Browse content similar to 07/08/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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area around them reduces. We are out of time. | :00:11. | :00:15. | |
Unease now Scotland tonight: a house of Commons committee says | :00:15. | :00:22. | |
that the legal authority for a referendum must end with Miss -- | :00:23. | :00:28. | |
and must rest with Westminster. But cant MPs change the law if they | :00:28. | :00:34. | |
want? And exam results are sinking in. Can we be sure that further are | :00:34. | :00:40. | |
higher education is necessarily the best step for everyone? | :00:40. | :00:42. | |
The house of Commons Scottish Affairs Select Committee has | :00:42. | :00:47. | |
published a report suggesting that there is overwhelming evidence that | :00:47. | :00:50. | |
holding an independence referendum would be beyond the current powers | :00:50. | :00:57. | |
of a Scottish parliament. Any attempt, they say, would end in | :00:57. | :01:05. | |
legal wrangling through the courts. A special order, a section 30 | :01:05. | :01:13. | |
notice could be issued. I was beat the committee's chairman, | :01:13. | :01:22. | |
Ian Davidson MP. But Andrew Tickell also told us that there was no | :01:22. | :01:26. | |
argument that it would be legal for her Holyrood to hold a referendum. | :01:26. | :01:29. | |
There is a lack of case law in terms of the constitution which | :01:30. | :01:39. | |
:01:40. | :01:43. | ||
makes it clear that the powers are either out with -- are bedecked | :01:43. | :01:47. | |
with are in it. What the Scotland Act does and says it is that | :01:47. | :01:51. | |
Holyrood has power over everything that is not reserved to Westminster, | :01:51. | :02:01. | |
:02:01. | :02:08. | ||
and every argument against this is that it is absolutely clear. It is | :02:08. | :02:17. | |
by no means clear -- as as clear as he claims. There is the persuasive | :02:17. | :02:21. | |
argument that it is contrary to the Parliament Act to have fun | :02:21. | :02:26. | |
referendum on independence. I am joined by Ian Davidson, who | :02:26. | :02:30. | |
chairs their house of Commons Scottish Affairs Select Committee. | :02:30. | :02:35. | |
It is a fact legally that there is no lock -- knock-down argument on | :02:35. | :02:40. | |
either side and you could lose this in court? The overwhelming balance | :02:40. | :02:46. | |
of legal opinion that we received was that it is absolutely clear | :02:46. | :02:50. | |
that the responsibility for the constitution, the relationship | :02:50. | :02:54. | |
between Scotland and England, lies with Westminster. That was quite | :02:54. | :02:58. | |
specifically in Scotland that it was agreed by the Scottish people | :02:58. | :03:03. | |
in the referendum in 1997. I do understand of course that it UK | :03:03. | :03:07. | |
lawyer's enough, they will argue a contrary case. No lawyer that we | :03:07. | :03:13. | |
have come across a tall says that the Scottish Government has the | :03:13. | :03:16. | |
power to conduct a referendum on their own. The most that they will | :03:16. | :03:21. | |
say is that it is an arguable case, as you Speaker there said, which | :03:21. | :03:26. | |
means that it would end up being disputed in court. That is quite an | :03:26. | :03:30. | |
astonishing proposition to say that a lawyer's to are engaging and get | :03:30. | :03:35. | |
an alternative viewpoint I doing it because if you pay at lawyer enough | :03:35. | :03:40. | |
they will give you an alternative viewpoint. If you hire a lawyer to | :03:40. | :03:45. | |
fight the case for you, he will fight that case. That is the point. | :03:45. | :03:52. | |
The point is that there is no case law in this. You have eminent | :03:52. | :03:55. | |
lawyers both saying that actually this could go the other way, | :03:55. | :04:00. | |
because we do not have the case law on this. The point is... None of | :04:00. | :04:04. | |
them say that it would not end up in court if the Scottish government | :04:04. | :04:12. | |
tried to do it on its own. That is the point. The point is whether you | :04:12. | :04:17. | |
win or lose in court. No, it is not. The point is that we want to have a | :04:17. | :04:22. | |
speedy referendum. My side want to get this resolved, we want to have | :04:22. | :04:26. | |
a referendum, because we think we're going to win quite frankly. | :04:26. | :04:29. | |
We believe that having an agreement between Westminster and Scotland | :04:30. | :04:34. | |
through a section 30 notice, where there is no dispute about the | :04:34. | :04:39. | |
legality, is by far the best way forward. If you want that, been | :04:39. | :04:44. | |
legally, there is nothing to stop you tomorrow, putting in up to | :04:44. | :04:54. | |
:04:54. | :04:55. | ||
