the general election as a de facto referendum. in other words, if you or you and perhaps other pro independence parties can win more than 50% of the vote in a general election, you would take that as a mandate to open negotiations with westminster over scotland leaving the united kingdom. so she does that first and then she says, we re going to have a special party conference to decide whether that s a good idea. that s a bit odd, isn t it? i think the uk set up is pretty odd, to tell you the truth. so, first of all, you are right, we are going to have a conference about this. but why announce the policy first and then have the conference later? see, this is what i m going to come on too, right? so we will have the conference eventually, because there are a wide range of arguments for what election should be used and the best way to do it. it sounds a bit messy. of course it s messy and the reason it s messy is because the snp and the scottish government have been elected numerous time
i am just being clear that that is your view that is what you think. well, i mean, it would be crazy to say that compared with, say, a couple of years ago, we re experiencing strikes and we weren t then. the difference, of course, is not only going through covid and all of that but, primarily, the increase in inflation. i suspect that if we hadn t seen inflation spike as it did because of putin s war in ukraine, the energy prices and, therefore, the inflation that has followed it, i don t suppose we would have this industrial action. that s not to say. so you accept that it is worse now than it was, say, a month or two months ago? to say strikes aren t worse than they were, of course, wouldn t be true. yeah, because the impact on people s, you know, lives and livelihoods through high inflation is having a bigger impact. let s talk about the whole idea of minimum service levels, or minimum safety levels this idea that it is put into law that there is a baseline provision of a servic
are not sitting in whitehall, but government is shifting itself out of london as well. so i mean, i agree with the idea that, you know, the country, the closer you can govern to people, the better. but in the end, we are one nation. you have got to collect the money somewhere. decisions have to be made somehow and actually, i do think the west midlands has done superbly well under andy street and long may it last. well, something that is happening all across the nation, it is strikes, isn t it? i mean, we have seen, what, nurses, teachers, paramedics, civil servants all out or heading out in the coming days and weeks. this industrial relations problem is getting worse, is it not? yeah, look. fundamentally, i think we have to kind of recognise that things are tough and things are tough because putin invaded ukraine and pushed up the energy prices and has pushed inflation. worse? you said yes.
front that s going to drive in this milder air. so, a south westerly wind starts to kick in to northern ireland and scotland for the start of the weekend. that will bring milder air with it, a rapid snow melt, as well, at times. you can see to greet us first thing on saturday morning 3 or 4 degrees here, but across much of england and wales, still temperatures below freezing. it s going to be another cold, frosty start. lots of sunshine around across england and wales on saturday but the cloud will push in through scotland, northern ireland, maybe north west england, and there ll be some showery outbreaks of rain not really amounting to too much but a difference with the feel of the weather, 9 or 10 degrees here, maybe temperatures around 3 7 across england and wales. still that weather front creeping in for the second half of the weekend but the far south east corner may well cling onto that colder air throughout the whole of the weekend, so it s a slow process. certainly on sunda
quite an interesting day, i think. you know, knocking on doors and you were taking on douglas alexander. of course, you won. and you go to the house of commons and you are what they call, and i bet you don t like this, the baby of the house. but that s what they call it, the youngest mp. how old were you? 20? 20. right, and now you re the deputy leader of the party at westminster. it s a journey, isn t it? it s a big question but what s that been like? it s all downhill from here, you know! i ve peaked too soon. what was the start of that journey like? being so young. i don t mean to be, i really don t mean to be. no, you re not patronising at all, not at all. ..patronising. it s unusual. definitely. so, honestly, the answers that i gave when i was 20 were true. it was a case that i became impassioned by the independence referendum. i was knee deep in policy and politics and of course, we lost the referendum and i thought, we ve not put in this amount of work