The Ponsonby and Massie Podcast

Bernard and Alex delve into one of the bigget topics of the modern political age. Why can't Westminster or Holyrood seem to manage our public finances?

In Part Two, in marking the 25th anniversary of the death of Donald Dewar, Bernard and Alex reflect on the Office of First Minister and how it has changed since Dewar's time as the first office holder. Plus they rate every First Minister out of 10. PART ONEDonald DewarHenry McLeishJack McConnellAlex SalmondPART TWONicola SturgeonHumza YusafJohn SwinneySummary and Ratings

In Part One, as we approach the 25th anniversary of the death of Donald Dewar, Bernard and Alex reflect on the Office of First Minister and how it has changed since Dewar's time as the first office holder.

(00:05) Set-up: Tory & SNP conference week — immigration, ECHR, and whether the Conservatives are “doomed.”(01:29) Are the Tories finished short–to–medium term? Leadership vs timing and arithmetic after a crushing defeat.(03:59) What the Conservatives are trying to sell: contrition on net migration; mooted ECHR exit; welfare/PIP tightening (incl. ADHD/mental-health references).(06:49) Both main parties “dancing to Farage’s tune” — the Reform UK gravitational pull on immigration policy.(08:56) “Can you out-Reform Reform?” Why the answer is no — and why growth/economic confidence is the real antidote to populism. Threats to Labour from the left (Greens/Corbyn).(11:18) Tory identity crisis: talk of repealing the Climate Change Act vs the real problem of UK power prices — headline-grabbing vs serious policy.(13:18) What are the Tories for now? From coherent Thatcherism to today’s knee-jerk opposition.(16:45) Scotland: Tory revival rode the constitutional (pro-Union) wave; with independence parked, what’s their offer?(19:27) A quarter-century in devolved opposition and still no centre-right blueprint for Scotland (state size, tax, business, justice, “wokery”).(23:31) Holyrood “fanning around”: dog-theft bill as a symptom; why brand toxicity blunts “common-sense Conservatism.”(26:41) SNP conference preview: independence strategy debate; polls, minorities parliament, and why activists may not “rock the boat.”(30:06) “Steady-as-you-go” Swinney: on ~35% the SNP could still be largest party (≈58–60 seats) due to fractured opposition and candidate churn.(32:23) Voter mood: if “they’re all useless,” stick with “the useless ones we know” — SNP success as least-worst option.(32:56) Longevity shocker: after 19–20 years in power, SNP still in pole position; next episode trail — Donald Dewar at 25 years.

Scottish polling: SNP still first; Reform’s rise fractures the unionist vote and could hand SNP an outsized seat haul on a modest vote share.Scottish Labour’s bind: must sell a credible policy offer while “owning” SNP record attacks — but Starmer’s unpopularity in Scotland limits Sarwar’s room.Reform dynamic: positioned as a “super protest vote”; mainstream parties risk losing if they try to outbid Farage on immigration.Electoral system: case made for shifting Holyrood to STV to avoid disproportional outcomes under a fractured party system.Approval ratings mood: Starmer underwater; Swinney seen as safer “adult in the room,” explaining SNP resilience despite policy discontent.Immigration: small boats symbolic of border control; debate increasingly about legal migration thresholds (ILR rules, salary/English requirements).Centre ground wobble: concern that political centre is collapsing, opening space for Reform beyond traditional limits.Leadership jeopardy: Starmer’s authority tied to Budget performance and spring elections; internal manoeuvring (incl. Burnham) noted.Fiscal outlook: expectation of a tax-raising Budget; VAT hike flagged as the most likely manifesto breach.Post-election arithmetic: conditional openness to SNP–Labour cooperation if both in mid-30s seats range.

A big mixed bag of issues in this week's episode“Deplore the Man. Respect the Office.” → How Starmer & Swinney played Trump for UK/Scotland gains → Moral vs national interest “Love-Bombing Trump: Smart or Shameful?” → The realpolitik you weren’t told about → Starmer + Oval Office letter; subtle money/investment icons.“The Real Opposition? The Auditor General.” → £2bn hole, welfare rules, and the bill coming due → Auditor General report“Scotland’s Justice Pivot: What You Weren’t Told” → Not Proven scrapped — but did safeguards go too?“Saloon-Bar Morality vs National Interest” → Engaging Trump: grown-up statecraft or sell-out?“Buy Now. Pay Later. Government.” → Why Scotland’s books won’t balance by 2029“Soft Words. Hard Bills.” → The welfare promise vs the budget reality“Yellow Card Politics” → Hepburn v Ross, seagulls & standards at Holyrood“Proven. Not Proven. Truth.” → Bernard’s case for how verdicts should really work“Ego, Investment… and Whisky Tariffs” → How flattering Trump might pay Scotland