process the section 30 permission. But will he do that? Of course. | :04:55. | :05:01. | |
Before you explain that, you must as separate out the wall back, | :05:01. | :05:06. | |
which you could do. You could get their section 30 order through it | :05:06. | :05:13. | |
any point. Or you could attach conditions, and that political | :05:13. | :05:17. | |
decision as were the problem lies legally. Instead of going ahead | :05:17. | :05:21. | |
with a legal solution, the attached conditions to it, which is a | :05:21. | :05:28. | |
political solution. I understand it Newsnight Scotland's position is | :05:28. | :05:32. | |
that the power should be given to the people. I cannot let to | :05:32. | :05:38. | |
continue. That is a ludicrous proposition. And I'm about to | :05:38. | :05:42. | |
answer you... I am asking you perfectly reasonable question that | :05:42. | :05:47. | |
I am entitled Ask. Of course, and I am entitled to answer. You are | :05:47. | :05:53. | |
suggesting that time predicated my question on a preconception... | :05:53. | :05:56. | |
is a general political view. That Newsnight Scotland is biased in | :05:56. | :06:01. | |
favour of the Scottish Parliament handling all these issues | :06:01. | :06:05. | |
themselves. Our position is not that. Our position is that | :06:05. | :06:12. | |
Westminster had been given powers to deal with that Mathur -- to deal | :06:12. | :06:17. | |
with the matter of the Scottish referendum. Our legitimacy comes | :06:17. | :06:21. | |
from the referendum. We then have legitimacy to decide how these | :06:21. | :06:29. | |
matters should be dealt with. We then have power if we wish to | :06:29. | :06:39. | |
:06:39. | :06:40. | ||
handed over to Scotland. But we choose not to do so. Before we | :06:40. | :06:44. | |
continue, it perhaps might be appropriate at this stage if you | :06:44. | :06:48. | |
would like to apologise to me for suggesting that I have come into | :06:48. | :06:55. | |
this interview in any way biased against your argument Party won | :06:55. | :06:59. | |
political party are another. No one on this programme works in this way | :06:59. | :07:04. | |
and it is offensive that to suggest that. I have already complained | :07:04. | :07:10. | |
about the way in which Newsnight Scotland begins. I think you are | :07:10. | :07:14. | |
clearly biased against in the Unionist parties and if that causes | :07:14. | :07:20. | |
you concern any need to realise that you are not above the fray. If | :07:20. | :07:25. | |
you want to stand for election do so, otherwise you should be nor | :07:25. | :07:29. | |
neutral. If I absolutely reject what you say there, and there is | :07:29. | :07:33. | |
plenty of evidence to refute that. Are you saying that you drive your | :07:33. | :07:39. | |
mandate from the 1997 referendum? Let us then say that people going | :07:39. | :07:43. | |
and the 1997 referendum had undermined whether a future | :07:43. | :07:52. | |
referendum conducted by their Holyrood Parliament would relate to | :07:52. | :08:00. | |
this, how late it possibly relate this? In 1997 there were a whole | :08:00. | :08:05. | |
number of things being proposed. One of which was the ongoing | :08:05. | :08:08. | |
relationship between Scotland and England, are Scotland and the rest | :08:08. | :08:12. | |
of the United Kingdom, and the responsibility for constitutional | :08:12. | :08:17. | |
matters. It was quite clear, because it was debated at the time, | :08:17. | :08:22. | |
that it should lie at Westminster. That was what was in the Scotland | :08:22. | :08:26. | |
Act and that is what people voted for in the referendum. Moral | :08:26. | :08:33. | |
authority in this matter does lie with Westminster. The chair of the | :08:33. | :08:37. | |
Scottish constitutional Convention is writing that if the Unionists | :08:37. | :08:47. | |
:08:47. | :08:49. | ||
claimed that -- are in effect saying that only way that | :08:49. | :08:54. | |
Scotland's people can be sovereign is a through independence. That is | :08:54. | :08:58. | |
the logical conclusion of their position. It is not. My position | :08:58. | :09:01. | |
and the committee's agreement is that we want to see an agreement on | :09:01. | :09:05. | |
how the referendum should pull forward, because we believe that it | :09:05. | :09:09. | |
is in Scotland's interest to have this resolved as quickly as | :09:09. | :09:12. | |
possible. We want to have all the issues hope fully debated and | :09:12. | :09:18. | |
agreed between the two parliaments. But if it is not possible to reach | :09:18. | :09:22. | |
an agreement in the responsibility does lie with Westminster. We're | :09:22. | :09:27. | |
worried that those who face defeat in the referendum will try to spin | :09:27. | :09:37. | |
