Tag Archives: bernard ponsonby

Caron Lindsay

WATCH: Two very different interviews for Willie Rennie

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 24th April 2016 - 4:51 pm

Scottish Lib Dem Leader Willie Rennie faced two very different interviews this week. The first was with STV political editor Bernard Ponsonby.

Willie said he thought we were going to grow because of our record as the strong liberal voice and because of our positive, uplifting plan for Scotland with its transformational investment in education and investment in mental health.

Before he was able to talk about all these plans though, he faced quite a grilling over coalition mistakes (he said the Bedroom Tax was one which should never have happened) and over Alistair Carmichael (he said he would still vote for him despite his mistake, which was an aberration and out of character for the Orkney & Shetland MP).

Ponsonby gave him a really hard time over tuition fees in Scotland. Liberal Democrats were responsible for their abolition, against coalition partner Labour’s wishes. He tried to make out that us supporting the Graduate Endowment – which was not a tuition fees, which didn’t go to pay for lectures or learning but simply to enable more students from disadvantaged backgrounds to go to university – and then voting to abolish it (when circumstances allowed) was inconsistent. Willie managed to get across that the Liberal Democrats had been the drivers behind free education.

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 2 Comments
Caron Lindsay

STV report talks up Tory chances in seats the party has written off

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 20th February 2015 - 11:55 am

The Scottish Conservatives meet in Edinburgh today for their Conference. The other day, the STV political correspondent filmed with them and talked up their chances in seats like Argyll and Bute and West Aberdeenshire. He can’t have realised that those seats are among five Lib Dem seats in Scotland that appear on the list of seats that the Tories are not targeting in Scotland as Mark Pack reported last week.

The Tories have also written off their chances in Edinburgh West, Ross, Skye and Lochaber and North East Fife.

Shetland MSP Tavish Scott described the Tory leak as a “letter of surrender”:

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , and | 5 Comments
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