Scotsman Politics: FMQs Review - Thursday January 11 2024 - video Dailymotion

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Scotsman Politics: FMQs Review - Thursday January 11 2024  Scotsman Head of News Dale Miller and Political Editor Alistair Grant look back on FMQs

Transcript

00:00 (upbeat music)

00:02 - Hello and welcome to the Scotsman's Politics Show.

00:10 We're doing a wrap of First Minister's Questions.

00:14 The 1st of 2024, it's gonna be a general election year

00:18 and we can look forward to some fiery ones ahead.

00:21 Alistair, it was no surprise

00:24 that the Post Office Horizon scandal was leading FMQs,

00:29 but something that caught my attention

00:31 right towards the end was an update on XL Bully Dogs.

00:34 - Yeah, so this was Humza Yousaf

00:38 essentially confirming that Scotland

00:39 will follow England and Wales

00:41 and introducing restrictions on XL Bully Dogs,

00:44 an effective ban on the breeds.

00:46 Obviously people can still own them

00:48 if they apply for this kind of licensing scheme

00:50 and walk them with a muzzle and a lead,

00:52 but a ban for all intents and purposes,

00:55 for headline purposes, he's following

00:57 the kind of England and Wales measures on this.

01:00 And I think it's particularly notable

01:01 that it's taken the Scottish government

01:03 quite a bit of time to get to this position,

01:06 despite the fact that it seemed almost inevitable

01:08 for people looking on,

01:10 and I think even speaking to people

01:11 behind the scenes in government,

01:12 there was an acceptance that they would need

01:14 to do something about this

01:16 when England and Wales introduced their own measures.

01:19 I think it was at the start of January.

01:21 Ever since that time, we've had stories

01:23 of XL Bully Dogs being brought across the border

01:26 into Scotland, we've had an acceptance

01:28 in the government that they had seen an influx

01:29 in the breed, there's been all sorts of concerns

01:31 about the impact that might have,

01:34 both in terms of safety of the children,

01:38 perhaps, and families that are taking these dogs

01:40 into their home, but also on the treatment

01:42 of the dogs themselves when they come to Scotland,

01:45 where they're going, who's purchasing them.

01:50 There was just, it was almost inevitable

01:51 that the Scottish government would need to act.

01:53 And even as recently as Friday last week,

01:56 Humza Yousaf was saying that he didn't think

01:59 there was a need for a ban in Scotland

02:00 because there was already a strict regime in place,

02:04 but now they've clearly gone back in that

02:06 and they have realised that they had to do something

02:08 and the inevitable has happened

02:10 and they've followed England and Wales.

02:12 - Just on that, Alistair, 'cause I wanna pick a bit at it

02:15 because we had it on the front page of Saturday Scotsman,

02:18 Humza Yousaf said later on Friday,

02:22 "Look, we have no intention at this stage."

02:24 Then six days later, he's saying,

02:27 "We're gonna go ahead with the ban."

02:29 It doesn't seem like a great look

02:31 for the Scottish government,

02:32 and it's maybe not the first time in recent weeks

02:34 where they've lost out, for want of a better word,

02:37 to the direction of the UK government.

02:39 Do you think it's an issue?

02:40 - I mean, as I say, I think he just had the sense

02:44 of inevitability about it.

02:45 You're right, I'm afraid he was saying,

02:47 I mean, he was saying that they were keeping this

02:48 under review and he was saying it wasn't

02:49 the kind of final position, but he was saying

02:51 he didn't think there'd be a need for a ban.

02:53 We've obviously gone back in that.

02:54 Their position has always been that you've got groups

02:57 like the SSPCA, you've got groups that deal

03:00 with animal welfare that don't like the idea of a ban,

03:03 that are against it for various reasons,

03:06 not least kind of welfare issues.

03:08 There's obviously a lot of problems a ban creates,

03:11 particularly when it's introduced in the way

03:12 that it has been introduced.

03:14 But I think when you've got a situation

03:16 where people can easily just cross the border

03:18 into Scotland, and there was this kind of narrative

03:20 developing that Scotland was, you know,

03:22 quote unquote, a safe haven for exiled bully dogs,

03:25 whether or not that was the case,

03:27 it was just clear the Scottish government

03:28 is going to have to do something.

