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The Steamie: From The Scotsman political team - Thursday September 11 2025
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00:00The Steamy, a politics podcast from The Scotsman.
00:11Hello and welcome to The Steamy, The Scotsman's politics podcast.
00:15I'm Alistair Grant, The Scotsman's political editor, and it's been another pretty crazy week in politics.
00:20Last Friday saw the resignation of Angela Rayner sparking a major reshuffle of Keir Starmer's top team,
00:26including the sacking of Ian Murray as Scottish secretary and his replacement by Douglas Alexander, the new Labour veteran.
00:34Meanwhile, at the start of this week, First Minister John Swinney jetted off to Washington, D.C. to lobby the U.S. president over whiskey tariffs.
00:42John Swinney now says there's a real chance of striking some kind of deal to remove or reduce tariffs on whiskey,
00:48which are currently costing the sector £4 million a week in lost exports.
00:52To discuss all this and more, I'm joined by David Ball, The Scotsman's deputy political editor,
00:57and by education correspondent Kat Stewart.
01:00David, first things first, what did you make of Ian Murray's sacking?
01:04I know you spoke to Scottish Labour leader Anna Sawa about this just the other day.
01:10Yeah, well, I tried to speak to Anna Sawa, but he just wasn't really engaged in whether he was involved or spoke to the Prime Minister at all.
01:18And he got asked 11 times by a journalist and just said he wasn't going to go into any conversations or even acknowledge that it happened.
01:25But I think it was pretty surprising that Ian Murray was kind of first out of the hat from Keir Starmer in this big reshuffle,
01:32given some of the turmoil in other parts of the UK government at the moment and some of the pressures on immigration and things.
01:39Although there had been moves, it was quite stark that Ian Murray was pretty much the first name out of the hat who was leaving government.
01:46He was then brought back into government in sort of a junior ministerial role, a dual role.
01:51But that was after he'd been announced that he was actually leaving government.
01:54So it is a bit of a mess.
01:56I mean, there's questions for Anna Sawa still about what he makes of it
02:00and whether he tried to persuade Keir Starmer to keep Ian Murray in the government.
02:08But again, yeah, it was just quite a tumultuous Friday.
02:12And still, we've got Douglas Alexander as the Scottish secretary.
02:15It's been some sort of talk that he's not the most popular within Scottish Labour.
02:20And yeah, still a lot of turmoil Labour, which is not what they wanted going back to Holyrood.
02:25Yeah, I love that.
02:28Not the most popular in Scottish Labour.
02:29I mean, there was a quote in another newspaper from an unnamed Labour MP calling him a wee prick who nobody likes,
02:36which is a pretty brutal thing to say about a colleague.
02:40What did you make of this, Kat?
02:41And what do you make of the decision to draft in Douglas Alexander?
02:44He's obviously someone with huge experience.
02:46He was Scottish secretary before, about 18 years ago under Tony Blair.
02:50He's kind of been around the block a bit.
02:52He has. I mean, he's obviously an experienced pair of hands, but he's coming in on the back foot
02:57because he's starting in the middle of controversy.
03:00It took a few days before any of his MP colleagues came out and said anything warm and welcoming about him.
03:07And even then, it was a fairly muted welcome.
03:11So he's having to deal with all of that, knowing that this is an unpopular decision.
03:16We'll see how his experience plays in.
03:18Ian Murray was popular among the group.
03:21There was a lot of MPs and MSPs coming out in his defence, explaining all of the work that he was doing behind the scenes.
03:27There had been some criticism that he wasn't visible enough, but his colleagues were saying that actually this was because he was juggling so many different things.
03:34And he was working really hard, focused on Scottish interests.
03:38So I think that's going to be a difficult start for Douglas Alexander, but it also speaks to this disharmony behind the scenes.
03:48There are factions in Labour that are not getting on at the moment.
03:51Keir Starmer is being criticised for his decision making, for his, in particular, slow decision making.
03:57And this is another example of that, because Ian Murray was categorical in his leaving letter that this was him out of government.
04:06And you could, you know, you didn't even really have to read between the lines to realise that he was very unhappy about this decision.
