Scotsman Bulletin Thursday 22 May

The Scotsman

22/05/2025

Transcript

00:00hello welcome to the scotsman's daily video bulletin for this thursday my name is dale

00:14miller i am deputy editor of the scotsman and i'm joined by our westminster correspondent

00:19alexander brown alex good morning um again going to talk shortly about well what the subject of

00:27the scotsman's front page today is which is the winter fuel payment uh cut u-turn so kia starma was

00:36challenged once again uh it feels like there's been discussion over this issue for months and there

00:42has been evidence that it has been impacting this labor government at the polls as well and so kia

00:49starma giving the first firm indication yesterday during prime minister's questions that there would

00:55be a new partial u-turn or rollback it's wanted to make the winter payment available to more

01:01pensioners uh that obviously led our front page and uh prince william the duke of rothsay was also in

01:08leaf yesterday our front page picture and there's a story that you can read on the site from jane

01:14bradley from that visit alex just on the winter fuel payment why now is the question it's been months

01:21since they uh actually announced they were cutting fuel payments and means testing for millions of

01:27pensioners why yesterday did we hear that there might be a partial u-turn i think it's worth noting

01:32this is probably not because it's the right thing to do financially or for the economy i mean so much of

01:38labor's rhetoric has been around taking those tough decisions and hoping that people come along with

01:43them such as on such things like the two child benefit cap which broadly the public support uh and

01:48so labor have kept it but on this it wasn't just the battering of the local elections where reform

01:54swept the councils and took many mayors it's also you got polling uh i think at the end of last week

01:59or maybe the beginning of this one which showed that actually kistama his popularity is at a record

02:03low so is the uk governments uh and labors uh among the uk population and they're just very very

02:11unpopular at the moment they are not in the position where they should be as a government uh and the

02:16messaging has been all over the place to be frank uh you know we can if you look at what's going on

02:22inside downing street there have been numerous changes uh with communications and head of strategy

02:27and lots of different people moving in and out and this revolving door of members of staff so i

02:33you know labels say this isn't panic and it's recognizing where the public are and actually they can

02:39find other ways to make that saving and they didn't realize the brunt of it and they've listened

02:43but i think the the problem is a lot of people will go well the damage is done you're only not

02:49doing it because you couldn't get away with it and it looks like political opportunities are now to say

02:53well we won't do it but only because you didn't like it uh it's and it's sort of a partial you said

02:58like we don't we don't know the full extent of it so we don't know what i think the threshold will

03:02probably go up a little bit but that doesn't necessarily mean that everyone who was did qualify for

03:07winter fuel payment will suddenly get it back and it does show yet again we have a uk government

03:12that follows pensioners uh over everything else alex um we know up here in scotland that the

03:19scottish government has committed to um some sort of winter fuel payment up and above obviously it's

03:25devolved here so uh john swinney announced that by saint andrew's day there would be a payment

03:31varying between 100 pounds to 300 depending on circumstances it'll be interesting to see whether

03:37there's some sort of graduated payment like that that is introduced but so kia starmer said nothing

03:43will be announced until the next fiscal event which is autumn which is still months away uh

03:50is that an issue for the government that um it's still potentially a significant period of time before

03:55they outline what um action they give it to well i mean there's there's two arguments for that i mean

04:01firstly it's not winter for a while right so they can get to a bit later in the year without having

04:07without creating that uncertainty some people say well i want the uncertainty now i want to know

04:11do i need to be start saving now do i not need to be spending this much because i will have

04:15you know i'll need to spend more of my uh my heating uh when winter comes around but the uk

04:20government could probably rightfully argue well actually it's not gonna be cold for a while you don't

04:24need to do that yet and we will see how the economy develops uh so i don't think it's problematic but

04:33i do think it shows a confused thinking in downing street they can't say we've got a plan we're sticking

04:38to it they will try to argue well you know we are reading everything we're making sure across all the

04:44details and we're going to do what's best but they've already done an unpopular thing and not fully

04:49announcing you're on undoing the unpopular thing isn't going to give them the bump in the polls

04:54and popularity that they desperately need at the moment alex um just on uh live news from today

05:00uh so far there's a high court judgment ruling on the chagos islands that's uh another speed bump for

05:07the government can you feel yeah so uh it's two women from chagos islands have brought a i brought a

05:14legal battle uh against signing off the deal which would see britain uh lose sovereignty of the uh

05:21of the islands the tories have really opposed it uh and actually it's really interesting because i

05:26the uk government what at least labor who had not suffered these uk got these uh high court defeats

05:32and same with the conservatives so often did around issues such as uh rwanda so it's it's a blow there

05:38and also the timing of it they thought they were signing it way it was supposed to be signed today i mean

05:43there's a morning email that goes out from politico uh which said you know we're all expecting by you

05:49know today the main event will be starma signs uh the agreement and actually this late injunction i

05:55think it came through in the early hours has essentially meant the whole the whole ceremony

06:00pomp and circumstance the deal is now on ice uh and legal battles have to be prepared so it's more money

06:06that taxpayers will have spent on a legal battle or the uk government for a decision that many people are

06:12unhappy about uh i don't know what the ramifications are of this to be honest because i think for the

06:17broader public they don't really care but we i think it is important from a security issue uh the uk

06:23government have said that it's really important to you know not no longer be the custodians of the area

06:30uh for you because it helps with defense bases and agreements but that's more complicated when tories

06:36just saying you're giving up lands that we consider to be british so yeah i'd imagine there'll be a lot of

06:41places to fall out through the day you can read uh stories around the two issues we've discussed

06:47the winner fuel payment uh partial u-turn and the ruling on the chagos islands and what it might mean

06:54going forward at scotsman.com if you ever can't find our politics tab coverage there is a politics tab

07:00in the navigation bar uh available to access from the main home page uh you can uh follow us on all social

07:07media channels and we'll have a new print edition of the scotsman to pick up at your newsstands

07:13tomorrow which will also cover uh details of the meeting of the scottish police authority uh today

07:20where chief constable joe farrell is addressing several thorny issues uh the latest coverage um in

07:27the paper and on the scotsman website throughout today alex thanks to you and thanks everyone else for

07:32joining us

Scotsman Bulletin Thursday 22 May

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