“Turmoil” in the SNP
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 11 February 2021
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The prospect of independence for Scotland may never have been brighter for the SNP. Elections to Holyrood are due in May and the party has promised to seek a new referendum on independence if it gains a majority. Yet, at the same time, a prominent SNP MP concluded this week that the “turmoil” within her party was “unprecedented”. Others have talked about the “fight to the death” that’s currently being waged between supporters of the leader, Nicola Sturgeon and supporters of her predecessor, Alex Salmond. The feud has its roots in a government investigation of Mr Salmond in 2018 that led to him being charged with a number of sexual offences. A jury cleared Mr Salmond on all counts in a trial last year. So what’s going on in the SNP? How can it be so apparently popular while being so deeply divided? And how might this affect its chances of realising its ambition of an independent Scotland?
With BBC Scotland editor, Sarah Smith,; journalist Dani Garavelli; and Professor of Politics at Strathclyde University, Sir John Curtice.
Producers: Tim Mansel, Sally Abrahams, Kirsteen Knight Editor: Jasper Corbett
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:06.7 | Welcome to the briefing room with me, David Aronovich. |
| 0:09.6 | We have 28 minutes to understand a big issue of the day and the top experts to help us. |
| 0:15.6 | Better get on with it. |
| 0:17.1 | In this edition, there are big ruckians inside Scotland's governing party, the SNP. |
| 0:22.6 | What's going on and how does it affect the party's campaign for independence? |
| 0:31.6 | The Scottish National Party has always been known for running a tight ship. |
| 0:40.4 | But not anymore. |
| 0:41.8 | This week, one of the party's most senior Westminster MPs, Joanna Cherry, wrote about it being in a state of unprecedented turmoil. |
| 0:50.1 | And this, as the polls suggest, the S&P and its leader, Nicola Sturgeon, |
| 0:57.1 | are ahead in the run-up to May's Scottish elections, |
| 1:00.4 | elections which could well decide if the Scottish Parliament will ask for another independence referendum. |
| 1:03.5 | So this week, I want to understand what's going on inside the SMP |
| 1:07.3 | and what effect it might have on the future of Scotland |
| 1:10.4 | within the United Kingdom. Step inside the briefing room and together effect it might have on the future of Scotland within the United Kingdom. |
| 1:12.3 | Step inside the briefing room and together we'll find out. |
| 1:18.3 | In some ways, this story begins in 2017. |
| 1:22.3 | Joining me first in the briefing room to take a machete to the apparent jungle of complexity |
| 1:26.5 | is Sarah Smith, the BBC Scotland editor. |
| 1:30.5 | Sarah Smith, can you just remind us how close Alex Hammond and Nicola Sturgeon were? |
| 1:36.7 | They were really close personal friends as well as political allies, and that's not always true |
| 1:42.1 | even with people in the same political party, but they were. He went out of his way to make sure that she succeeded him as the leader. |
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