Browse content similar to 19/12/2013. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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and they were still being attended to an hour or so later. I have seen | :00:00. | :00:00. | |
a crane going up to the roof of the theatre to fix it. Tonight we have | :00:00. | :00:18. | |
had the SNP's white paper arguing the case for independence, we have | :00:19. | :00:23. | |
had a raft of documents arguing for the opposite and the result is the | :00:24. | :00:27. | |
campaigns are pretty much where they were last Christmas. What happens | :00:28. | :00:33. | |
next? What does the Yes campaign have to do to turn things around? | :00:34. | :00:40. | |
Does Better Together risk expiring out of complacency? How do they keep | :00:41. | :00:44. | |
us interested? The referendum campaign is a long one by the | :00:45. | :00:48. | |
standards of British politics and there are another nine months to | :00:49. | :00:53. | |
go. But despite campaigners working themselves into a frenzy, the polls | :00:54. | :00:58. | |
are pretty much where they were one year ago. Huw Williams examines | :00:59. | :01:07. | |
where we are at this Christmas. It is the season of goodwill, time for | :01:08. | :01:12. | |
tidings of comfort and joy and peace on earth among women and men. An | :01:13. | :01:23. | |
astounding cultural heritage... But this year has seen the referendum | :01:24. | :01:28. | |
campaign ramping up. The Scottish Government launched its White Paper | :01:29. | :01:33. | |
on Scotland's feature. But how much influence have the Yes campaign for | :01:34. | :01:36. | |
the better together campaign actually had? The latest polling | :01:37. | :01:47. | |
figures published today show a continuing shift towards voting yes | :01:48. | :01:52. | |
for independence. That is a trend that has been going on for the last | :01:53. | :01:57. | |
few months, but there is a stub when third to say they do not know how to | :01:58. | :02:02. | |
vote. Today's survey shows awareness of the Scottish Government's white | :02:03. | :02:10. | |
paper was very high amongst the over 55s, but lower amongst younger | :02:11. | :02:14. | |
voters. But not many people who knew about it said it would change the | :02:15. | :02:20. | |
way they would vote. The novelty is softening and they are tending to | :02:21. | :02:25. | |
move towards no as they do not know. There is a lot of work from both | :02:26. | :02:28. | |
camps to win the people back for the No campaign or for the Yes campaign | :02:29. | :02:35. | |
to win people back. How should they sell themselves to consolidate their | :02:36. | :02:41. | |
support and went over the undecided? The Yes campaign has got positivity | :02:42. | :02:46. | |
on its side. It is all about the future, potential, things that could | :02:47. | :02:51. | |
and might happen and that is quite attractive, quite seductive. But | :02:52. | :02:57. | |
that can tip over into recklessness. They have got an emotion they can | :02:58. | :03:02. | |
build on. The advantage of the No campaign has is that most people are | :03:03. | :03:07. | |
risk averse. It is very difficult to launch new products and open up new | :03:08. | :03:12. | |
sectors in the market and it is very hard work. People like what they are | :03:13. | :03:17. | |
familiar with. It is worth remembering next September is still | :03:18. | :03:23. | |
nine months away. We have had arguments on both sides so far. With | :03:24. | :03:27. | |
the release of the White Paper that will start things off a bit more and | :03:28. | :03:33. | |
once we get into 2014 it might concentrate minds a little bit and | :03:34. | :03:38. | |
make people take it more seriously. The campaign will ramp up at that | :03:39. | :03:44. | |
point in time as well. The No campaign are quite a long way in | :03:45. | :03:47. | |
front and that is where this momentum starts to become much more | :03:48. | :03:52. | |
interesting. In a marketing sense if your message was not getting across, | :03:53. | :03:58. | |
you would not want to push too hard and too fast. You would hold back | :03:59. | :04:02. | |
and keep your reserves in store and let them loose later on in the | :04:03. | :04:08. | |
spring or the summer of next year. Spring is an important time in the | :04:09. | :04:12. | |
Highlands when shooting estates Brendan Moore is to benefit the | :04:13. | :04:17. | |
grouse. Perhaps next year it will also be the time when the referendum | :04:18. | :04:21. | |
campaigns start to set the heather alight. I am joined by the former | :04:22. | :04:26. | |
Scottish Government adviser Alex Bell and by the art critic and | :04:27. | :04:31. | |
commentator Joyce McMillan and in Glasgow the lawyer and labour | :04:32. | :04:36. | |
activist Ian Smart. Alex Bell, we were told the White Paper was going | :04:37. | :04:41. | |
