ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO SKY NEWS, SOPHY RIDGE ON SUNDAY

SOPHY RIDGE: Now it’s the SNP’s spring conference in Edinburgh this weekend and the First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, will say later that it’s time for Scotland to become independent. Well the SNP’s Leader in Westminster, Ian Blackford, has taken a break from his speech prep to talk to us this morning, thank you very much for being on the programme today. We are expecting to hear from Nicola Sturgeon later talking about the reasons she thinks there needs to be another Scottish independence referendum, are you worried that some people will think that you should be focusing on some of more crucial, critical issues in Scotland domestically rather than pushing for independence at this time?

IAN BLACKFORD: Well the SNP has been in government in Edinburgh since 2007, it’s 12 years and if you look at what’s happening, if you look at many of the polls that have come out over the course of the last three days and the popularity of the SNP or indeed of the attractions for independence, I think you can see there is a wide demonstration of public support for what the SNP is doing and I think there is a very sharp contrast with the chaos you can see in Westminster, a government that is not working for anybody and certainly not working for the benefit of the people of Scotland. Here we have an SNP government that is getting on with their job. You were talking earlier about climate change but of course we’ve got world leading climate change targets here in Scotland and we want to go further but I think in all these cases what we have done is we’ve shown leadership. I have to say this, Sophy, we are now 20 years on from devolution, 20 years in which Scotland has changed dramatically and I think our message to the people of Scotland is you like what we’ve delivered on education and on health, the fact that we don’t have tuition fees here in Scotland is another clear example, the time now is to complete that journey and to make sure that we can make sure that we can protect the economic interests of the people of Scotland by being an independent country in the European Union, so making Scotland a destination, making sure we have got the powers to grow the economy, make sure we have got the powers so we can invest in health and education, that we can eradicate poverty in Scotland, we can deliver a fairer society. So there is a very sharp contrast of the agenda that the Scottish National Party has and their aspirations for Scotland and what we see is a UK that is becoming increasingly inward looking, very much focused on Brexit, turning its back on free movement of people, we don’t want to have anything to do with that.

SR: Hang on, you’re saying there that people like what the SDP are doing in things such as education but there has been a lot of criticism, hasn’t there, about the education at the minute in Scotland. I mean if you look at the 2015 PISA report for example, that’s the most latest one, I know it’s a couple of years ago but Scottish schools were recording their worst ever performance, scores for maths, reading and science all declining. I mean it’s not as if it’s a really rosy picture on education is it?

IAN BLACKFORD: No, I think there is a lot of change in education but I think John Swinney who is our Education Secretary gave an outstanding speech yesterday about how we are closing the attainment gap and people from poorer backgrounds and are having increasing chances of going on to university. University places for Scottish students has increased dramatically over the course of the last ten year period. I mean we’re very serious about closing that attainment gap, that is working and we will continue that progress over the course of the next few years. I think we have actually got a very proud record when it comes to educational attainment.

SR: Nicola Sturgeon said she needed to make education here number one priority and yet very recently we’ve seen stories from Reform Scotland for example saying there’s been a reduction in the number of courses that Scottish school children can study, the Holyrood Education Committee said in some schools 14 year olds and 18 year olds are being taught in the same class. You were talking there about universities but when it comes to schools surely there are things that you should be focusing on now to try and improve what many families and children are experiencing.

IAN BLACKFORD: Well of course we’ve had the introduction of the National Curriculum here in Scotland, something that was supposed to be on a cross-party basis and what we’re seeking to do is to make sure we are preparing people for life after school and as a very key element of that is the increased depth we have seen in the subjects that Scottish school children are learning so of course I think it’s more important to make sure that the quality and the value of that education improves, that’s very much what is happening. The Scottish government wants to make sure that there is enough depth and breadth in the curriculum which is being offered to young people and we are making it very clear that that is our priority.

SR: Okay, now we know of course Nicola Sturgeon will be talking later about the reasons for another independence referendum. You mentioned a little bit earlier in the interview some of the polling which has shown a slight increase in support for another referendum but at the same time it is not exactly a decisive surge. I mean the YouGov Times poll for example has support for Scotland leaving up to 49%, it’s still not over that 50% barrier is it?

