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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Well now, let’s take a look through the Sunday papers and I’m joined by the former Director of Public Prosecutions who is hoping to become a Labour MP, Keir Starmer, by the novelist and campaigner for Scottish independence, Sara Sheridan and by the author and former Conservative MP, Jeffrey Archer whose book, Be Careful What You Wish For, is out now in paperback and before you say it, number one on the Sunday Times bestseller list.  Listen, it’s a bit of a bombshell for people to wake up to, many people who thought it would never happen, it just might – Scottish independence, it’s on all the front pages, this poll, one of the polls, that puts the yes campaign ahead for the first time.  Sara, you must be buoyed up.

SARA SHERIDAN: It’s been an incredible movement that’s been happening in Scotland though, it’s almost like the rest of the UK has just suddenly realised because you cannot stand at a bus stop, you cannot go to a dinner party, you cannot walk into a pub without people, everyone, everywhere, talking about it and we have a very well informed electorate now in Scotland for this referendum and so the news this morning is that Better Together has woken up as well because Better Together had no campaign and they had a really negative campaign, they have really come up with very little that’s positive and at last they’re bringing it to the table and I’m up for this ruck because we have been wanting to have a proper argument about it and it’s been really difficult because all they have been able to come up with really so far are scare stories.  So finally …

DM: Hang on, ruck brings up images of rugby where people start pulling each other’s ears off.   

SARA SHERIDAN: Oh no, we’ll be terribly civilised, we’re very civilised north of the border but we really want to have that conversation, we genuinely want to have that conversation.  So they are saying they are going to come up with a package and it’s very unspecific at the moment and they are going to have a big job on their hands because as Kevin Bridges said in his Edinburgh Fringe set, it’s as though the whole country is doing its Modern Studies Higher, that’s what it’s like and so people aren’t having general conversations, they are having really specific conversations. 

DM: About so many dimensions.  Kier, I wanted to ask you about the effect on the Labour party and Labour in Scotland seeming to be leading the Better Together campaign, haven’t they mucked it up? 

KEIR STARMER: Well I think a lot of people didn’t think they were going to get to this place and we have got to this place.  I think we are better together, I think what is going to be very interesting is the package that’s put on the table over the next few days because until now it hasn’t been on this knife edge, it now is and I think that package is going to be very, very interesting. 

DM: But what about the campaign?  Sara talked about the negativity, I mean it is subtitled the no campaign, it’s a hard thing to argue for isn’t it? 

KEIR STARMER: In a sense it is a harder argument to make but I do think that a lot of people didn’t think we were going to get to this point and therefore it was made in a particular way.  We have got to this point and so really it’s now critical and that’s why that package is going to be very important.  There is a deeper political issue, I mean there are different issues why people might want to vote yes but one of them is undoubtedly a sense of the sort of inequality that has gone on now for many years, the sense of wanting to be away from the austerity and the Westminster led politics and that’s got to be addressed in this actually, that’s a deeper issue.

DM: Gordon Brown understands it, as you saw I was speaking to him yesterday, he understands the desire for change and as a campaigner, Jeffrey Archer, one of the best campaigners of your generation, isn’t the difficulty that Alex Salmond has driven a coach and horses through this but the coalition of the no’s is made up of Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling, yes, but he’s got David Cameron there and indeed Nigel Farage and the Orange Order. 

JEFFREY ARCHER: The big problem I think is about a month ago when Alistair Darling won the first debate and clearly won it, there wasn’t any doubt about that, we all went to sleep south of the border.  I was going around saying 60/40, what are we worried about, Darling won easily and the comeback has been amazing.  There is a piece, in the leader of the Sunday Times this morning, there is the most amazing sentence which brings it all home, ‘Voters in Scotland either do not believe the warnings or think being free of Westminster would be a price worth paying.  They do not necessarily believe the First Minister’s promise of sunlit uplands, more Scots expect to be financially worse off than better as a result of independence, but they are prepared to do it anyway.’  That’s the problem. 

DM: Sara, let me give you the last word on this during the paper review, do you think whichever way it goes it’s inevitably going to be close, is Scotland going to be a divided nation?  If it’s yes there are going to be a lot of people saying we really didn’t want this, oh my goodness me what are we going to do and vice versa, the other result also?

SARA SHERIDAN: What we’re going to do if we get a yes is that we’re going to have Team Scotland because we’re going to have to imagine a nation, we’re going to have to start from scratch and think about how we really feel …

DM: Do you think the 48 or 49% or whatever it is according to the polls who voted no, do you think they can buy back into the project?

SARA SHERIDAN: Well that’s democracy.  The fight in Scotland will be for the Labour party because the Labour party have been really split from quite early on.  The no campaign has been men in suits, top down traditional bunker politics and it has been very much party politics, the no campaign (sic) is grassroots, the no campaign is everything from pandas for yes to women for independence and Labour for independence which is a huge part of what’s going on.