04:12Less than 24 hours later, he's got not one, but two ministerial briefs and he's back in again.
04:18And you just wonder what on earth they're thinking with regards to having a coherent plan and getting Keir Starmer to a point where he looks like he's not just moving with where the wind's taking him, but is actually strategising and planning ahead and sticking to his guns.
04:37Yeah. And David, I mean, one of the things that's been said about Douglas Alexander is part of the reason he's been brought in is that he's someone who's very good at strategy.
04:43He's obviously the co-chair of Scottish Labour's Holyrood campaign alongside the deputy Scottish leader, Jackie Bailey.
04:51He's someone who's seen as kind of able to come in and maybe shake things up a bit, turn things around for the party.
04:58It's not going particularly well in Scotland for them, largely because of events down south.
05:03They need to do something to make some kind of recovery ahead of the next Holyrood election in May.
05:09What do you think their chances are?
05:11Do you think Douglas Alexander is going to help or do you think this is just rearranging deck chairs in the Titanic?
05:19That's a good question.
05:20I do think they wanted him in a prominent role in Scotland, given, like you said, he is going to be a big part of that election campaign.
05:27Although I mostly saw that being behind the scenes.
05:30So putting him as the face of UK government in Scotland is, given he's done it before and he's associated with sort of Tony Blair's time in office, I did think it doesn't look like a fresh face, does it?
05:42It's not maybe what the party needed.
05:44But he is seen as quite a smart guy, someone who can, like you said, strategize and look at the bigger picture.
05:50So behind the scenes, I do expect him to be quite influential.
05:54But if he hasn't got the backing of the MPs, at least that's what it looks like anyway.
05:58And they're still quite sore about Ian Murray getting booed out.
06:04It's just not ideal, the optics of doing it.
06:06I think Keir Starmer wanted to have Douglas Alexander in his cabinet.
06:09It does feel like this was maybe he thought this was an opportunity to get to get him in there because he was a junior minister and he obviously rates him quite highly.
06:17But I do think the optics of this, given that Ian Murray was the sole Labour MP in Scotland for so long, kind of held the fort on his own.
06:27And that job was kind of seen as his.
06:29And he's blessed, what, just over a year.
06:31And he's kind of, that's him done.
06:33So I do think the optics internally are not great.
06:37And it will just be interesting to see how they, whether they just go on business as usual,
06:41but whether he can kind of bring about a kickstart to the campaign leading up to Holyrood, we'll just have to wait and see.
06:48I mean, on the optics of this, I mean, there's all sorts of chat, Kat, about the fact he was fired over the phone.
06:53Although I suppose, like, what else are you going to do?
06:55You're not exactly going to kind of fly out and see him face to face to do that.
06:58And there's pictures of him at the airport, obviously drafting his resignation statement.
07:02There was kind of a feeling that he'd been mistreated, that this was an unfair way to treat someone like Ian Murray.
07:08But is it even possible to fire someone in politics, to sack someone in politics in a way that doesn't leave people sore?
07:17I mean, it just seems impossible to do.
07:19I think the sacked over the phone line was taking things a little bit too far.
07:24As you say, you have to think about the practical aspects of this and the location of people.
07:31So the phone call wasn't the problem.
07:33The problem was sacking him, realising that you'd made a mistake, and then pivoting.
07:38And offering another role.
07:39It wasn't that he was initially offered the ministerial roles first, and then Douglas Alexander brought in as a replacement.
07:47This was obviously Keir Starmer running to catch up, realising that he'd made an error.
07:53I think, I mean, politics is a brutal game.
07:56It is not good when people are very visibly treated badly.
08:01And I think the fact that Ian Murray had so much support from Scottish MPs, from the wider group, was always going to cause problems for Keir Starmer.
08:11And he perhaps hadn't realised that, but it's his job to realise that.
08:14It's his job to plan ahead and to strategise this.
08:17And this was done particularly badly.
08:19But I don't think there would have been a particularly good way of doing it.
08:24Sacking people is never pleasant.
08:26There's always going to be disgruntlement behind the scenes.
08:29But it's the almost immediate U-turn that is the huge problem in this instance.