:09:37. | :09:37. | ||
this out, either through legal Now, about 160,000 people received | :09:37. | :09:40. | |
their exam results today, which means the best part of million of | :09:40. | :09:43. | |
us have been on tenterhooks on behalf of friends or family | :09:43. | :09:46. | |
directly affected. I hope it went well for you, but whether it did or | :09:46. | :09:49. | |
didn't, it's time to be considering whether the next obvious step, | :09:49. | :09:52. | |
perhaps into higher education, is necessarily the best thing for you | :09:52. | :09:55. | |
or yours. In a moment I'll be speaking to a university leader | :09:55. | :09:58. | |
with a unique point of view on all this, but first, Catriona Renton | :09:58. | :10:07. | |
reports. Right, folks, in honour of the | :10:07. | :10:11. | |
Olympics we will open the envelopes together. I will do a count down. | :10:11. | :10:18. | |
Three, two, one. Red! Is a memory that still fills the | :10:18. | :10:22. | |
many of us with dread, the trepidation of opening the big | :10:22. | :10:29. | |
envelope. It could be an e-mail or text nowadays. Congratulations. | :10:29. | :10:33. | |
Pupils at in the Clyde academy went through it in front of the | :10:33. | :10:39. | |
television cameras. This means I can say what I want this year and | :10:39. | :10:45. | |
it means I will have a basis to get a good job. It is all right for me. | :10:45. | :10:55. | |
:10:55. | :10:57. | ||
I want to go for mechanics after- school so I think I have done well | :10:57. | :11:01. | |
enough. It was like having no life. I went home and I constantly | :11:01. | :11:07. | |
studied. I did my homework. To many tears and tantrums but it was so | :11:07. | :11:17. | |
were fit, I am so proud of her. She is a star. | :11:17. | :11:21. | |
160,000 students in Scotland got their exam results today. Pass | :11:21. | :11:29. | |
rates are up again. Standard Grades are not 0.4% on last year. Highers | :11:29. | :11:37. | |
are up 1.8% to 76.9%. That is up 7% in the last 10 years. Advanced | :11:37. | :11:45. | |
tyres are also up. The Education Secretary rejected suggestions that | :11:45. | :11:50. | |
the exams are not hard enough. answer is tried exams yourself. I | :11:50. | :11:55. | |
could not pass a lot of these exams myself. I could not pass many of | :11:55. | :11:59. | |
them. I suspect that is true of you and many of us. This is hard work | :11:59. | :12:04. | |
which we should be glad of. Within the figures, some subjects have | :12:04. | :12:08. | |
suffered a fall in pass rates and others have suffered a rise. That | :12:08. | :12:13. | |
indicates that some subjects have years in which people pass and a | :12:13. | :12:17. | |
years in which people find it more difficult. What we are seeing is | :12:17. | :12:24. | |
good work in Scotland's schools. these students in Kilmarnock know | :12:24. | :12:27. | |
today is about celebrating their achievements. Where do these exams | :12:27. | :12:33. | |
really lead? Getting a job is not that easy. | :12:33. | :12:40. | |
Youth unemployment has reached an all-time high, almost one-quarter | :12:40. | :12:46. | |
are out of work. Statistically if you want to get a job, it still | :12:46. | :12:51. | |
appears to be the right thing to do to get a degree. 90% of graduates | :12:51. | :12:54. | |
that left university last year are either in paid employment or | :12:54. | :13:01. | |
further studies. Only 7% are assumed to be unemployed. When you | :13:01. | :13:04. | |
drill down deeper into those statistics, of those working, | :13:04. | :13:08. | |
around one quarter are only doing part-time hours and a significant | :13:08. | :13:12. | |
proportion are doing jobs that traditionally would not be | :13:12. | :13:15. | |
considered to be graduate jobs. This young entrepreneurs started up | :13:15. | :13:20. | |
his own business when he was 13 and he has now 22. He says higher | :13:20. | :13:27. | |
education is not the answer for everyone. Any body that once to run | :13:27. | :13:31. | |
their own business themselves, doing it is better than anything | :13:31. | :13:35. | |
else. We all make mistakes but they are the same mistakes were the have | :13:35. | :13:40. | |
the education or not. University does not know how to teach you how | :13:40. | :13:44. | |
to handle a customer or how to sell, these are skills you have to learn | :13:44. | :13:48. | |
on the job. University is great if you want to be a specialist in a | :13:48. | :13:51. | |
particular field but if you want to go out and be an entrepreneur, | :13:51. | :13:57. | |
there is not a lot you can study. If you're not ready to start your | :13:58. | :14:01. | |
business then education is great but if you were at this stage I was | :14:01. | :14:05. | |
that way you want to get out and do it, there is no benefit to it at | :14:05. | :14:10. | |
