25/01/2016 Scotland 2016

Stand by for 100 days of campaigning until the Holyrood election -

But is the winner a foregone conclusion?

And how will the parties play the expectation game?

As the Syrian crisis worsens, with no end in sight,

the first peace talks in two years have been delayed

because of tensions over who would be invited.

We'll hear from our correspondent in Switzerland.

And on the bard's birthday, the Makar has her say.

I definitely would not like to have been married to Robert Burns, I will

tell you that. Does a poet look for inconsistencies? No, we look for

someone who can express so many facets of mankind and womankind.

Good evening and welcome to the programme.

You may be anxiously awaiting the lighter nights and drier days

so you can pound the pavements for your favourite party.

Or you might be slumped on your couch, complaining that

Whatever your view, there are 100 days of campaigning to go

Huw Williams takes a canter through Scotland's parties.

Riding high in the polls after the general election, the SNP the

concourse to repeat or even better than their unprecedented performance

at the last Holyrood ballot. The SNP have to worry about

complacency and the expectations that have been built up that they

will win even better than they did in 2011, and of course, that they

will go on to govern and deliver a great deal for Scotland. So there

are some real challenges ahead for the SNP, especially given the

expectations that are building up that they will have a very easy ride

in these elections. Today Labour were talking education,

they also seem to be managing down expectations, so that however bad

the results are, they can be presented as some kind of recovery.

The danger is that after this election is over the viewership will

be challenged and the party will be seen to be dead in the water and so

on, and that can only be in the short to medium term or long term

very bad news for the Labour Party. They have to lower expectations and

see that they know this is coming and expect to do badly. That can

create a mood within the party in terms of affecting campaigning which

would hurt the Labour Party. Today the Tories presented the

findings of their tax commission. They have taken a high-risk strategy

of talking up their chances. Could the Rooney takes second place?

Parties that talk up their position are usually doing so because they

want to get attention and that they are not marginalised. In the

election the constitution will be on the SNP and Labour parties of the

Tories have to get noticed. Talking up their support is one way of doing

that. There are fierce danger is that you talk yourselves up and feel

to deliver, that can be damaging. -- feel.

The Greens are talking big as well. They claimed they could do well. The

Greens tend to get overexcited. In past elections even after they were

over and the counting had begun, the Greens had gone onto the television

telling everyone they would come out with more seats and that has not

always happen. I am not sure it quite got there and I am not sure

they have the resources to do that. But you cannot fault them for trying

to talk up the support, it is inevitable for a party that is very

much a small part on the margins of politics.

The Lib Dems meanwhile, don't seem to know how to talk about what they

are hoping for after the election in the month of May.

They have got to get a hold into that parliament. They know they are

heading for a bad election. They are not even talking up or down their

support, the, I think, are focusing on the constituencies that they hold

and hoping they can win through and have some representation in

parliament, which they are always certain to have but it will not be a

good election for them. Opinion polls suggest this is a

foregone conclusion but last week all stars had to concede they called

the general election wrong, so is it really that simple?

I am joined now in the studio by Margaret Curran, a former Labour

MP and Shadow Scottish Secretary, who was defeated in the general

And in our Edinburgh studio we have Alex Bell, a former adviser

to Alex Salmond, and Andy McIver, a former Scottish

Good evening to the view and thank you for joining us. You might help

to make people's' mind up. Alex Bell, first, how does the SNP manage

expectations? Jim Mitchell in that report said that in some ways a

majority is unexceptional given the poor ratings but in some ways it

could be exceptional, another huge majority?

It is exceptional when you take into account the electoral system that we

have and the way that parliament was structured. The big problem for the

SNP is giving people interested. If it appears to be a foregone

conclusion they have to worry about people not coming out to vote.

Usually they can rely upon their supporters to come out because there

is that passionate side to them, that sense that there is a cause

which has to be one. But if the party makes it very clear it has

conned down the taps on independence and that makes it clear that it is

good to win this election with a landslide, its main problem is just

getting people out to cast the votes that they need.

It must be very difficult for strategists to look at these poor

ratings coming in. That is an enviable position to be in but in

some ways perhaps it makes strategy a little tricky.

Let us not talk up the problem too far. Any party would like to think

it is going to go into an election possibly winning 73 seats. I do not

think the SNP is in anyway panicked or alarmed by this and as we are

probably about to get onto, the SNP is by far the best party on offer to

the politicians and the voters at this particular election, it just

looks better, it is more efficient, it is more confident and what is on

offer. The issue of this election is what the other parties will do to

try and start their mark. Scotland needs much more of the political

debate, much more of a marketplace of ideas. It is not good for

Scotland that the SNP will walk this election.

