John Swinney clashes with BBC’s Kaye Adams over ‘constant interruptions’

The First Minister appeared on BBC Radio Scotland on Tuesday morning, where host Adams asked him what people “have to do to tell you that they don’t want independence”.

It comes ahead of this Thursday’s General Election with Swinney previously saying that the SNP winning a majority of seats will trigger a process of negotiation with the UK government to bring about Scottish independence”.

Swinney told Adams that he believed the main issue was that people should have the choice to decide on Scotland’s future.

He said: “In 2021, we were told to go away and get a parliamentary majority in favour of an independence referendum if we wanted to demonstrate support for independence.

“We went away and we got that and that parliamentary majority exists today and I simply want it to be respected so that the people of Scotland who elected the Scottish Parliament in 2021, gave it a majority in support of a referendum on independence, should have the opportunity to now see that delivered.”

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As Swinney continued speaking, Adams interrupted to ask what would happen if the SNP lost a “stack of seats”.

The First Minister again replied to say: “What it means is I want the democratic views of the people of Scotland to be…”

Adams again interrupted to ask if the result on Thursday “means nothing about independence”.

At this point, Swinney (below) replied: “Well, wait a minute Kaye. We’re not gonna get very far if you’re just interrupting me all the time.”

The host replied to say she had seen people interrupting each other in leaders’ debates and that “seems to be the way to do it”.

Swinney hit back and said: “Well I think it’s pretty purposeless to be honest. I don’t think the public like it.

“I think the public are fed up with the constant interruptions so let me just set out my view.

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“You asked me a question which was how do people express their view about independence. I think they should express that in a referendum.”

He added that Scotland was promised the UK would retain its EU membership if people voted No in the referendum in 2014 but that this was no longer the case due to Brexit.