all. Perhaps that is just it, one size does not fit all. The Scottish | :14:10. | :14:16. | |
government has guaranteed every 16 to 19-year-old can get a place in | :14:17. | :14:21. | |
training and there is a helpline to give them a hand. | :14:21. | :14:26. | |
The Open University in Scotland has seen a rise of almost 50% in the | :14:26. | :14:34. | |
last five years in applications from students under 25. I'm joined | :14:34. | :14:37. | |
now by Dr James Miller, who's director of the OU in Scotland. | :14:37. | :14:41. | |
What do you think is behind the figures of the under 25 increase? | :14:41. | :14:45. | |
There is a multitude of factors contributing to this. Undoubtedly | :14:45. | :14:50. | |
there is the increasing competition in campers based universities which | :14:50. | :14:55. | |
is one of the factors. More and more young people are looking at | :14:55. | :15:00. | |
the opportunity of going into employment and combining that with | :15:00. | :15:03. | |
higher education study, through distance learning opportunities | :15:03. | :15:08. | |
like those at the Open University. We have seen that dramatic increase | :15:08. | :15:15. | |
over the past five years. Has what people want to study the change? | :15:15. | :15:19. | |
What is attracting people at the moment? Because of the flexibility | :15:19. | :15:22. | |
of the courses that are offered by the Open University, it offers a | :15:22. | :15:29. | |
wider choice. Over the years, these have remained broadly the same. As | :15:29. | :15:35. | |
well as offering the discipline, specific content knowledge, steady | :15:35. | :15:41. | |
inflexibly part-time also gives additional benefits to students, so | :15:41. | :15:45. | |
they can demonstrate to employers their resilience, timekeeping, the | :15:45. | :15:50. | |
ability to apply their learning in real life, as opposed to studying | :15:50. | :15:55. | |
and then moving into employment at a later date. Clearly this works. | :15:55. | :16:02. | |
The Open University has returned the highest levels of student | :16:02. | :16:05. | |
satisfaction in the National Student Survey since it started in | :16:05. | :16:09. | |
2005. No other university has been able to achieve that. A what a | :16:09. | :16:13. | |
drop-out rates like? He it is very difficult to identify drop-out | :16:13. | :16:18. | |
rates because of the way in which people learn. Some people can learn | :16:18. | :16:21. | |
over three years or more and some will take 12 years to complete a | :16:21. | :16:26. | |
degree. It is as flexible as it needs to be. You think that is a | :16:26. | :16:30. | |
strength of the system? It is because it allows students to adapt | :16:30. | :16:33. | |
their steady to their lifestyle which might be about employment but | :16:33. | :16:39. | |
it might be about other things. We have a number of students who are | :16:39. | :16:43. | |
currently competing in the Olympics and the Paralympics to have | :16:43. | :16:47. | |
combined that lifestyle with their study. If depending on the subject, | :16:47. | :16:51. | |
how valuable -- how valuable is higher education? I think it is | :16:51. | :16:55. | |
very valuable. What employers are looking for is very many of the | :16:55. | :17:00. | |
graduate qualities that higher education produces. Of course that | :17:00. | :17:05. | |
can be done in a variety of ways. The piece was mentioning their that | :17:05. | :17:11. | |
we have a very diverse sector which produces a very diverse set of | :17:11. | :17:15. | |
graduates which is good for the economy and it is good for Scotland. | :17:15. | :17:19. | |
Do you think you have an advantage where we have concerns about | :17:19. | :17:23. | |
graduates coming out and being overtaken by subsequent graduates | :17:23. | :17:26. | |
and the employers will one the ones closest to graduation, do you have | :17:26. | :17:33. | |
more flexibility in that system? Absolutely, they can adapt their | :17:33. | :17:40. | |
subject choices as well. It is about Rees killing. Thank you very | :17:40. | :17:42. | |
much. Now a quick look at tomorrow's | :17:42. | :17:46. | |
front pages. So Chris Hoy is everywhere. The | :17:46. | :17:51. | |
Daily Mail is liaising with Chris Hoy triumphing again. He is | :17:51. | :17:58. | |
Britain's greatest ever Olympian. He is also on the front page of the | :17:58. | :18:02. | |
Scotsman. The Guardian also have Britain's golden games, the biggest | :18:02. | :18:07. | |
gold medal haul since 19 oh wait. The Herald is going its own way | :18:07. | :18:12. | |
with the sports tycoon Mike Ashley who is buying a stake in Rangers. | :18:12. | :18:17. | |
That's all from me. If you want to see the programme again it's on the | :18:17. | :18:19. |