03:30 It has been a bit of a surprise that it's taken them

03:32 this long to get to this stage.

03:34 I think particularly when you've got Siobhan Brown,

03:37 the community safety minister in the Scottish government,

03:40 who I think was tweeting things last week

03:43 or in recent times anyway, basically against the idea

03:47 of banning a breed.

03:48 So, they've had a kind of confusing narrative around this.

03:51 And as I say, it's not a surprise

03:53 that they have eventually ended up in this position.

03:55 - Alistair, on the post office we had late yesterday,

04:00 Hamza Yousaf confirmed in a letter

04:02 to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak,

04:04 that basically all those sub postmasters

04:08 committed in Scotland would be cleared.

04:10 But the direction of travel today,

04:12 and it's slightly complex,

04:14 if our listeners want to know more about it,

04:17 please read Alex Brown's explainer

04:20 on the post office scandal at scotsman.com.

04:23 But effectively, the Crown Office was used to prosecute

04:26 here in Scotland.

04:27 Now that was picked at a bit today in FMQs

04:30 and there were calls for the Lord Advocate

04:33 to stand up and answer questions.

04:34 Can you explain a little bit about what that was about?

04:38 - Yeah, so obviously this is on the,

04:39 all of this kind of post office arising scandal

04:41 has been bubbling away in the background

04:43 for a number of years,

04:45 but it's kind of been thrown back into the limelight

04:47 on the back of this ITV drama,

04:49 which has very much humanized the issue

04:50 and made it into a huge political issue.

04:53 And we obviously saw Rishi Sunak coming out and saying,

04:55 well, they were going to introduce primary legislation

04:57 to effectively exonerate people involved in this.

05:01 Hamza Yousaf keen that Scotland follows suit,

05:04 but as you say, it's quite complicated this,

05:08 because obviously Scotland has a separate legal system.

05:11 While the post office was prosecuting itself

05:14 then in England and Wales,

05:15 in Scotland those prosecutions were being led

05:17 by the Crown Office.

05:18 And so it was Douglas Ross,

05:20 Scottish Conservative leader,

05:21 Anna Sarwar, Scottish Labour leader,

05:23 both going on this today,

05:24 they're picking apart different aspects of it.

05:27 Douglas Ross, basically trying to get to the bottom

05:29 of what the Crown Office knew and when.

05:31 So they were obviously,

05:33 and there's been stories very recently about this idea

05:36 that they had kind of been told

05:38 that there were potential problems

05:39 with the horizon system in 2013.

05:42 And prosecutions, I think I understand,

05:44 still went on after that,

05:46 but the Crown Office is saying that effectively

05:48 they were not prosecutions,

05:50 the horizon was part of the key evidence.

05:52 It's a very complicated situation.

05:54 And MSPs, the two party leaders effectively calling

05:57 for the Lord Advocate, Dorothy Bain, to come before MSPs.

06:01 She's obviously Scotland's top law officer

06:03 to answer questions on this.

06:05 I think it seems like she is willing to do that.

06:08 So I think we should expect that to happen.

06:11 But Douglas Ross, there are serious questions to answer

06:14 for the Crown Office.

06:15 And it's effectively, she's going to run and run.

06:18 - Alistair, I do think it's incredible.

06:23 You've seen the airing of the documentary

06:25 and by effectively Wednesday of this week,

06:28 commitments to clear all the people prosecuted

06:31 in these cases, a clear indication

06:33 of when there's political impetus behind an issue

06:36 about how quickly you can get a result.

06:39 Look, you can read all about the developments from FMQs.

06:43 We ran a lot of blog that's available at scotsman.com

06:46 and all the latest will be at the politics tab.

06:50 You'll find it in the navigation bar on the homepage.

06:53 Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter,

06:55 and you can read the very latest

06:57 in our print edition of the Scotsman Tonight.

07:00 Thanks to you, Alistair,

07:01 and thanks to all our listeners for joining us.

07:04 (upbeat music)

07:08 (upbeat music)

07:10 you

Scotsman Politics: FMQs Review - Thursday January 11 2024

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