Alex “The gap between theory and reality is often wide. Phase two has begun unpromisingly.”“Is he, as Kemi Badenoch put it at Prime Minister's questions this week, In office, but not in power.”“The journey from five MPs to 300 plus at the next election should be required to put Nigel Farage into Downing Street is the kind of leap that hasn't been made in an awfully long time, if indeed ever, in British politics.”“it's the Prime Minister's judgment that is the issue here much more than it is Peter Mandelson's judgment.”“it is always easier to blame the advisors than to blame the monarch himself. But most of the time, if there's a problem with the advisors, that is actually a reflection of the problem with the monarch itself.”“If Keir Starmer was a factional leader, that would be fine.”“So it's a government that is all things toward people and therefore absolutely nothing.”“it is never a good thing when you are resetting your Government for the reset to require a reset.”“the mere fact that we are even entertaining such speculation at this stage in the parliament is the real story there.”“the difference between a conviction politician and one who is a manager who doesn't like management, which is one of the problems with Keir Starmer.”“I still think it is more likely than not, but it is no longer completely inconceivable that he would be replaced… I think the chances have gone up from sort of 5 % to 25 % if I had to put numbers on it.”Bernard “Is the problem the Prime Minister himself? And I think with every passing month that becomes absolutely clear that the issue is indeed the Prime Minister himself.”“there is no such thing as Starmerism. He doesn't have any real ideological anchors within the Labour and Trade Union movement.”“this is a Prime Minister who... can't even sack a cabinet minister properly… These are not the actions of somebody who is on top of the job.”“I am increasingly of the view that he can't change because he doesn't have the political skill set and that at some point in this parliament the PLP will go into revolt.”“that now becomes a potentially very embarrassing visit… which would turn the visit into potentially a diplomatic disaster.”“At the end of the day, this was a decision of the Prime Minister. And therefore the key question, it's always that cliched questions, what did he know about Mandelson and when did he know it?”“Mr. Mandelson seems to have a penchant for people who are stinking rich.”“The content of some of those emails are on some levels beyond embarrassing and on other levels, plain revolting… and yet he's to be the British Ambassador.”“what they cannot accept is that this is all self-inflicted and a lot of it is self-inflicted in such a way where the current lot look every bit as incompetent and every bit as sleazy as the last lot.”“the buck stops with the guy at the top. The buck stops with the prime minister.”“you have to entertain the possibility that Reform UK might, might win a general election.”“and the parliamentary party will have its collective head and its collective hand and it will, I think at some point say, he has to go.”“both Keir Starmer and Kemi Badenoch will not lead the respective parties at the next general election.”

With around 1 in 5 Scots telling pollsters they're voting for Reform UK at the coming Scottish Parliament Elections, Bernard Ponsonby and Alex Massie analyse the current and likely effect on Scottish politics and how Nigel Farage's party can't lose out in this election. Bernard Ponsonby“What they're feeding into is a mood that the system is broken… the message about a broken political system is a message which transcends the traditional left-right issues. And it transcends the constitutional question.”“The rise of Reform UK is in part a crisis that the voters have in the confidence with the established order and with the established parties.”“The Scottish elections are an entirely free hit for Nigel Farage… he has a proportional voting system to fall back on next year. So he's going to get representatives. And the only thing that getting representatives at Holyrood will do is give him a further bounce.”“I think that they will have a good election next May. The only question is how good. I think for the Conservatives, they will have a bad election. The only question is how bad or perhaps even how catastrophic.”“Ultimately, just like the SDP, he will ultimately fail to break the mold of politics because… the asylum and immigration issue… won't cut through forever.”Alex Massie“In Scotland, Reform is winning around 25% of the working-class vote, C2DE voters… that tells you something. It tells you that in a strange way, some of the people who responded very well to the Yes campaign in 2014… it is the same kind of message that Reform is capitalizing on now.”“It is a howl of discontent that is not necessarily connected to any specific policies or even ideas that Reform have.”“Banging the drum on illegal immigration and forcing other parties… to conflate legal and illegal immigration is something that is extremely effective as a wedge issue for Farage and Reform.”“Poor old Russell Findlay… is taking fire from his right and from his left and his center is falling apart too. And so this really leaves him with little option but to counter attack, but with what sort of troops he can muster, I am not entirely sure.”“The rise of Reform again complicates matters because it becomes much, much harder to see how you can put together an election winning team… everybody in Scotland is a minority.”

The Chancellor's Budget season is upon us and "winter is coming" says Alex Massie. 1. Government debt costs hitting crisis levels“If debt interest payments are running at more than 100 billion pounds a year, that is by definition 50 or 60 billion pounds a year that can't be spent elsewhere.” (Alex Massie)2. Labour’s tax promises already collapsing“It becomes absolutely unambiguously clear that the Labour Party's pledge to the voters in the general election last year in relation to not raising taxes on working people is simply not going to hold.” (Bernard Ponsonby)3. Property tax and home sales under threat“One is an annual levy basically on the value of houses above a certain threshold, possibly as low as five hundred thousand pounds… The other proposal floated… is that the government might impose capital gains tax on the sale of family homes.” (Alex Massie)4. Pension age rising to 70 and triple lock scrapped“For people who are in the workplace at the moment, they can probably look towards a state pension age of about 70. In terms of the long-term sustainability of this, if you want to keep it at the same proportion of GDP, then it is inevitable that the triple lock will have to go.” - Bernard Ponsonby, 20:18)5. Scottish independence economics look dire“You would be starting with a deficit which you would have to service, which would be even bigger than that which the remaining countries of the UK would have to service and therefore you would be borrowing probably at punitive levels of interest rates or… into big tax increases or the kind of public expenditure cuts which would make you a very unpopular government on day one.” -Bernard Ponsonby