DM: Okay, moving on to international affairs now because of course that’s in a lot of the papers as well, the threat of ISIL, ISIS, Islamic State, whatever they want to call themselves.  Keir, this is the question everyone is asking themselves, encapsulated in the Observer today, how can we combat the spreading of ISIS?

KEIR STARMER: This is the Observer covering it, all very important questions laid out, ten questions starting with ‘To bomb or not to bomb and troops on the ground’ and making it clear that David Cameron’s position is still vague and I think this is a real problem.  This is bubbling up again, action is edging nearer and nearer and yet we haven’t got clarity about what it is we are seeking to achieve and how are we going to achieve it.  I think there is some support for air strikes but again you really need to know how and why and what is the follow through.  This is a very important story, it’s covered in a number of papers but these are the key questions.   

DM: So what are your thoughts on air strikes?  As a prospective candidate you’ll be asked this on the campaign trail, if it hasn’t happened, if it is happening, would you support them? 

KIER STARTMER: They can be a useful force in international law but we need to be clear about why we’re doing it, you can make a case for it.  My own view is that it should be done with UN backing if at all possible but there are certain circumstances in which you could justify air strikes. 

DM: But also with the memory of what happened in Iraq, originally what was happening in Afghanistan, do you think it would work?   

KEIR STARMER: Well I think that’s a much more difficult question because air strikes did not achieve long term change.  What we need is a debate about this, we need absolute clarity but what we shouldn’t allow to happen is that lack of clarity to be left there until a decision has to be made in a hurry because that’s what’s happened in the past.  This is a decision that needs to be made clearly now.

DM: Well air strikes are already taking place, more announced today by the United States, let’s talk about whether they work or not because Islamic State are not sitting there like good citizens waiting to be bombed, they are not sitting there in barracks, in huge battalions, they are not marching columns up and down the road which can be hit from the air, they are hidden away in villages and towns…

JEFFREY ARCHER: IS are a bunch of thugs and terrorists, they don’t even represent the religion they claim to represent.  98% of their religion do not support them, that’s the first thing to remember.  The second thing to remember, having got rid of Saddam Hussein, it is absolutely vital that the Kurds are backed.  If ISIS was able to get into Northern Iraq they would get their hands on two million barrels of oil a day and it is vital that the Peshmurga, the Kurd’s army, is able to strengthen that border and support it, it is vital that the Kurds are given independence, then the north of Iraq will have no problems, we’ll only have the south. 

DM: So there will be more boots on the ground.  There is a Henry Kissinger article isn’t there …

JEFFREY ARCHER: A brilliant article. 

DM: Is this what he’s recommending?

JEFFREY ARCHER: What Kissinger feels is that nothing has moved forward since his day but it would move forward greatly if we could give the Kurds independence because they are a middle class civilised group, they won’t …

DM: Well not all of them, this idea that the Kurds are the panacea, of course the Kurds are split, they’ve had their own internal wars and the Turks are very worried about some elements of them, the PKK.

JEFFREY ARCHER: I would dare to correct you, the Kurds are a unified group who live in the north, six million of them and …

DM: In Iraq but what about the Kurds in Turkey?

JEFFREY ARCHER: Ah you are quite right, ten years ago that was a massive problem but since they built the pipeline from Erbil through the Turkey and it’s flowing, not only is there an opportunity for the Kurds to have an income which would mean no support from the British, no having to give food bags, then that has changed completely.  Turks are now living in Erbil and Solmelia, that’s all changed, that’s ten years ago.  Give the Kurds a chance to run their own country and they won’t be calling for aid. 

DM: I’m glad you said running their own country because these are the kind of questions, Sara, let me throw this at you, these are the kind of questions that Prime Minister Salmond, if it is he if there’s a yes vote …

SARA SHERIDAN: First Minister. 

DM: But if he becomes Prime Minister or the President maybe of an independent state if there is a yes vote, would have to answer questions like this, what would an independent Scotland do about military action against ISIS?  Of course there is a Scottish hostage being held right now whose life is in danger.

SARA SHERIDAN: Yes, I know. I think it’s for the UN, I absolutely agree with Kier, it’s about the UN getting involved and actually we have fantastic negotiation skills in Scotland and across the UK, we have an amazing diplomatic service and I agree with Jeffrey, we need to bring the mainstream Muslim world into this debate because these are fringe extremists and like the Kurds there is a moral majority of Muslims who don’t like what these fighters are doing.

DM: But without UN backing?

[All talking at the same time]

JEFFREY ARCHER: There is going to be a UN referendum in two or three weeks’ time.

SARA SHERIDAN: Another one.

JEFFREY ARCHER: Another one but it’s at least run by the UN and independent, as to whether the Kurds want independence.  Once the UN has taken that vote and gone back to the UN and said here is the result, the game changes, the Kurds have a right to independence.  And by the way, the early polls aren’t 2% in the lead, they are 95 to 5 that the Kurds want independence. 

