile away.

One mile is not even a sea wind. It is really on the coast. The concept

of a wind turbine wind one buy-out Time for another classic trump

entrants -- entrance. He was in danger of becoming Mad Alex. In

Britain weeks, the first minister has been described as a Mad Alex.

didn't say that, you did. Now there are stories going round calling in

Scotland's Hitler. You're like him? Yes. I think he is misguided. If

you spent this sort of money on wind farms, I think Scotland will

have no money, they will be in a disastrous state. They will be

unable in five years to replace these horrendous things that they

have built, when the UK stops subsidising, Scotland will go broke.

One anti--Trump documentary maker said it was the golf course that

was the real problem. It is one of the worst environmental crimes in

history. He has got a failed documentary. Let Mr Trump answer

the question. He said he was the evidence, such was his expertise in

tourism, and he would not build the hotel part of his golf complex if

it had to look into the face of wind turbines? Then it was time to

go. The circus should never stay What was it like in the line of the

Donald Trump storm? There was sorting -- there was a lot of heat

and colour at the committee meeting today, I wasn't sure that there was

a lot of light, and we didn't learn more than we already knew on wind

power and renewable energy, but I think what this has done is created

a level of public interest in the work of the parliamentary committee

on renewable energy. I think that is a positive thing. Outside,

protesters both against her bines and dump -- Trump made their point

known. This man is becoming some -- something of a local hero. But pro

wind farm... I don't think there was much interest in what Mr Trump

was saying. He is clearly a sceptic of climate change. It is baffling

as to why he was at the Scottish Parliament at all. Then it was time

to say farewell. Both have a puppet and to the one who likes to pull

the strings. I am joined now by Mark Gibson, who was giving

evidence, and by the green MSP Patrick Harvey. I note that you

have some sympathy with his arguments, but he is the master of

overstatement, isn't he? probably is, but what he has done

is to bring the whole subject and debate to a fork, and I think it is

a good thing. Patrick Harvey, particularly on Donald Trump, you

could argue that this is a glorified case of not in my

backyard. These turbines are parked right next to his golf course.

Singh has this got his government was so keen to promote the

development, why can't they just shift the turbines? They already

have been discussions about adapting and changing the proposals

of offshore wind deployment South - - centres, and the response has

been measured, as they usually are, describing the odd change here and

there. The developer responsible for listening to beckon for --

concerns. Mr Trump has a very different attitude to development.

When you do not get your way, you pick up the bone to the first

minister and say give me what I want or a walk away. He does not

seem to understand the democratic planning process, and I'm sorry to

see -- say that Alex Salmond did not understand either. But he is

making a fuss. He committed gigantic bust. If you build a big

new house somewhere, and the suddenly found that there was going

to be a wind farm right next to it, or a gas plant or something like

that, that you had led to believe worst further away, you be

understandably annoyed about it? I don't buy the idea that Mr Trump

has been given such assurances, but the development will be about the

size of a thumbnail held at arm's length. This really is not an issue.

What we need to a cat is the quality of the evidence that we

heard today. Equality was about rock bottom. We had to sit through

a stream of trouble, riddled with inaccuracies, and the man seems

obsessed with Chinese turn up -- turbines when there are none in

Scotland. He was obsessed with other forms of electricity. He is

making an issue out of alleged promises, which apparently don't

I know you want to give us your views on to her Bines, on Donald

Trump in particular, it seems peculiar that the Scottish

government is very keen on Donald Trump and wind turbines, it can be

a coincidence that both things are in such close proximity, can it?

You have to assess every side on its merits. I do not agree with

Patrick Harvie that the evidence was repetitive. What it underlines

is the growing unhappiness. Hardly a week goes by without a one

authoritative paper from professional bodies or engineers

saying that this policy does not work. A I know that your

organisation marshals all the arguments it can, understandably.