to be the game changer and all our questions would be answered. It has | :04:42. | :04:45. | |
not quite worked out like that, has it? It has in the sense we have a | :04:46. | :04:52. | |
clear position, a point of view from which people can argue and that is a | :04:53. | :04:57. | |
strong thing for those in the Yes campaign. It is a heartening | :04:58. | :05:00. | |
campaign to go to the doorstep knowing that you have 650 questions | :05:01. | :05:06. | |
that have been answered. It is heartening to people in the campaign | :05:07. | :05:10. | |
that they feel this great sense that the other side has not defined what | :05:11. | :05:15. | |
they are about. We still do not know what is so good about the UK. In | :05:16. | :05:20. | |
that sense it has moved things along and it has given the campaigners | :05:21. | :05:25. | |
some kind of courage to go further on to more doorsteps. The White | :05:26. | :05:32. | |
Paper was one of the issues you had with the leadership of the SNP. What | :05:33. | :05:36. | |
do you think it should have done that it did not do? The analysis the | :05:37. | :05:42. | |
Scottish Government is putting forward is not sufficiently | :05:43. | :05:45. | |
compelling all the way to independence. A lot of what is in | :05:46. | :05:49. | |
the White Paper could be achieved with some form of Devo Max. When it | :05:50. | :05:55. | |
refers to the full ranges of the state, it does so in quite a | :05:56. | :06:00. | |
speculative way. If you look at its promise of the early years, then | :06:01. | :06:05. | |
what you get is a pledge about more childcare hours, but then some | :06:06. | :06:09. | |
speculative paragraphs about how you could link up welfare, tax and other | :06:10. | :06:14. | |
things. If you are selling independence, that is the bit you | :06:15. | :06:19. | |
want to flog much harder. You want to say, give me all the powers and I | :06:20. | :06:25. | |
can conspire a tax, welfare and other systems, such that it is a lot | :06:26. | :06:33. | |
better off in Scotland. Ian Smart, you would agree with a lot of what | :06:34. | :06:39. | |
Alex Bell has just said? The overwhelming element of the Yes | :06:40. | :06:45. | |
campaign is how inept it has been. If you go back to the original | :06:46. | :06:49. | |
message of the Lord, that decisions are best taken by the people in | :06:50. | :06:53. | |
Scotland, that is a very powerful message. It is not necessarily easy | :06:54. | :07:01. | |
for us to deal with. But they are building up these ragtag | :07:02. | :07:10. | |
lunatics... This is on the margins. You presumably would agree with Alex | :07:11. | :07:16. | |
Bell that your opponents would have had a better case had they outlined | :07:17. | :07:21. | |
some of the things he is suggesting? I think they would have | :07:22. | :07:26. | |
done better if they had started with we are in favour of independence and | :07:27. | :07:30. | |
that is a blank sheet of paper that Scotland can do whatever it likes | :07:31. | :07:35. | |
with. But most of this policy stuff is costly and it makes it look like | :07:36. | :07:42. | |
a hopeless leap of faith. Do you think it should have been more | :07:43. | :07:47. | |
radical? I am often in favour of people being more radical. My | :07:48. | :07:52. | |
problem with the SNP is it has not worked out its relationship to the | :07:53. | :07:57. | |
critical phase of advanced capitalism we are at. It is still | :07:58. | :08:02. | |
trying in a Blairite wait to be all things to all people and suggest we | :08:03. | :08:06. | |
can have a social democracy without confronting some of the | :08:07. | :08:10. | |
configurations of big business that we are accustomed to in the UK. The | :08:11. | :08:15. | |
whole issue over Grangemouth was a symbol of that. A normal social | :08:16. | :08:20. | |
democracy would not have such a major energy resource in private | :08:21. | :08:27. | |
ownership, but you do not hear that kind of thing from the SNP. You are | :08:28. | :08:33. | |
not saying nationalised the top 250 monopolies? No, of course not, but | :08:34. | :08:37. | |
if you look at Governments across Europe you are not seeing major | :08:38. | :08:41. | |
energy resources in private ownership. The French Government | :08:42. | :08:50. | |
still owns 80% of EDF. They are talking about Nordic social | :08:51. | :08:52. | |
democracy on the social policy side of what they are doing, so they need | :08:53. | :08:57. | |
to be more realistic about what that means. You would have liked to have | :08:58. | :09:04. | |
seen more of the Will Hutton type ideas of changing the way that | :09:05. | :09:09. | |
private companies would be governed in Scotland, the way finance would | :09:10. | :09:15. | |
be governed, getting rid of short termism. There were ideas in there | :09:16. | :09:20. | |
