Tag: IndyLive Radio

Craig Berry talks about the SNP Commonweal Group

GlasgowP4Indy 1 Comment

Julia Laurie, convenor of Edinburgh & Lothians P4Indy group, writes:

This is from our first meeting of 2021, and the year has not started well, with bad weather, rising Covid numbers, not to mention the end of the Brexit transition period with the awful consequences for Scotland becoming immediately apparent. So it’s good to get together again with our local members..

One of our members suggested that we invite Craig Berry. P4Indy does not support any individual political party, but whether you are a member of the SNP or simply lend them your vote, we do need the party to achieve our goal, and certainly need to know of developments within the party. So I decided to ask Craig. He responded very quickly, quite delighted to have the opportunity to talk to us, and I am very glad he did, as it was a really enjoyable meeting. You can listen to it here:

Pensioners for Independence
Pensioners for Independence
Craig Berry: SNP Commonweal Group
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Background …

Craig started by telling us a little about himself, and how he came to set up the SNP Commonweal group. He is a fervent believer in the Common Weal think-tank aims and he wants to bring as many of these aims directly into the SNP, with the aim of trying to influence policy-making.

We had a great variety of questions from our members:

  • is there too much centralisation within the SNP,
  • are policies agreed at Conference by the members taken forward,
  • Do you think we can persuade the SNP to make the election in May a plebiscite?
  • How do you endeavour to engage with SNP policies?
  • What do you think of the Salmond/Neal recovery plan?
  • how we can influence the party,  which made the meeting very interesting, and indeed fun.

Overall, it was a very good meeting, and our members who were able to join, really enjoyed it. Craig comes over as a forward looking, passionate young activist, and boy, do we need plenty of them! I do hope you enjoyed listening to this recording.

At our next meeting….

… to be held on Tuesday the 9th February, we have Dr Kirsty Hughes, Director and Founder of the Scottish Centre on European Relations speaking to us. She has published extensively, including books, reports, and policy papers, as well as contributing to a wide range of national and international media outlets. Her research focus has included: the UK, Scotland and Brexit, EU democracy, the politics of the Eurozone crisis, the EU enlargement to central and eastern Europe, and Turkey’s EU accession process. Kirsty spoke to us in November of 2019, and much has changed since then, so we are very much looking forward to this meeting.

Two Closes, a Referendum & Much More

GlasgowP4Indy

Continuing our Podcast Series, this is part 2 of the interview with Mary McCabe on IndyLive Radio. It was recorded on 18 Dec 2019 with Val Gauld and Marlene Halliday.

In this one we cover :

  • how Mary came to write her novel “Two Closes & a Referendum”
  • was the referendum really as divisive as it is sometimes described?
  • what was meant by “once in a generation”?
  • Sir John Curtice’ recent views on Scotland going forward
  • writing letters to newspapers
  • when is a mandate not a mandate?
  • post-general election how are we feeling?

Here it is. It may take a few seconds to get loaded up. Patience is a virtue 😀

P4Indy Goes Live!!

GlasgowP4Indy 1 Comment

This is me, Marlene, on IndyLive Radio last week. I was a bit nervous about doing it but Norrie was very good at getting the ball rolling and keeping it rolling! Once I got into my stride, I really enjoyed it. I asked Val Gauld, our Glasgow Twitter person, along as well. As you can see she was tweeting as I was speaking. She joined in the chat, too.

Norrie asked me about how P4Indy got set up. Then I had lots of time to tell his listeners about our AGM, about our push to help new P4Indy groups get off the ground and the funding we have for doing that, about the street stalls we run in and around Scotland, and about the Warblers, our concert party.

I also talked about the low numbers, only about 1 in 4, of over 65s who supported Yes in the 2014 campaign, some of the factors involved in that, and how we might engage with those. It does seem from recent polling done at the end of 2018 that more of our age group are coming round to Yes and it’s more like 1 in 3 support independence. Still some way to go and as I said to Norrie, it’s to help push that figure up that I joined P4Indy.

In the Broomcupboard Studio…

The hardest question Norrie asked me was what song track I wanted to play as we took a wee break from speaking. I’m not much of a pop music fan but I lived through the 60s and 70s so I settled for a Beatles’ track. I suspect Norrie was humouring my very old choice! After that I got to present that week’s community announcements from The National. And I got to announce the “Walloper of the Week Award” which last week went to Labour MP Paul Sweeney for his rather over the top response to ScotGov’s wee video about us being open and welcoming country. He thought it was “smarmy, saccharine, bourgeois tripe”. If you want to find out what else the man said and what responses he got, look here.

They call their studio The Broomcupboard! Aye, it is pretty wee. I liked it but it must be hard for Norrie and Kevin to work there all the time. Kevin showed me a bigger space in the same building that he hoped to be able to move to. And I hear that has now gone ahead. These guys are working on a shoestring when it comes to funding. If you can help them with a few spare pounds, please do. This is their website: IndyLive Radio