aman's is a young m.p. and fairbridge one nine hundred seventy four now he sits in the house of lords is played commies only peter of the realm in between is the age of play to the party of wales he took the party to its best ever election result in the first assembly elections of one nine hundred ninety nine and to within a whisker of ending labor supremacy of world politics in this interview he explains why played unlike the s.n.p. have never managed to build on that success but i guess it breaks it may be about to change the political landscape of wales but first your tweets messages and emails and in the nation to ensure a couple of weeks ago with lembit or pick and peter tatchell son campbell says to heartfelt interviews last night we sometimes forget what our politicians do after losing their seat it's not always back to an edited family business absolutely so suzanne when finlayson says in relation to last week's show great interview with alex neil what an interesting life he's had i wish the show was an hour long of a bit about mind kind of lines there is fascinating reflective and candid

discussion i hope more people take time to watch it came to you curling and finally arthur said fascinating walk through of devolution history great interview and a big yes to the model for an independent scotland or facts are there i now over to alex and data directly. sudden i joined by dr wigley barden wiggle that should say duff and welcome to the alex salmond show thanks very much indeed alex i want to take you back to your entry into politics in the early one nine hundred seventy s. i mean you had a successful business career joining play company and stanley for parliament wasn't exactly a career move well when i stood the first time for parliament in one hundred seventy i didn't get elected and when i went back i was working with mars then of course accountant and the head of mars give me a choice he said i could have a good career with mars i could quite possibly have a good political career but i couldn't have both so i joined hoover i became a financial controller hoover in merthyr and when i was elected in one hundred

seventy four they had a drop of fifty percent in place salary eleven or cleaned up the votes and cannot and then i arrived in the house of commons as the one of two of the fust calmly m.p. selected the general election then joined and told by the legend together for evidence so those three a few hot house parliament a hung parliament through the seventy's indeed but as i'm a fire well it was but we had the company of eleven the s.n.p. the scotland first eleven as i recall them being called iconic people like whitney ewing and donnie stewart to go and wilson and people like that george reid of course so we were able to work as a team at a time when the labor government barely had a majority they had an agreement with the liberals as they then were to stay in until maybe seventy eight but then in the winter of seventy eight through to seventy nine they were in serious trouble and that's when a small party of course can do a little bit on the margins so it seemed for a time that scotland and wales were set fair to get the assemblies of parliament i

mean was a big setback it was a big setback in the referendum then scotland of course voted to have a parliament but because the rules had been cooked in westminster they didn't get over the forty percent threshold forty percent of everybody including dead people on the register they were refused. to. have that devolve power meant we had a bad result the labor party whose policy it was of course they were split down the middle and people like neil kinnock were leading the campaign against evolution of their time and it was four to one majority against and i'll be honest i thought that probably in my lifetime a thing was dead but over the subsequent couple of decades things did change and i was glad to be in a position to influence those changes and your own constituency us triumphantly on from move large majority to larger majority leader maybe a few s.n.p. colleagues at that table fell by the wayside in the aftermath of the tory victory of seven tonight because of the seventy nine vote of confidence who was a phenomenal voter and

a labor lost by one vote and that was from northern ireland who came along and abstained in person it was a historic site and we had negotiated the package with the labor government important things like compensation to slay quarrymen and half a dozen other things which they did deliver fair play to them although they lost by one vote there was a scramble to get things through at the end of the s.n.p. had voted against the labor government and i think they paid the price in the subsequent election and there are some lessons to be learnt no doubt and i think you were in the process then alex of teaching people what those lessons were but you yourself for then became president leader of player coming succeeding going if i have an issue i think of being president of thirty five years that i had so i was still up relatively young politician becoming leader of your party but having the great set back of the referendum and wheels of night is something i how did you take the party forward what did you think the prospects for ply company success

well of course we were fairly well divided that i had an election against my colleague politically delish thomas and i just sneaked didn't play as somebody said a bus load of votes which i succeeded in organizing where did you get the bus wrong well we got it locally although one of my adversaries are tied with the the. pressured out in the tires to make sure they arrived late but it was that sort of election but what i'd learned at that time was the importance of showing that we were talking sense not just about evolution and about the economy and about europe but also about day to day matters disability politics is very close to my heart because of the difficulty we had a cold we lost two boys and i was lucky enough in one thousand nine hundred one to get a disabled persons act onto the statute book using parliamentary devices that are usually not used and that gave a boost and there are a number of one off campaigns like that companies such as the price of water in wales which was a scandal at that time where we were able to latch onto issues and project the fact