08:34Yeah, and I just, I never really see, I'd be interested to hear a kind of insider's perspective and what the point is in this kind of major reshuffle, where you're taking people who have not really been in their job for that long and moving them into completely different departments.
08:48And what that does to politics, what that does to ongoing problems in the NHS and housing.
08:54I mean, I know obviously the NHS wasn't changed in this instance, but it just seems like a strange way to run a country.
09:00But moving on, we should talk about John Swinney and whiskey tariffs.
09:06He was in Washington, D.C. on Monday to press a case for a better deal for Scotch whiskey in a pretty major coup, actually, for the Scottish government.
09:13He had a meeting with Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House.
09:16And he seems to be quite optimistic about the prospect of a deal on tariffs.
09:21John Swinney told journalists on Wednesday that Mr. Trump makes no secret of the fact that he likes deals.
09:26I wasn't going there with a sob story.
09:27I was going there offering a deal saying this is in everyone's interest.
09:33David, I mean, it is quite a coup, isn't it?
09:36It's not often you get a first minister being able to have a meeting with the president in the Oval Office of the White House.
09:42No, I mean, for John Swinney, I mean, probably couldn't believe his luck is optically, politically is is great for him, isn't it?
09:52It's a good look for him.
09:53I mean, I mean, it's a strange one because obviously Donald Trump isn't particularly popular in Scotland or the UK and especially with the SNP.
10:00But it's a very good look for the first minister of Scotland to be getting invited into the White House to talk about something that the UK government is responsible for.
10:09But it's probably fair to say it's not being their top priority when they're dealing with Donald Trump.
10:14So for John Swinney to kind of swoop in and make it his priority in person, get pictured with Trump in the White House, just opens up if there is a deal.
10:24He can take credit for it.
10:25And probably no one's really going to argue that he hasn't influenced that if something does happen.
10:31Yeah, I just think it is a good look for John Swinney.
10:34I think it was definitely worth him going over there and shaking hands and holding his nose and doing whatever else he needed to do to get in the door of the White House.
10:44And, Kat, John Swinney's played a bit of a blinder politically on this because at his press conference on Wednesday, he was talking about the fact that he thinks the UK government weren't making whiskey enough of a priority.
10:56He was talking about the fact that he's come in and created a platform for a deal and now it's over to the UK government to get that over the line.
11:01But you speak to the UK government and they would say that actually behind the scenes there's been talks about whiskey going on for ages.
11:07Like literally years they've been talking about this or issues related to it.
11:11But John Swinney's managed to basically come in and steal their thunder, steal their limelight.
11:17Yeah, if you listen to Boris Johnson, as I'm sure we all do, he accused Nicholas Sturgeon of stealing from his playbook in that Sturgeon used to go to the Cobra briefings, come out,
11:29and then make her announcements first during COVID.
11:33And Boris said, steal all of his best ideas.
11:37And this seems to be what John Swinney's done.
11:40If you listen to the UK government, as you say, they say that they have been talking about whiskey.
11:45Trump would counter that.
11:47Trump apparently told reporters on Air Force One that there hadn't been discussions about whiskey.
11:53But does Trump ever know what he's talking about?
11:56It's very hard to tell.
11:57But in this case, it's win-win for John Swinney, because if the tariffs don't come off, then he can blame the UK government.
12:04If they do come off, then he can take full credit.
12:07So it is an absolute blinder of a move.
12:10And it's important for him as well, because you remember the fractious relationship between the SNP, the Scottish government,
12:17and the alcohol industry following minimum unit pricing.
12:20That was a huge headache.
12:21And in the run-up to an election, that is a major industry that the Scottish government needs to have on board.
12:27So this is him coming out and saying, look what I'm trying to do for you.
12:30I'm trying to save you all of this money that you're losing on tariffs.
12:34And it looks great.
12:35Optically, it looks brilliant for John Swinney.
12:38So he's maybe stolen from the Nicola Sturgeon playbook, stolen from the Boris Johnson playbook.
12:44Who knows?
12:44It's an absolute win-win.
12:47And David, I know it's a difficult question, but what do you think is the chance of success?