about mandatory trade union representation, worker | :09:21. | :09:22. | |
representation, but they were just floated. There were lots of ideas | :09:23. | :09:29. | |
anyone on the left would find preferable to anything coming out of | :09:30. | :09:34. | |
the Labour Party at the moment. But there are still contradictions that | :09:35. | :09:37. | |
make you feel a bit uneasy and I would like to see the SNP working | :09:38. | :09:43. | |
harder at making international alliances to develop a kind of idea | :09:44. | :09:49. | |
and a series of systems that might restore to governments across the | :09:50. | :09:52. | |
western world some control over their social policy and stop us from | :09:53. | :09:58. | |
being sucked into an increasingly strange phase where multinationals | :09:59. | :10:00. | |
are almost dictating Government policy. | :10:01. | :10:06. | |
Ian Smart, if you have a theory about why that could be quite | :10:07. | :10:11. | |
dangerous for the SNP if they did what both Alex Bell and Joyce | :10:12. | :10:21. | |
McMillan have suggested. The SNP do not traditionally do well and Labour | :10:22. | :10:27. | |
areas. For the first time ever recently they did do well in those | :10:28. | :10:31. | |
areas but the bulk of the support us in rural north-east Scotland and | :10:32. | :10:34. | |
those people are not attracted to any kind of left-wing prospectus | :10:35. | :10:40. | |
involving denationalisation of utilities -- nationalisation. You | :10:41. | :10:48. | |
know, subsidising the feckless and long-term unemployed as they would | :10:49. | :10:53. | |
see it. The danger is that the SNP get tied up in this agenda and that | :10:54. | :10:58. | |
the price of chasing our vote will mean that they will lose a lot of | :10:59. | :11:02. | |
their traditional vote. That is a problem, Alex Bell, for the SNP. | :11:03. | :11:10. | |
This could play well in meetings and Glasgow and Edinburgh but the SNP do | :11:11. | :11:15. | |
have to worry about how this goes down on the streets of the likes of | :11:16. | :11:22. | |
Forfar? If you are trying to win a majority in Scotland you must choose | :11:23. | :11:29. | |
the votes that you do not have. But you must not alienate those who | :11:30. | :11:34. | |
vote for you already. That is not the case at the moment. The | :11:35. | :11:40. | |
challenge for the SNP is to win new boats and by doing so they must | :11:41. | :11:46. | |
break new territory. I think this slightly bizarre for a man as | :11:47. | :11:51. | |
engaged and understanding and raising awareness of Scotland for | :11:52. | :11:58. | |
Labour over the decades, for him to dismiss the wider debate that is | :11:59. | :12:03. | |
going on in Scotland is very strange. The referendum will be won | :12:04. | :12:07. | |
or lost, but what is happening to Scotland and the process? Where are | :12:08. | :12:11. | |
we going to intellectual a during this? What will be effect on | :12:12. | :12:18. | |
September the 19th when we looked around and ask ourselves" what do we | :12:19. | :12:22. | |
do next?" To independence you have a sense of that but there will be a | :12:23. | :12:28. | |
mass of the morning on the 19th if we can't around and said that we | :12:29. | :12:31. | |
voted no but what do we do next? Therefore at least Joyce McMillan | :12:32. | :12:37. | |
and myself are trying to engage in a nonpartisan debate which is about | :12:38. | :12:42. | |
how Scotland's leases itself in the world. You have to level is, one | :12:43. | :12:48. | |
that the SNP must win that extra vote therefore it is silly to say it | :12:49. | :12:52. | |
should avoid the west coast of Scotland and number two, all of us | :12:53. | :12:56. | |
who engage in Scottish politics must engage in a global argument. Joyce | :12:57. | :13:05. | |
McMillan looks bemused. I am amazed to hear Ian Smart dismissed some | :13:06. | :13:10. | |
sort of return to a socialist democracy to one that is so | :13:11. | :13:13. | |
left-wing that Google in the North East of Scotland will not support | :13:14. | :13:17. | |
it. You must be clear about this, it is the current British government | :13:18. | :13:22. | |
that is remarkably right wing by any kind of European standard and what | :13:23. | :13:24. | |
we are looking for in this independence debate is some way back | :13:25. | :13:30. | |
through a form of British politics or independence through a more | :13:31. | :13:34. | |
rational form of government and the interest of all of the people. The | :13:35. | :13:38. | |
crucial factor in this campaign has you can pick away at the SNP's | :13:39. | :13:43. | |
programme if people say they are getting bogged down in the details, | :13:44. | :13:47. | |
others say they cannot answer the questions, but at least they have | :13:48. | :13:52. | |
tried as imperfectly as anyone might argue, to write down their | :13:53. | :13:56. | |