Equally, it is not for the SNP to get too worried late at night.

Margaret Curran, Alex Bell says the SNP would more efficient and

confident, the better party all around. What can the Labour Party

do? I agree with Alex that it is not good for Scotland for one party to

dominate as such, even though I would end the debate that they have.

We have to have better ideas about the future of the country.

But we are used to sing the Labour Party being dominant.

Indeed. One important thing is that we get the electorate how serious

our problem is and that we need short-term change and long-term

change. I have been thinking long and hard about this over the past

few months. This is accumulative and has come over many months and years

and we have not addressed fundamental problems in the past and

I think now we have to start to do that. We have a terribly bad habit

of defining politics in relation to ourselves rather than in relation to

the issues that the country faces and I think at the last election as

some of the research, and there is not enough of it in Scotland, but

some of it shows we did not have a coherent narrative to speak for a

strong, assertive and inspiring Scotland and we have to do some of

the serious thinking that will get us there, because I still think it

is only a centre left perspective that is connected to Britain and the

rest of the world that will begin to get us that kind of analysis and

answers for people's lives. There's Kezia Dugdale the right

woman to do that strategic thinking? I would not put it all up on her

shoulders, she has to work with other people and it is a deeper

movement issue, the movement must think long and hard and stop the

internal conflict and think more strategically than we have currently

clearly been doing. I think Kezia Dugdale is a subtitle character, or

emphasis on the positive, or emphasis on new, competent and

committed candidates, new readership will begin to make the difference.

We need to make the difference before the month of May but it is a

longer term challenge than that. Andy McIver, emphasise the positive,

that is what the Scottish Conservatives are doing this time, a

different tactic from the steady as she goes approach of the past,

looking to overtake the Labour Party this time around.

That is not as different as we might be led to believe. It is not the

first time that the Conservatives at the election have talked up their

prospects. I remember the 2010 general election we talked up the

prospect of getting 11 seats and ended up with one. It is not the

first time it has happened. That said, it is fair to say that the

stars are aligned for the Tory Party more than they have been for quite

some time. That is partly because of what you have asked Margaret Curran

Abbott, the reality is from a mainstream classical perspective,

the Labour Party have left the field because of Jeremy Corbyn's election

and that has made it difficult for Kezia Dugdale to put any individual

stamp on it because she has been obliged to form -- to follow Jeremy

Corbyn into some areas, many of which are not vote winning policies

in England or Scotland. What that has done is create a bit of a gap

for the Conservatives in the New Labour centrist week to take some

votes. That said, the big test remains for the Tories as to whether

the brand can advance in that way, you know, Ruth Davidson is

connecting with people in a way that other readers have not been able to

do. Our personal ratings are relatively high and she has

performed well. Andy McIver, looking at the general

election result, the Conservatives got 15% or less than that of the

share of the vote. That is what I am seeing, the

problem for the Tories is that... We have seen this movie many times

before whereby the party will speak up their prospects and things might

look like they are going well but the opinion polls also looked good,

but everything suggest that a party advocating policies for example low

tax, very popular policies of choice, schooling, things like that,

should do well, but they do not do well because of the party label that

is attached to them and the big question for the party as, Abbey

over that now as a nation? Are we overheating the Conservative Party

will be never get over that? That is a different question to and and will

only be absurd in the of May. Alex Bell, if the opposition are

trying to land tips on the SNP, where are the weak points for the

SNP? I am sorry, I have spent years in a

position of a minority party that it is just so good to be the main

party. I am not sure that is the question, to keep engaged in this

election campaign, we must ask ourselves with the new ideas are.

We're looking for the Labour Party and the Tories to bring those ideas,

they have not mentioned them yet, and frankly, that is too great. I

agree that in the next 100 days perhaps Kezia Dugdale and Ruth

Davidson can make a super new and packed and come out as stars, more

than they are, but so far I just do not know what the position of the

Labour Party is on the constitution. I do not know what it is on some of

the key social issues and for that matter I am not sure what the

position of the Tories is either. How can the Labour Party

successfully attacked the SNP? It sounds like you can't at the moment.

It is to do with life circumstances and we need to share the political

narrative that way. One of the big things that will happen in Scotland

in the next humans is the impact of cuts to local government. That is

where despite, you know, the words that begin from the SNP, their deeds

are key task different and if Kezia Dugdale can expose that she could

get into some fertile territory, because if you look at what is

happening in the UK and England predominantly, and look at what is

happening in Scotland, there is a strange par like developing with the

analysis is that the people that will bear the brunt for the cuts

being introduced are by far and away local government. Those are services

really matter to people. It is about the quality of life and when Kezia

Dugdale begins to look at this reality in Scotland, I have to give

the SNP aplomb for their rhetoric, but we have to look at how people

live their lives and change that narrative.

