General Election 2019 - AND IT’S LIVE!

[Sir Tarmo Kink]

Sturgeon is comfortably the most genuine and most capable leader standing for a party in this election. Do you disagree with this?

I’m not an SNP voter but I’d agree, not that it’s hard though.

[alta-pete]

Sturgeon is comfortably the most genuine and most capable leader standing for a party in this election. Do you disagree with this? SHE COYLD MAYBE CLAIM TO BE THE LEAST SMELLY.

There are some very credible criticisms of the SNP: health getting a lot of headlines IT IS, AND RIGHTLY SO. but education is another one AGREED. and ultimately they're always going to struggle on the economy CORRECT. - because independence will be a bit of an economic earthquake IT WILL BE , hopefully only a short term one. ONLY 10 YEARS APPARENTLY?

But she handled those attacks tonight reasonably well, DID SHE, AYE? despite being understandably flustered. FIRST TIME IVE SEEN HER GET BLOTCHTY TO BE FAIR.

Sorry m9 but for the first time in years she’s come up against a non-deferential interviewer without a mortgage.

[Ned Nederlander]

19 minutes ago, alta-pete said:

 

Sorry m9 but for the first time in years she’s come up against a non-deferential interviewer without a mortgage.

 

I've seen a lot of this on Twitter tonight,  I think she's scrutinised and criticised more than most UK politicians - she just generally handles scrutiny extremely well.

The AN interview went as I'd expected and I think over the week we'll see that the FM handled it better than most - each point in the NHS 'steamroller' at the end would have been answered had sufficient time been given but again that's what he'll do to them all over the week

(I think, although I may  be wrong, that he went with dirty water being the cause of the recent heartbreaks!?)

[HeartsOfficialMoaner]

Brexit benefits in 50 years. 

[Ira Gaines]

40 minutes ago, alta-pete said:

 

Sorry m9 but for the first time in years she’s come up against a non-deferential interviewer without a mortgage.

The very definition of an "aye but" answer to get more attention.

Another one to just ignore.

[RavyDavy]

That AN interview was an absolute car crash for Sturgeon.

To be fair, she stuck to her guns but has gone down fighting.

At least she doesn't flip flop like others but they'll be hurting tomorrow morning at SNP HQ over that one.

Can't see any cause for complaint about the way the interview was conducted - all the questions were justified. I expect the same treatment for the rest of them and it's about time. They've all had it too easy for too long, hence the absolute mess that we are in now.

[JamieThomas]

Been reading a lot on Twitter that independence is now over, Sturgeon is finished and the SNP are destroyed after the interview. Who's everyone voting for now, lads?

[BawWatchin]

4 hours ago, JamieThomas said:

Been reading a lot on Twitter that independence is now over, Sturgeon is finished and the SNP are destroyed after the interview. Who's everyone voting for now, lads?

As a life long independence and SNP supporter, I was absolutely disgusted by that performance. So much so, I've burned all my SNP and indyref 2 gear. Ripped all of the posters off the wall. Popped all of the yellow balloons and it's going to take a shit load of windex to get those feckin stickers off the windows.
 

 

In saying that.... i'll probably flip back again after the Boris interview.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

Decimation of our local hospital - on her watch.
Cancer treatment targets missed - on her watch.
Overall treatment targets missed - on her watch.
Edinburgh sick kids hospital likely to be 9 years late - her watch as health minister and first minister.
Glasgow taken into special measures thanks in no small part to a state of the art hospital that can't keep its water clean - see a pattern here?
 
It's never the SNPs fault though. It's always Westminster. Or it's a problem they're in the process of fixing. Or, like the utterly reckless investment in Prestwick and BiFab, never questioned at all. There comes a point when the SNP record on areas like health or on big spend items has to be scrutinised and under anything like robust scrutiny they've been a monumental failure.

The only pattern I see here is SNP Baaaad. It's as if you have been waiting a long time for this interview, so now you have it.

The SNP Government does not have a blame-free record and Sturgeon is not the Messiah. But like Churchill said about democracy, when you consider the alternatives....

And we'll never really know just how much they have mitigated the worst excesses of austerity and the intro of UC, not that the haters would afford them any credit anyway.

Come back in five or ten years time, when the grave of Scottish self-determination has been fully danced on, and tell me just how bad this present time was. You might be surprised.

[Paco]

Sturgeon was floundering at parts last night and anyone not devoted to the cause could see that.

I suspect it’ll be much the same for the other party leaders, including Johnson because Neil is an obnoxious c**t to everyone, but that should be no real comfort. As ever with these things I doubt many, if any, are watching and deciding how to vote as a result, which is about the only positive Sturgeon can take from that.

[Mastermind]

It is but it's allowing the unionist press to score cheap points on areas.not affected by this election and as such is a subversion of democracy.  The same way the likes of Scottish Labour campaigning on health and education in this election is too.

Unionist press [emoji23]

The only reason he asked the question, and dished out an absolute telt to Sturgeon, was because she’d brought the NHS up in relation to Trump.

