Hello and welcome to Trigonometry. I'm Francis Foster. I'm Constantine Kissen. And this is a show

for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people. And a fascinating guest we have

for you today. He's returning to the show for the second time. Scottish historian, TV presenter,

Neil Oliver, welcome back to Trigonometry. Oh, thank you very much for having me, Jens. It's good

to see you both. It's good to see you and to have you back. Listen, since we last spoke,

we talked mainly about history and the pandemic and things like that. But there's been a lot going

on in your country in Scotland. I lived there for many years and I have no idea what's going on.

And we were just looking at it going, we need someone to explain it to us. And here you are.

Oh, my goodness. Well, in the beginning, the earth cooled.

I'm part of it for me. I would say right right from the top, you know, you say my country of

Scotland. And of course, I was born and I live in Scotland. But the whole thing for me is

underwritten by the fact that my country is Britain. That is, and that's not a, or it never used

to be a political statement. I was born well 54 years ago. And just quietly without any particular

reason by Osmosis or whatever absorbed an understanding that I was British born in Britain.

And it's, it's very important to me that that situation prevails. Apart from anything else,

I'm often characterized as being anti-Skottish independence. In truth, I'm not actually anti-

anything. First and foremost, I am just for the United Kingdom of Britain because that's where I was

born. And that nationality is my, is part of my identity. And I simply refuse to have any group of

politicians here today, going tomorrow, strip me of what I understand to be my nationality and

replace it with another without my consent. And so, yes, there's a great deal happening up here

on account of the, the Scottish government in the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood.

And I am, I am confused and dismayed by, by a lot of it. But my stance isn't always has been

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