KEIR STARMER: But it is very important that the UN leads on this, on all these issues about what action should be taken.  

SARA SHERIDAN: I think we are agreed about that.

KEIR STARMER: There are real problems with military action if there isn’t a proper UN framework for it.  We’ve seen those issues, look at Iraq and look at other places, if you don’t have a proper UN authority you really run risks in taking this sort of action. 

DM: So you think 2003 didn’t have proper UN authority?  Of course there was one resolution but without the second resolution there was …

KEIR STARMER: I said this at the time, I made it very clear that in my view there wasn’t UN authority and on a purely legalistic front, international law, the law was internationally unlawful. 

DM: So Tony Blair carried out an illegal act?

KEIR STARMER: It’s international law which makes it clear you can take military action if it’s for self-defence, collective self-defence or there is UN authorisation.  I was not persuaded that the UN authorisation was valid and wrote about it at the time.  I think a lot of people took that view and it is the same scenario here, that is why we must now do the work making sure that if any action is taken, whatever it is, it’s got proper authority and if we haven’t got that we need to think twice.

DM: That is interesting, Tony Blair carried out an illegal act therefore there are those who want to arrest him and put him in before a war crimes tribunal. 

SARA SHERIDAN: It’s a big campaigning issue in Scotland actually, the Iraq war and a lot of people say we don’t want our boys and girls to …

DM: Would Tony Blair be safe in an independent Scotland?  Could he be arrested?

SARA SHERIDAN: Well …

JEFFREY ARCHER: If we give the Kurds the opportunity, the Peshmurga are the bravest soldiers on earth but it is like the last World War, when we declared war on Germany the Poles, one of the bravest nations on earth, started charging tanks on horseback.  What the Kurds need is equipment, what the Kurds need is arms, what the Kurds need is expertise – they don’t need feet on the ground, they’ll do the job themselves if you give them the chance.

DM: Okay, from geopolitics I’m afraid to a lighter note and excuse the pun because it is a pun, Keir and Sara you have this, and it is an important health story and it’s a simple formula isn’t it, about how to keep track of your weight given the obesity epidemic we’re talking about  - keep your waistline as half your height, very simple. 

SARA SHERIDAN: We’ve all got our string out this morning, wrapping it round to make sure it’s okay, I’m sure the whole country is going to be going on a diet.

KEIR STARMER: I’m can imagine lots of people when they saw this story this morning standing on tiptoe for as long as possible to do the mathematics. 

SARA SHERIDAN: And having muesli for breakfast with skimmed milk. 

DM: As if that makes any difference.

JEFFREY ARCHER: But the figures are absolutely grotesque compared with twenty years ago and it’s not in one’s imagination.  One only has to walk down the street, my wife who worked in a hospital as its chairman said the nurses thirty years ago were all thin with tiny little waists, no weight and if you look across the country now, the NHS has a massive billion pound obesity problem.

DM: There is another story which we haven’t got in the papers here about the amount of meals that are being thrown away by the NHS because many of the patients find them inedible.  One last story here and this is a business story, incredibly important, the Deepwater Gulf of Mexico and of course BP still in deep water and facing huge potential liabilities.  They have set some money aside, they have paid out an awful lot of money already but it could go even higher, Keir Starmer. 

KEIR STARMER: This is a very important story, this is a New Orleans judge this week in a civil proceedings, using words like gross negligence to describe the behaviour of BP and even stronger language elsewhere in the judgement so this is the examination of the details by the civil courts, it shows the courts are much more serious about these things these days and gross negligence and holding corporations to account is an up and coming issue that is going to affect boardrooms much more than we may …

DM: But is it only countries like the United States that can hold someone like BP to account?  Could an independent … do you see where I’m linking this?  Could an independent Scotland really tell a behemoth like BP off?

SARA SHERIDAN: I’m not saying we couldn’t stand up for ourselves, I think we could stand up for ourselves and what drew me to this story actually when we picked it out was this amazing picture of this pelican absolutely covered in oil clearly in terrible distress, it looks like a pterodactyl, it looks terrifying and then you read it, it’s all about the money.  They are talking about BP shareholders saying we don’t to pay money, this is not a story about money, look at this picture.  This is a story about the planet and it’s too important.  

DM: Your last thoughts on this Jeffrey Archer, do you think BP has done enough, they have paid out billions already?

JEFFREY ARCHER: They haven’t done enough but the only good thing that comes out of it is every other oil company now must be triple checking and quadruple checking to ensure this can’t happen again.  So the publicity is good in that way, it reminds people and they can’t just have a board meeting and say oh don’t worry about it, we have it under control.  They don’t have it under control.

DM: Well we certainly had that paper review under control, well more or less.  Thank you very much indeed Jeffrey Archer, Sara Sheridan and Keir Starmer, very good to have you here taking us through some of the Sunday papers.