The Scotsman Bulletin Wednesday September 13 2023 #STL

The Scotsman

Transcript

00:00 Hello and welcome to the Scotsman's Daily Bulletin for Wednesday. I'm Alan Young, Deputy

00:08 Editor of the Scotsman. I'm joined today by our political correspondent Rachel Emery to

00:12 take a look ahead to the day in Holyrood. Hi Rachel.

00:17 Morning.

00:18 Let's have a look at the front page first. And we lead today on the drugs deaths again.

00:26 There were new figures out yesterday that showed that suspected drugs deaths were actually

00:33 on the rise again, running at 100 a month. And that is while there's a continuing debate

00:40 around the idea of a safe drug consumption room pilot in Glasgow, we picture on the front

00:48 there the dejected Andy Robertson after England's win at Hampden last night. We don't need to

00:55 say any more on that, I don't think. So Rachel, let's look ahead right away to what's coming

01:01 up at Holyrood and should be another big day with the thorny issue of short term lets on

01:09 the agenda.

01:10 Yes, it's the debate that the Scottish Conservatives are bringing forward this afternoon. Our Deputy

01:16 Political Editor, Clare Matchett, will actually be at Parliament today to sit in on that debate

01:20 and hear what actually happens. But basically, this is a new scheme the government's introduced

01:25 where everyone who has a holiday let, whether it's a full property or just a spare room

01:30 they have on Airbnb, for example, they have to have a licence for that. And the deadline

01:34 to apply for that licence is coming up soon on the 1st of October. Now, those who want

01:40 this scheme in the government say that not only will it help to regulate this industry,

01:45 but it will also help to maybe free up some housing as well, because we know that there's

01:49 a bit of a problem, particularly in areas like Edinburgh and the Highlands, where there

01:53 is just such a saturation of these holiday lets, it becomes difficult to rent or buy

01:58 a house if you actually live there. So those on that side say that's going to help. On

02:03 the other side of things, though people are warning it could have a really negative impact

02:07 on the tourism industry, I think the Association of Self-Caterers, they've said that two thirds

02:12 of businesses could shut down as a result of this as well. So that's kind of the two

02:16 sides of the debate at the moment. Should there be a licence or should there not? Now,

02:20 the debate this afternoon from the Conservatives is asking for the scheme to be paused. So

02:24 not necessarily thrown out altogether, but paused because there's so much sort of complaints

02:28 about it and so much sort of unrest between those in the industry. It was also quite interesting

02:34 last week, there was a demonstration outside the Scottish Parliament from those campaigning

02:40 against this legislation being brought in, people who had holiday lets and things like

02:44 that. I saw a few of them outside, quite a lot of anger there. I think a lot of them

02:50 were sort of going a bit far as well with their messaging saying that it shows that

02:53 Holland's a pogrom parliament and things like that. So I'm not sure that messaging is particularly

02:58 helpful to their cause, but that happened last week as well.

03:01 Yeah, but, you know, despite the anger, and there's clearly a lot of anger in the industry,

03:08 I've seen reports of this is the end of the B&Bs, for instance, which may be an exaggeration,

03:16 but it clearly demonstrates the amount of feeling there is in the industry. The Scottish

03:23 government, though, have been pretty firm on it and not showing any sign that they're

03:28 going to budge.

03:29 Yeah, so I've spoken to people in the SNP and sort of in the government at Holyrood,

03:34 they're very much saying that this is just regulation, this is just a licence, this is

03:38 not anything more than that. So they're very much just saying, look, it's not going to

03:42 change very much at all, it's just going to provide a bit more regulation and a bit more

03:46 sort of security in the housing market. So they're very firm on that point, yes.

03:50 So we expect the Tory debate this afternoon and subsequent vote to fail, clearly, because

03:57 the SNP and Greens have the numbers, but there will be quite a lot of interest in it, and

04:04 particularly what one SNP rebel does.

04:07 Yes, this is Fergus Ewing here, very well known names in the SNP movement and the MSP

04:14 for Inverness and Nairn. And he's very recently, in recent months, got this sort of title of

04:19 rebel backbencher, because he has spoken out on a number of government policies recently,

04:25 including short-term lets. Now, the reason that we're wanting to watch this one quite

04:28 carefully is, I don't know if you remember, back in June, there was a vote of no confidence

04:32 in the Green minister, Lorna Slater. And in that vote, Fergus Ewing voted against the

04:37 government and went with the Conservatives instead, which, I mean, that's really not

04:42 the right thing to do. It has been described as a very serious matter by the first minister.

04:46 At that point, there was widespread speculation that he would be suspended from the SNP for

04:51 doing that. Now, that didn't happen at the time, we think probably because his mother,

04:56 Winnie Ewing, ended up dying very shortly after that vote took place.

05:01 So we're now a few months down the line, and we're still in a situation where he's not

05:05 been suspended, but there's still the speculation that he will, and that's been ramped up in

05:08 the last few days. Now, the reason that we're quite interested in this debate is because

05:13 he has spoken out against short-term let licensing before. We're kind of expecting him to do

05:17 that again today, which will be another example of him speaking out against the government,

05:22 and surely will just add fuel to the fire of those who are calling for him to be suspended

05:26 from the SNP. So it'll be really interesting to see what he does in this debate and what

05:31 the fallout of what he does will be as well.

05:34 Indeed, and that debate happens this afternoon?

05:37 Yes, this afternoon.

05:39 Great. Please do follow it live at scotsman.com throughout the day. If you are on the site,

05:46 please also subscribe if you can, and then you will not miss a thing. If you're out and

05:51 about today, please do also pick up a copy of the paper, despite the result last night

05:56 from me and from Rachel Edds. Bye for now.

05:59 Bye bye.

06:00 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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