The Scottish Independence Podcast

For the 60th episode of the Scottish Independence Podcast I spoke with John Robertson.

John is the academic that recently published extensive research showing that the BBC has been favouring the No side in the Scottish Independence debate.

The story however did not end there as the BBC began a series of, well, sleekit manouevres to play the man and not the ball. This resulted in, amongst other things, his appearance in front of a committee in the Scottish Parliament at which certain members seemed determined to continue the defamation.

We talked about the research, the aftermath and John's more general opinions on the media and why Scotland should be an independent country.

My dog Marvin also made his first appearance on the podcast, throwing in his tuppence-worth in the introduction.

Hope you enjoy.

LINKS

http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/
https://twitter.com/mgreenwell
http://www.newsnetscotland.com/index.php/scottish-opinion/8679-uws-academic-responds-to-bbc-scotland-criticism-of-indy-news-study
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8cZ04MeEAw
http://twitpic.com/dxqtsx

The 59th episode of The Scottish Independence Podcast is with architect Alasdair Stephen.

We talked about the contents of that lecture and some of the continuing mistakes in the fields of procurement and others that continue to cause problems in Scotland.

Also, you should hear what he once wanted to build as a monument to Scottish Labour!

Hope you enjoy…

For the 41st episode of the For A’ That podcast Andrew and I were joined by broadcaster and blogger Derek Bateman, former Socialist MSP and member of Women For Indy, Carolyn Leckie and writer and blogger William Duguid.

First we talked about the Sturgeon/Lamont stramash. At the risk of going against one of the things we thought was bad about it, was the real knockout blow actually delivered to the political process itself? Is it too simple just to say it was awful and move on? Were they both equally guilty? Do we (or well, the media) need to start using alternative formats.

Secondly we talked about the recent activities of the Tory government who seem to have been going round businesses begging them to say something negative about independence. Should we just be a bit stronger and tell them where to go?

Another topic was the Women for Indy project and the report it is going to publish shortly. Carolyn let us know what the main problems and outcomes were, and how much work there still is to do in this area.

We also got on to the crowdfunding stories in the last week. Amazing, certainly, but why has this phenomenon started to gather pace and can we be sure the money is going where it's needed most?

There is all that and more in the new episode.

Hope you enjoy.

LINKS
http://www.womenforindependence.org/
http://derekbateman1.wordpress.com/
https://twitter.com/mgreenwell
https://twitter.com/carolynleckie
https://twitter.com/PeatWorrier
https://twitter.com/WomenForIndy
http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/
http://lallandspeatworrier.blogspot.co.uk/
http://williamduguid.blogspot.co.uk/
https://twitter.com/WilliamDuguid1

Sorry for the truly dreadful title but the 58th episode of The Scottish Independence Podcast comes from a recent Yes Leith/Edinburgh North West Event, and thanks to them for letting me reproduce it as a podcast.

It took place last month and the speakers were, in this order, Fiona Hyslop the Scottish culture secretary, Robin McAlpine from the Reid Foundation (here's his new-ish blog too), Michelle Thomson from Business for Scotland and Colin Fox from the SSP (and he's got a rather good line in his bit).

The question and answer session at the end is also worth listening to.

Hope you enjoy

LINKS
http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/
https://twitter.com/YesENL
http://www.businessforscotland.co.uk/
https://twitter.com/MichelleThomson
https://twitter.com/FionaHyslop
https://twitter.com/colinfoxssp

This is another one of those "No comment, you'll have to listen" episodes.

"Like Wonga.com on steroids".

The 56th episode The Scottish Independence Podcast is the second of the presentation-type podcasts that I've put out this week, next time we'll get back to the interviews.

This time the presentation comes from Business for Scotland and features former guest on the podcast Ivan McKee, who I'm sure you've been seeing on TV recently, and Michelle Thomson.

The presentation is called The Economic Case for Independence, and that quote with Wonga.com at the start was not referring to Scotland's prospects.

It's quite a long episode so you might want to divide your listening into sections.

Hope you enjoy.

LINKS

http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/2013/08/08/the-scottish-independence-podcast-29-ivan-mckee/
http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/

The 55th episode of the Scottish Independence Podcast is the first of two that aren't the usual interview format but rather some talks that are taken from here and there and will provide both useful information for campaigners, and I hope some enjoyable listening.

This one comes from an event a few weeks back in Kirkcaldy and the speakers were Alistair Bruce, who is involved with Yes Kirkcaldy, Ross Ingerbergson who is a communications director for the SNP, Robin McAlpine who is the director of the Reid Foundation (I also interviewed him here) and writer and former BBC journalist Lesley Riddoch, who, apart from the excellence of the talk itself, in this speech deals admirably with a heckler (I also interviewed her here).

It's quite long so you might not want to listen to it in one go but I'd recommend that even if you do it all in parts, you try to get through it.

Also thanks to Two Thumbs Fresh Productions, for letting me reproduce it.

LINKS
http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/
http://www.cmonscotland.org/
https://twitter.com/ReidFoundation
https://twitter.com/LesleyRiddoch
https://twitter.com/mgreenwell
https://twitter.com/YesKirkcaldy
https://www.youtube.com/user/twothumbsfresh?feature=watch

No comment, you'll have to listen.

For the 40th episode of the For A’ That podcast Andrew made his return and we were joined by Anne Donohoe and Kenny McQuarrel, who is the Director General of BBC Scotlandshire.

David Cameron's speech of the other day was a topic, and the love-bombing he proposed therein. Also, Salmond's fiery reaction to it was worthy of note.

The equal marriage bill has passed, and about time too say most of us but we had a look back at the road to getting to this position.

We also talked about the SNP's continuing difficulties on the justice brief, particularly, but not only, with regard to the proposed corroboration reforms.

Lord Lang's comments were also worth a mention.

Finally, due to safety considerations relating to the threat of Cybernattery against the DG of BBC Scotlandshire, he was forced to join in the conversation from inside a concrete bunker 30 feet underground, and the resulting loss in sound quality could not be helped.

Hope you enjoy…

LINKS
http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/
http://lallandspeatworrier.blogspot.co.uk/
https://twitter.com/mgreenwell
https://twitter.com/SovereignSadie
https://twitter.com/PeatWorrier
http://www.bbc.scotlandshire.co.uk/

It's the 53rd episode of The Scottish Independence Podcast and this time I spoke with William Duguid who on his own blog and for National Collective, has been writing some of the funnier stuff we've been seeing recently.

In fact, that was one of the points of discussion, as we ruminated over Rory Bremner's assertion that there isn't enough comedy in this debate.

William lived down (very) south for a long time so we also talked about the gap (well, chasm) between what is actually going on in Scotland and how it is perceived in that place where people are going to be calling us all from soon.

We also talked about William's reasons for supporting Indy.

Finally, although we didn't have wind of Cameron's attempt to boost the Yes vote by 10 percent at the time we recorded, Love-bombing got a look in.

Hope you enjoy…

LINKS

https://twitter.com/WilliamDuguid1
https://twitter.com/mgreenwell
http://michaelgreenwell.wordpress.com/
http://wingsoverscotland.com/to-a-grouse/