IAN BLACKFORD: Well the fact is we have spent the last two years trying to see if we could get a compromise on Brexit. We’ve talked about that nobody in government sees such a thing as a good Brexit, we think that all of the United Kingdom should stay in the European Union but at the very least we should have stayed in the single market and the customs union because that would have given the best protection for jobs so that’s been our focus. Over the course of the last years we’ve not been talking about independence, what we’ve signalled this week is of a [meeting?] that determination, independence is the best option for the people of Scotland and we are going to be going out on the doorsteps over the coming weeks and months and we’ll be presenting that case, the vision that we have of a prosperous independent Scotland, a socially just Scotland and that starting position is one where the support for independence is virtually neck and neck with the status quo. If I may say so, Sophy, there is a follow up this morning in the Sunday Times which shows very clearly that in the light of a no deal scenario then support for independence would increase quite dramatically but I’m looking forward along with colleagues in having that debate about what is the future for Scotland and we want to encourage other parties to engage in that debate with us as well. We believe independence is the best option but let’s build a political consensus, let’s make sure that we can actually have that debate about how we can deliver sustainable economic growth in Scotland, how do we improve the life chances of the people of Scotland and I’d simply say to the people of Scotland that since we had devolution 20 years’ ago, Scotland has change. It’s changed for the better and we need to make sure that we are that destination in Europe, that we do have access to free movement and people that’s so critical for the growth of the Scottish economy. If we don’t have that then we won’t have that ability to deliver sustainable economic growth to the extent that we want and there’s a sharp contrast in the immigration policies which have been perceived by the Conservative government and that openness, that desire that people can come and live and work and be part of Scotland’s story and indeed that opportunity that we should have as a right to live and work in 28 EU member states as well. So there is a very sharp divide in terms of what we see as a positive message that we’re delivering and contrasting that with the UK which is turning inwards on itself. I actually quite firmly believe that when we have that debate with the people of Scotland, support for independence will rise markedly. We will complete that journey to independence, Scotland will become an independent country and I simply say to Westminster that you have to respect that when the SNP won the election to the Scottish Parliament in 2016, it was with a manifesto commitment that if there was a material change in circumstances that we had to have that right to have that referendum. The people of Scotland should be able to determine their own future and Westminster should listen to that.

SR: To be able to stop a no deal Brexit from happening is to effectively sign up to some kind of deal and what seems pretty clear from the votes that are being held in the House of Commons is that the thing that seems to be the most likely path to building a majority is a customs union. Last time it failed by just eight votes so why didn’t the SNP back that?

IAN BLACKFORD: Well what the SNP did back was a motion that supported single market and customs union because let’s remember that services are 80% of our economy and a customs union does not protect the service economy and the one thing that I have continually mentioned is that importance of free movement of people. We can’t grow the economy unless we have that so it is really important that we retain that alignment with the single market, that has to be the absolute minimum and I certainly believe that if we do have an indicative vote process in Parliament over the coming weeks, if we can win that argument across party for a single market/customs union option, that is the spirit of compromise that the SNP has sought to engage in over the course of the last year. A customs union on its own won’t do it and also there is an additional factor, because we all have to be aware of the responsibilities that we have to support the Good Friday Agreement in the island of Ireland and a customs union in itself wouldn’t solve the border issues that are so important and so integral to the Good Friday Agreement.

SR: So, just to be clear, there are no circumstances that the SNP would back the customs union idea that has been put forward?

IAN BLACKFORD: Well what I’m arguing is that the customs union on its own doesn’t satisfy the needs of our economy, it doesn’t protect the service sector in Scotland and it doesn’t protect that free movement of people which is so important. We need free movement of people that enable us to have the labour which we require for our health services, for our tourist industry and so on and so forth. It simply doesn’t go far enough and at the end of the day there is one [inaudible] that we have which is to protect the economic interests of the people of Scotland. That is why we need to have that partnership as an absolute minimum of membership of the single market and the customs union, it’s the only way that we can do that. That is the least worst option of Brexit, there is no such thing as a good Brexit, Brexit is going to cost jobs. Our responsibility is to make sure that we stop that damage, we stop that chaos, we stop the loss of income, the loss of jobs that people of Scotland and indeed right throughout the United Kingdom will suffer from if we don’t have that option.

SR: Okay, now just finally, you said that you are not going to be attending the state dinner for Donald Trump in June. He is the US President, why won’t you have dinner with him?

IAN BLACKFORD: Well I think it’s very important that we show due respect to the people of America and the office of the Presidency itself but of course when you look at what President Trump has been doing, the way that he’s behaved, the way he’s behaved in a misogynistic manner, the way that he has trampled over the rights of minorities, the racist way in which he’s behaved, it simply wouldn’t be the right thing to lay out the red carpet and to sit down on the basis of his state dinner and have a pleasant evening with the President of the United States. Of course the United Kingdom should be engaging with the US, it should be saying to President Trump that the way he is behaving, the way he is talking about building the wall and excluding people from Mexico as an example is simply not acceptable. You had a long debate on your programme this morning about climate change, the fact that President Trump is a climate change denier and refusing to sign up to the Paris Accord, we simply cannot support what the US President is doing, it would not be the right thing to do sitting down and having dinner with him.

SR: Okay, Ian Blackford, we’ll let you get back to conference. Thank you for taking time to be on the programme this morning.

IAN BLACKFORD: Thank you.