12:52I mean, behind the scenes, I know there's been all this talk about the removal of tariffs, these zero-on-zero tariffs,
12:57some kind of deal that would mean tariffs were removed completely for whiskey in exchange for spirits from the US.
13:02But it also seems that behind the scenes, they're sort of playing down the prospect of that,
13:07and that actually any reduction in tariffs would be a massive win, and we need to keep that in mind.
13:14Yeah, it's very difficult to see Donald Trump just conceding on something that he doesn't get anything out of.
13:19He seems to go through all his decisions in the presidency as a business deal or a real estate deal.
13:26Everything boils down to money for him, so I can't see him just conceding just because John Swinney, he likes him.
13:36He seems to have taken a shine to him, especially when he came over to Scotland.
13:40He pointed out John Swinney specifically is a guy he likes, but he's not going to concede if he doesn't get anything out of it.
13:47So I do think it's very unlikely that we'll get that deal.
13:51You never know.
13:53They may have to pay something the other side of that.
13:55They might have to give up something, like you mentioned, at what cost, basically.
14:00But I think, as Kat said, if it doesn't come off, John Swinney can probably still go,
14:04well, I tried, and the UK government didn't pull its weight.
14:07So for him, politically, it's gold, really.
14:11And Kat, just before we recorded this podcast, shortly before, Peter Mandelson, the UK ambassador to the US,
14:19was sacked after new information emerged about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
14:24Do you think that could have any impact on Trump's second state visit to the UK, which is coming up next week?
14:30It's awful timing, to be honest, from the UK's point of view.
14:35And any kind of knock-on impact on trade talks, not just the whiskey talks, but just the wider,
14:41the wider trade deal that's going on.
14:43I think those concerns are why Keir Starmer is dithered on this.
14:48And it's twice in just over a week that he's defended one of his colleagues and then ended up sacking him.
14:55He came out in full hope to defence of Angela Rayner.
14:58And then a couple of days later, she was gone.
15:01He was defending Peter Mandelson just on Wednesday, and now he's gone.
15:05There are so many questions around how much Keir Starmer knew when he was making that defence of Peter Mandelson.
15:10And he doesn't move quickly, Keir Starmer.
15:15He's not nimble.
15:16He is thoughtful.
15:18He's not, he's better in long form.
15:20He's not good at soundbites.
15:21And I think you see that in his decision-making on these sorts of issues.
15:25But you have to have that speed in politics.
15:28You have to have that nimbleness in politics.
15:29And when it comes to something of the gravity of what the Peter Mandelson situation is, then there seems no reason not to move quickly, other than in the context of the state visit next week and the issues around negotiating tariffs.
15:44I think it is going to be extremely difficult for Keir Starmer.
15:48Will Donald Trump look sympathetically on the decision to sack Peter Mandelson?
15:53It's very difficult to say because I just don't think that we can treat Donald Trump like a normal politician and try and think forward and strategise on his thoughts because he's so capricious.
16:03You never know what's coming down the line, but certainly I think that concern has really played into how Keir Starmer has handled this situation and he hasn't handled it well.
16:15Yeah, I mean, I thought you put it quite diplomatically by saying he isn't nimble in his approach to things.
16:21I mean, there's that kind of saying that you campaign in poetry, you govern in prose.
16:26Keir Starmer seems to do both in kind of bureaucratic legalese.
16:30He's just not a kind of, he's not very, doesn't seem to be great at the kind of raw politics of it.
16:35Although I'm not saying that these things are not easy, these decisions are not simple.
16:39Sometimes when you see commentators giving their hot takes in social media, you'd be forgiven for thinking there are clear answers.
16:45I don't think there often is.
16:47But David, you were in a huddle with journalists asking John Swinney about this after First Minister's questions.
16:54What did he have to say about it?
16:55Yeah, so he was asked about whether this would kind of scupper any whisky or trade deal.
17:01And he was quite adamant that he doesn't think it will because Keir Madison, although he's been obviously involved to some extent,
17:08has been dealt with through kind of a trading negotiation team from the UK government.
17:13So he was quite confident that this won't derail anything, but he's obviously going to say that anyway.