Is there a groundswell of support for your position? If there is, it

presumably is mainly honest better grounds? It is on Donald Trump

grounds. As I said, I said to Patrick Harvie this morning, we all

want to be on the same size copper -- on the same side, we will want

the best for Scotland. We have a policy which is not based on

evidence and which people are increasingly not believing in. That

is a very dangerous thing. People would accept something they might

not otherwise like so much if they believe that it is right. If they

see that it is wrong, their views are ignored, democracy is trampled

on. That is dangerous. What is needed is an independent review of

the whole system. In what sense is democracy trampled on? All these

wind turbines are subject to planning controls. It is a very

unlevel playing field. You have the developer spending tens of millions

of pounds on every application against local communities, the ones

who are most affected the and least able to have found -- to defend

themselves. They have the least time to make an objection, they

have 28 days compared to years for the developer, if their local

authority decided and listens to their concerns, and reject the

application in over 45 out of 50 appeals, the Government pushes it

through. Patrick Harvie, if there is a case for compromise on the

Donald, is there a case for compromise more generally? I know

you're in favour of wind turbine ploo mac, but you must accept that

there are a lot of people who live in rural areas to Dong want to have

their view dominated by these things. Is there some way of

getting what you want a without imposing what a lot of people do

not want? Mr Gibson is quite right to and from -- to argue for a

fairer planning system. I will support changes for that. His

position on this development, renewable energy, wind power, is

inconsistent. He said tonight that we should take a case-by-case

approach. The Wren submission at her calls for a moratorium. No, I

stand by a... He seems to be rejecting all mainstream climate

science. At least the community against carbines have a legitimate

stake in this. It is about time someone asked dog Trump who the

hell he thinks he is to come and dictate energy policy in Scotland.

He had ignored my point. Is there a compromise, there are a lot of

people that agree with Mark Gibson. Wider community appeal I have long

argued for in the planning system. It is something that would level

the playing field. I would still support that. Mark Gibson, briefly.

I am his urologist, I am a chartered surveyor. I am very

active in my local community. -- IMI's urologist. -- I am a

zoologist. There is no evidence of any benefits from term by ins.

is nonsense. Simply nonsense. see direct evidence of nature being

violated, you cease once, we have those, we have 47-50 pairs each

winter, they migrate between the lock and a village, within Qatar

mines application site of mapped hang on, we are out of time.

wonder what have you. You can continue sometime else. Or after

the programme, if you want! It is just after a week until the

polling stations open in Scotland's local council elections. The last

boat four years ago it was subsumed with the controversy around the

electronic voting system. The e- counting machines will be back for

next month's elections. There will be offered him 200 of them at

various venues. Well the system work this time? We have been behind

the scenes. A sophisticated electronic system

designed to deliver an electoral result that is fast and accurate.

Where have we heard that before? There were 1501 rejected papers.

1850 and be listened. 1536 in Airdrie and Shotts. How my hundred

and 78 rejected papers. They could be 100,000 rejected ballot papers

across Scotland if this trend continues. In the end it, 130,000

ballots were rejected, supposedly spoiled. Most had been rejected by

the counting machines without human intervention. 2007 was the perfect

storm. We had elections to the Scottish Parliament and local

government on the same day. We had the single transferable vote be

introduced at the same time for local government elections. We had

the ballot paper design for the Scottish Parliament, which created

all sorts of problems and we had e- counting, all of this on the same

day, all at once, and inevitably, I think, something went wrong.

big question is, is it going to be accurate? Is it going to be secured

and is it going to work? The process is under new management. An

IT consultancy and an election services company says it has been

exhaustively tested. We have scant 10,000 Cup -- 10,000 ballot papers.

We then took recommendations from the local authorities to enhance

the software, to improve it for the voters and for the users. We then

went through a phase of trying out the software, demonstrating the

software and that culminated a a large-scale demonstration in Perth,

where we stand 164,000 ballot papers to the system. Another

change from 2007 - we will know who is in charge this time.

Canadian who gained -- could it be independent search -- research. He

could not find one person to blame last time. He recommended that the

chief electoral officer for Scotland be established. That was

discussed, and eventually it was decided to establish an elections

can be near pictures are poor at to that end. We focused on utilising

that report. It was about putting the water first. Making sure that

we took transparency into account whenever we were designing the

solution, so we ended up with a solution that we feel as

transparent, robust, is tried and tested.

Why use four atoll? Because of the single transferable vote system.

Its supporters say at least a fair result. The downside, counting by

hand can take days. A few clicks of the mouse can do the same thing in

seconds. The excess votes have been redistributed. As another candidate

met the quarter? North. We got to the next stage. There we are. We

now have three candidates elected. Jason many met the quarter. -- met

the quarter. There should be no nasty surprises. No changes to the

software or the ballot papers. we established a ballot paper

design very lollop -- very early on in the process. Spoiled ballot

papers will be rejected by humans, not machines. Automatic

adjudication is not allowed, so all ballot papers will be adjudicated

by human beings on the Friday when they are counting the votes.

main difference this time as that the elections were held a year ago

for the national parliament, they should be no reason why things

should go wrong, there should be no reason why we cannot count

electronically. He should be the case that things will prove

successful and they will not be any difficulties. If that is the case,

all voters will have to worry about his voting. Remember, putting

across in a box is so last year. did not use an X. You express your

choices, you put a one for your first choice, and so on. You do not

have to vote for all candidates on the ballot paper, you can vote for

as few as many as you want. system has already been used

successfully in several smaller Scottish elections. One thought was

for a health board that had 70 candidate on the ballot paper. Some