prospective for a progressive programme for a future Scotland | :13:57. | :13:59. | |
under independence. The absolutely outstanding factor as... Give them a | :14:00. | :14:12. | |
chance to reply! A corporation tax cut is not social | :14:13. | :14:19. | |
democracy. Asking workers to give up active involvement in a trade union | :14:20. | :14:23. | |
is far from a progressive democracy, this is absolute nonsense! That is | :14:24. | :14:34. | |
what the White Paper says. What they are trying to do us all of these | :14:35. | :14:38. | |
things and give them to all of the people. We are focusing on the Yes | :14:39. | :14:42. | |
campaign, is the problem not that the No campaign... What is the point | :14:43. | :14:48. | |
of this Better Together campaign? In a sense what someone like you would | :14:49. | :14:53. | |
like to say presumably is that you would not want a direct debate on | :14:54. | :14:57. | |
these terms, the whole issue of independence as irrelevant, there | :14:58. | :15:00. | |
are more important things to worry about, yet the focus of the Better | :15:01. | :15:05. | |
Together campaign is to address the Yes campaign on the territory of | :15:06. | :15:12. | |
their choosing. I think opposition to independence as what unites the | :15:13. | :15:22. | |
No campaign. Is there any evidence that the Better Together campaign | :15:23. | :15:26. | |
are getting on any better than the Yes campaign? The Scottish | :15:27. | :15:30. | |
government uses JFK International Airport amounts of money to do | :15:31. | :15:35. | |
bat-mac promote an idea but the fact that the Better Together campaign is | :15:36. | :15:38. | |
doing better shows that we are doing well. That is not good enough. Let | :15:39. | :15:46. | |
me bring up an issue I discussed with Alex Salmond. There was a poll | :15:47. | :15:52. | |
in Aberdeenshire of school students who voted 75% against independence. | :15:53. | :15:57. | |
Sorry, are we supposed to believe that young people in Aberdeenshire | :15:58. | :16:00. | |
made that decision because they thought Alistair Darling or Alistair | :16:01. | :16:05. | |
Carmichael where really convincing or because they just don't see the | :16:06. | :16:08. | |
whole issue as being relevant to them? It is the latter. The point of | :16:09. | :16:17. | |
the cat -- Better Together campaign is to address the concerns that | :16:18. | :16:20. | |
people might have and to highlight their concerns and make sure that | :16:21. | :16:23. | |
the maximise their concerns to make sure that independence is finished | :16:24. | :16:30. | |
not for a generation but for ever. We are running out of time. Quickly, | :16:31. | :16:37. | |
Alex Bell, obviously the Yes campaign is a game changer. What is | :16:38. | :16:41. | |
it going to be? The Yes campaign must get its case at Ross with more | :16:42. | :16:47. | |
enthusiasm. I need more than that! I come from a Labour background. My | :16:48. | :16:52. | |
father wrote speeches for a Labour Prime Minister. I was brought up | :16:53. | :16:57. | |
around left-wing thinking and socialism. You were not going to get | :16:58. | :17:05. | |
the things you wanted from a Labour point of view and that is why I am | :17:06. | :17:11. | |
now more pro-nationalist. Briefly please, Joyce McMillan, what do you | :17:12. | :17:16. | |
think must change. Over the past year nothing much has changed is the | :17:17. | :17:23. | |
basic bones of it. If the better together campaign continues and its | :17:24. | :17:29. | |
president -- present mode, then the Yes campaign will have little other | :17:30. | :17:33. | |
to do than sit and wait for the no vote to begin to crumble because the | :17:34. | :17:40. | |
10th two mat -- Better Together campaign has failed to give us a | :17:41. | :17:43. | |
vision of a better United Kingdom. People will become increasingly | :17:44. | :17:49. | |
unable to vote for it. The negativity as shocking and there is | :17:50. | :17:54. | |
too much scaremongering, it is ridiculous. Which side are due on at | :17:55. | :18:01. | |
the moment? I am definitely leaning towards the Yes campaign because I | :18:02. | :18:05. | |
cannot stand the negativity of the No campaign. | :18:06. | :18:10. | |
You should be expected at this point to say the terrible danger for the | :18:11. | :18:15. | |
Better Together campaign is complacency but in a bombshell in | :18:16. | :18:19. | |
your latest blog you have not said that. I was having a rather end of | :18:20. | :18:26. | |
year the joke. There is no room for complacency. | :18:27. | :18:34. | |
Tomorrow's front pages: The Telegraph talks about those injured | :18:35. | :18:38. | |
after the roof collapsed in the west end theatre. Join us again in | :18:39. | :18:43. | |
January. Merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Goodbye. | :18:44. | :18:49. |