17:20He was kind of questioning the Prime Minister's judgment, though, about what he knew when he hired him.
17:27So I think there are questions for Keir Starmer.
17:29Like you said, he's not nimble.
17:30He doesn't think on his feet.
17:32And he always says he's going to consider the evidence or he's going to have a look at it.
17:36But as we've just seen this week, things can change so quickly.
17:41And then you just end up being on the back foot straight away.
17:43So the timing is all for what they probably thought or at least hoped it would kind of keep calm enough to for him to stay in place while Trump came over.
17:52And that's obviously not been possible.
17:55And it is just quite a big mess.
17:57And it's just going to overshadow whatever really happens, I would have thought.
18:00Even if there is a deal, the story is still going to be on Mandelson and that relationship,
18:05especially given Donald Trump's kind of ties with Jeffrey Epstein as well.
18:10It's just a bit awkward on all fronts.
18:13Yeah.
18:14And I'd like to go back to that.
18:16I mean, I'm just kind of fascinated by this relationship between John Swinney and Donald Trump,
18:20because they are such different politicians.
18:21And yet they seem to have struck up some kind of, you know, reasonably good relationship with each other.
18:27I mean, he will, John Swinney will be playing a part in that state visit.
18:30I think he's going to be down in London for some of it next week.
18:34And obviously he met Donald Trump in Scotland in July.
18:38They seem to, as I say, get on.
18:39Donald Trump hails him as a terrific guy, singled him out for praise when he opened his golf course in Aberdeenshire.
18:44I mean, on the face of it, this is such an unlikely relationship.
18:47And it's something that you can't really have imagined that Nicola Sturgeon would have been able to do, really.
18:52Well, it's also an unlikely relationship because John Swinney backed Kamala Harris in the presidential race.
18:59And he hasn't held back in being critical of Donald Trump.
19:03He's suggested previously that he wouldn't want to meet with him,
19:06that he shouldn't have the luxury of a state visit.
19:11He's been pretty critical and yet faced with the actual politics of the situation,
19:17he's decided better the devil you know.
19:19And what was it you said, David Ball, shaking hands and holding your nose at the same time?
19:24It is a sucking with a long spoon kind of situation.
19:28John Swinney has played it very cleverly.
19:30He's identified what Donald Trump likes and he's playing into that.
19:34So Donald Trump likes a strong man, he likes a challenge, he can't abide weakness.
19:41And so John Swinney has said, we're not going across to the U.S. with a begging bowl,
19:45we're going across and we're saying very clearly, this is what we need, this is what we want.
19:50And he's couched that in terms of how it will help the U.S., how it will help the bourbon industry.
19:56And that's what he did at the time of the visit in July.
19:59He talked about having been over, I think, in Kentucky and speaking to the people who make the Kentucky bourbon.
20:06He has been politically very clever and Donald Trump likes to be flattered.
20:11So I think John Swinney has just handled this particularly well.
20:17Whether they're going to go for a pint, I highly doubt it.
20:21But, you know, in public, it all seems to be doing pretty well.
20:25But again, it's Donald Trump, give it five minutes, he could change his mind.
20:30Yeah, I think that's like the stuff you were saying there, I think, is very true in terms of what John Swinney,
20:35what buttons John Swinney has chosen to press when it comes to the readout from these meetings,
20:40talking, like you say, about jobs in America and the kind of the bourbon industry.
20:45And also really focusing on the Western Isles.
20:47He was saying yesterday he was speaking to Donald Trump about the Isle of Harris distillery
20:50and some of the impact, the wider problems in the industry has created there in terms of local jobs.
20:56And he was saying that Donald Trump is really interested in the Western Isles because obviously his mum is from Lewis.
21:02But it's fascinating stuff.
21:05That's all we've got time for.
21:06But I'm sure when we do the podcast again next week, there'll be lots more to discuss on this.
21:12We may even have an answer as to whether a deal was, in fact, possible.
21:15But until then, thank you very much for listening.
21:18Please stay tuned to the Scotsman's website for all the latest news, comment and analysis.
21:22Thank you very much.
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