Finally, Andy McIver, we are hearing this debate about cuts, but actually

the Tories are going in a different strategy with talks to -- cuts to

taxes. Tax cuts are popular, this is no

secret, people have this concept that Scotland is radically different

to every country in Europe and that we don't vote for parties that

advocate low taxes, this is not true. Most of the time you will have

a social Democrat party which used to be labour and is now the SNP and

incidentally that is the big problem for Labour, the territory has been

taken by other parties so they are not the obvious replacement any more

and usually countries have a party of the Centre or centre-right that

advocate things like low taxes. Therefore the normal thing in

politics or a country to have a party like the Scottish Conservative

Party but in other countries this party is generally much more popular

and breaks 30 or 35% of the vote. The big test... The question at

issue is not the policies of the Tory Party, they are popular

policies, we test is probably will be voted for by the people because

it is the Tory Party. Alex, you are shaking your head.

Huge amount of respect to my colleagues, should The Big Issue is

actually this is what life is like in a neoliberal state. Rather,

voters want low taxes and things to be managed well and that is what the

SNP are doing. Broadly, the reason why the Labour Party and the

Conservatives cannot get into the argument is because the SNP is doing

all the things that the Labour Party and the Tories want to do.

We have run out of. Thank you all for joining us.

Peace talks between the warring parties in Syria, which were

scheduled to open today, have been put back until Friday.

The UN's Syria envoy, Staffan de Mistura, said the meeting

had been delayed over disputes over who should attend.

He told reporters discussions on this are continuing,

but he believed invitations would be sent out tomorrow.

The first priority will be the focus of what most Syrians, if not all,

want to see here. The possibility of a broad ceasefire and the

possibility of stopping the threat of Isil. And there for attempts to

seek a broader ceasefire in humanity in aid.

Earlier I spoke to BBC correspondent Imogen Foulkes from her home

in Geneva and asked her why there has been such difficulty

agreeing on who should be involved in these talks?

I think the key difficulty which was highlighted today at the UN was the

difficulty in the opposition deciding who would represent it. I

think one of the things that people are perhaps not quite so aware of is

just how the war in Syria has fragmented so much that there are

dozens of different groups, phone who don't disagree with each other.

As an example, I was speaking to the director of operations for the

International Red Cross. The aid agency with probably the furthest

and most prominent reach in Syria. It said going from the mask is to

let go to deliver aid, his staff had to go through 60 checkpoints of

different groups seeing, who are you, where are you going? I think

that highlight just how complex this conflict has become. So one group

gets up and says, we are the one legitimate party to negotiate with

the Syrian regime for peace. Another group will get up and say, no you're

not, it we are and we will not go to the table if you are. This is the

problem facing UN departments as they try to get talks off the

ground. A difficult situation, what hopes

for these talks, Imogen? Invitations go out on Tuesday, we

will see how this Joel excepts. The United nations are hoping to appeal

to people's pride and honour. No-one once did reject an invitation to

peace talks. It looks like quite a broad 's spectrum groups will be

invited. These are proximity talks, UN diplomats scuttling back and

forth, trying to find some sort of common ground. Sadly, not even a as

we were originally told as these talks begin, just people arriving in

Geneva and we will see what happens. Good things can start slowly, and I

think that is what a lot of people here are hoping.

Thank you. Across Scotland tonight toasts

are being made and vast quantities of haggis

are being consumed to honour Not everyone is fan of course -

but it's recognised around the world that a sheer talent that

burned bright produced his Liz Lochhead - our makar,

or national poet - paid her tribute today

with her reading of To A Mouse Weasley kit colouring timorous

beastie, what a panic is in their breast.

All good poems are relevant forever, none more so than To A Mouse. When I

was ten years old I learned it off by heart to read out at the miners'

welfare competition. I didn't do very well, I was not placed. But I

learned the poem off by heart. When I was in my 20s and liked more Bob

Dylan Heng Anna tiger bones -- Bob Dylan type Burns. Later, when my

life fell apart when my husband died, I could not read the poem

without bursting into tears and thinking how relevant it is about

how your life can be cut into, not literally by applying, like it is by

the males. But I'm thinking how relevant it is for these people who

have come from Syria. Ordinary people who have come over and left

their homes. Their homes have been literally cut through. Of course, it

is only good because it is about a real malls, that real malice that

Burns met in 1785. He was not writing to a metaphor, he was

writing to a real malls will stop. Everything has relative value, and

that is the value of poetry. Poetry relates to different people in

different ways, and it relates to the same people and different points

of their life. This poem, I think, was expressing real feelings he had

at the time. He had a feeling as a farmer, for the third time at that

point, he was wondering how he was going to feed his children. He had a

really hard life, there is no doubt about it. And that hard life happens

to belong to a great and deeply gifted poet. Edwin Nero, this

cottage:, not Edwin Morgan, that Edwin Muir, said that he was a

puritan and a unionist. To the socialist he was a revolutionary. To

the sensualist he was a love poet and a poet Poyet -- body poet. He is

a very funny body poet. He was just a man for all seasons.