And only once in the clip of the NHS question doing the rounds on Twitter did Sturgeon actually try to speak. Is Neil just meant to stop mid-question every time Nic speaks?

The usual victim mentality from the minority.

[BawWatchin]

1 minute ago, Mastermind said:

 

Unionist press

The only reason he asked the question, and dished out an absolute telt to Sturgeon, was because she’d brought the NHS up in relation to Trump.

And only once in the clip of the NHS question doing the rounds on Twitter did Sturgeon actually try to speak. Is Neil just meant to stop mid-question every time Nic speaks?

The usual victim mentality from the minority.

No. But generally when you're doing an interview, you're supposed to stop after each question to allow an answer to follow, not quickly rush onto the next set of questions while the person you're interviewing is still addressing the first question.

[Mastermind]

As a life long independence and SNP supporter, I was absolutely disgusted by that performance. So much so, I've burned all my SNP and indyref 2 gear. Ripped all of the posters off the wall. Popped all of the yellow balloons and it's going to take a shit load of windex to get those feckin stickers off the windows.
 
 
In saying that.... i'll probably flip back again after the Boris interview.

I’m sure you’ll be dressing up your dug in a tartan coat and donning your See You Jimmy hat for the next Janey Godley or Tommy Sheridan marches.

[BawWatchin]

1 minute ago, Mastermind said:

I’m sure you’ll be dressing up your dug in a tartan coat and donning your See You Jimmy hat for the next Janey Godley or Tommy Sheridan marches.

All the while, you'll be sitting at home, snots and tears all over your butchers apron as it dawns on you that it's all over.

[Dunning1874]

8 hours ago, alta-pete said:

Sorry m9 but for the first time in years she’s come up against a non-deferential interviewer without a mortgage.

 

It’s natural to an extent for anyone to look for their own opinions and prejudices to be confirmed when watching political interviews. Even if you’re only doing it subconsciously, someone who is anti-Tory watching a Boris Johnson interview starts from a position of wanting him to look bad, if they support them they’re wanting him to look good, and the same applies to every party. When things don’t go the way they want to, people will often then point at the interviewer or audience before concluding it’s just down to that individual’s own performance - they’ve either been caught out by bias (the immediate post-programme Tory line about the QT audience the other night) or it’s a soft interviewer giving an easy ride if you don’t want to accept someone you dislike has done well.

People who aren’t complete obsessives should be able to switch this off a bit, otherwise you end up with everyone drinking their own kool aid and you’d get Lib Dems insisting that Swinson actually did well the other night. Someone who supports the SNP should be able to accept that Sturgeon got rattled last night regardless of broadly agreeing with her answers or what you think of Neil as an interviewer, while someone who hates them should accept that while she didn’t do as well as her usual performances it was still nowhere near a Swinson level car crash.

To argue though that Sturgeon hasn’t ever faced tough questioning from the media in years is just an absolutely ridiculous position to take. The SNP face by a distance the most media scrutiny in Scotland. They’ve been the party of government for a decade so that’s natural to an extent, and that expected scrutiny is then further heightened by the majority of newspapers having an explicitly pro-Union editorial stance. The reality is that Sturgeon usually deals comfortably with that scrutiny because she’s usually very composed under pressure and handles the media far better than any other party leader does, not because there’s a pliant media fawning over the SNP.

[pandarilla]

The very definition of an "aye but" answer to get more attention.
Another one to just ignore.

Not a clever move Andrew wells. It results in you only hearing the voices that agree with yours.

[Dons_1988]

It didn't go very well for Nicola Sturgeon.

I don't like Neil's style but he will treat the other leaders exactly the same, it's how he interviews everyone.

He made some fair points/asked fair and relevant questions but think half an hour simply isn't enough time to address some meaty issues, plus he really does talk over people's answers which is unhelpful. I think he treats it like an argument he's trying to win as opposed to just getting information from people. As I say, that isn't anything personal towards Sturgeon, it's just what he does.

I would be interested to hear the long form answers to some of those questions.

 

[Old Pack]

[Paco]

He made some fair points/asked fair and relevant questions but think half an hour simply isn't enough time to address some meaty issues, plus he really does talk over people's answers which is unhelpful. I think he treats it like an argument he's trying to win as opposed to just getting information from people. As I say, that isn't anything personal towards Sturgeon, it's just what he does.
I would be interested to hear the long form answers to some of those questions.
 

Agree with this. I’d be very interested to hear a proper answer from Sturgeon on the NHS question, for too long ‘better than England’ has been the stock answer to any criticism at all. Scotland doesn’t have the population of England, hasn’t had the growth of England, hasn’t had Tory b*****ds deliberately driving it into the ground like England. Despite funding challenges it should be better than England.

That doesn’t mean it’s performing well and Neil in his self-interested rant raised some reasonable points that fundamentally matter day-to-day. Would be nice to hear some proper answers, which Sturgeon wasn’t really allowed to give.

[jamamafegan]

The SNP have got you absolutely seething and it’s wonderful. All you’re capable of is posting daft anti-SNP pictures - very tragic indeed.