SHE READS TO A MOUSE. I'm joined now in the studio

by the former editor of both The Scotsman and The Times

in Scotland, Magnus Linklater, and by Anna Burnside,

the Daily Record's feature writer. Thank you for joining me. It was a

pleasure for me to meet Liz Lochhead and hear her speak there. Magnus,

what do you make of Burns? A man for all seasons you think?

Everyone has tried to claim him. They have, haven't they? He is quite

hard to pin down. He had quite strong and radical views himself. He

supported the French Revolution, for instance. He was very daring in

private. Actually, in public, he took great care not to put a foot

wrong. He had a job working for the government as an excise man, and he

can afford to fall out with the Government. So although privately

had very strong views about freedom and liberty, in those days it was

dangerous to speak out, so he kept his head below the parapet.

Anna, he has been described as being a little inconsistent in his views,

bit it was said the other day that we can expect people to be

consistent nowadays and Twitter would not have coped with the same

consistency? He had various different

constituencies who he had to and wanted to please. He knew what he

was doing. He was immensely smart. He knew very well what he was doing

and what played well in the drawing rooms and salons of Edinburgh were

not what played so well in a bachelors club. And he moderated his

message depends on his audience. When you think about him, he was

really an incredible talent. He died at the age of 37 - all that was

accomplished by the age of 37! He really was incredibly young and

stop his poetry is of course not only brilliant poetry, it is so

diverse. It was intensely moving as well. Perhaps we should put the

politics to one side and just focus on the poetry.

I have to turn to politics, unfortunately, because it was the

Conservative tax commission who revealed a number of announcements

today. Looking for perhaps a 30% tax rate for the aspirational

middle-class. The commission is clear, they want

Scotland to be competitive, they want to grow the Scottish comedy.

Economy. We should be endeavouring to try and lower the tax burden on

people there for. I grew with that 100%.

So this commission, what do you make of this lower rate, this 30% rate?

Strangely, I found myself in agreement with the Conservatives,

which is not something that happens very often. There is a huge gap

between the cut-off point, the point at which it gone from the 20% tax

rate to the higher tax rate. The 40% tax rate comes in at ?130,000 per

year, a massive difference. The press are living at the lower end of

that as a person living a very different light to the person at the

top end. I would say there is definitely room for another tax band

in there. However, there provides the should be another tax band in

the middle but not one of the top, I am not so happy with that. I can't

see why we can't have both and have a more graduated system will stop

that doesn't seem terribly radical or controversial to me.

Magnus, new powers coming to Holyrood make this a very different

debate doesn't it? It is a real debate, isn't it? We

are talking about real changes in tax. Your other Tories now

positioning themselves for what they call the aspirational middle

classes. And that will be very attractive. They will be the only

tax cutting party. I think both Labour and the SNP, and probably the

Liberal Democrats, I tax raising parties. So it offers a genuine

choice. But also opens the Tories to some attack - where are you going to

find the cuts which will inevitably follow when you reduce the tax on

one section of the population? So, Anna comedy think this will

prove difficult for the other parties? But the voters think there

is another option here? I think the Conservatives are

looking like an attractive option to quite a lot of Scottish voters. The

polls would suggest that. Ruth Davidson presents herself very well.

I think this is just one of the issues on which voters might well be

thinking, yeah, rightly something in for us.

We are still waiting to hear from the SNP. I suppose voters like to

hear that, don't they? The thing about the 50p rate, in

Scotland, there are not all that many higher rate burners, so the

take is not all that great. -- higher rate burners. I think this is

the reason why the SNP is holding back stop because if you do tax

them, the opportunity is for people to shift the tax base away, and you

lose that source of income. It is a difficult decision to take.

Anna, we were talking about the election and the beginning of the

programme, it will be an exciting campaign when you think about it?

I think it will be a really exciting collection. 100 days to go, I'm

looking forward to it, personally. Thank you both very much for joining

me. Shelley will be back at the same

time tomorrow night. From all of us here though, do have

a very good night. Bye-bye. I have never experienced

anything like it before.