that we were standing up for wales personal targeted the loss of two sons over to your political career you had to take a backseat but instill in you the tremendous valve of campaigning on disability issues yes. i felt that i had been put in that position by whatever fluke it was that i was in the right place at the right time to stand up and to work with people like jack ashley was a tremendous campaigner morris lewis carter jones great people and working across party lines in order to get some progress for disabled people and that was something that kept me going when you were in the small party as you probably think back far enough you can remember you can be in a lonely position and you need small victories to keep your batteries charged and that's what is happening with the disability campaign and with a number of campaigns we had during that period the one of the important things i had at that stage that i felt very strongly about was the european dimension

plighted campaigned in seventy five against continued membership of the european community is then was i felt very strongly that we should be in and i'm afraid i broke party ranks. and in the fullness of time by the end of the eighty's the whole party had come around to accept that. meant independence in the europe was the sensible the only real context for a small country like wales and that's why what's going on now has this particular poignancy for me i had some experience of breaking party ranks as well in my younger days but by the ninety's both of us were back in parliament and the political fortunes were starting to swing and there were a bit of scotland and the deed of well yes there were the eighty seven election when you came in and margaret doing was with you and the welsh remember right we had three members you had a couple who joined you one by election and another person to cross the floor to join you that give you five so we were well balanced team and we were able to work

together at that time and the changes that were happening in scotland i think john smith was realising that the claim of rights basis in scotland to the power comes from the people and not from establishment should have justify getting the scottish parliament back in one hundred seventy nine and he regarded it as you well know it was his unfinished business and because that momentum was building up in scotland and because there were changes happening in northern ireland which john major my parliamentary pair was involved involve very much and understood yes prime minister at the time and he was recognising that if the people of northern ireland voted for reunification of ireland that should happen and he said of the people scotland or wales voted for independence he would be very sad about it but he would respect it and that was in a way that a claim of right the recognition that our nation's how had the legitimacy to make that decision and that gave an urgency then for us to be able to use that opportunity later in the ninety's as it came as a young leader of the s.n.p.

in the one nine hundred ninety s. i rather model my campaigning style and you're. very. but if you consciously see the opportunity of progressing wales is. claim in the in the in the lead of scotland said vance well of course scotland's advance was a tremendous boost for us of the two parties been very close together and sometimes played in the one nine hundred sixty s. a little bit ahead and then the s.n.p. was a little bit ahead we came back in the late seventy's early eighty's and therefore we were inspiring each other and that was a great thing but there were also several of the changes that took place from the referendum in one hundred seventy nine to one thousand nine hundred seventy for example we had four sectors of state for wales that weren't even welsh m.p.'s that these were tories people like john redwood and who had some difficulty with the welsh national anthem asylum and yes there's a lesson for us all though if you don't know the words don't try to have

a. clip of film was used ever after but the point was the decisions were being taken by sectors of state that weren't in any way answerable to it some of them were good people peter walker was a good person and. we work closely with people like that and david hunter and william hague but that highlighted the democratic deficit that existed in wales we were governed by a whole lot of quangos the welsh development agency and bodies like that that again were answerable to a non well secular state and not to the people wales we also had the european dimension the decisions were being taken in brussels and we weren't getting a direct voice there so these gave the opportunity to project the need for us to have control over our own affairs what got you one question about europe which is always fascinated me you and i and the mastic process where we're both busy doing deals in the house of commons we did a deal in the committee of the regions something we supported then we supported the

mastic treaty of course. scotland doing this deal with john major on something we supported but the guardian this enormous betrayal despite the benefits been wales of course you were greeted as a national hero for securing these things while quite the difference to well i would say the as a national hero but what matters is the content. so what you negotiating and if people see that the packages you're getting and we get a package included three things yes the committee the regions but also internet funding which helped western wales linking up with island and we got an all wales body representing local government and m.p.'s to debate two or three times a year the question of wales's role in europe now and that was an embryonic parliament if you like and it showed the need for us to have that parliament in the european context so all these things it wasn't the fact that we negotiated people didn't mind what we negotiated with who if we could deliver things that were beneficial for you it was so weird back to referendums with the end coming labor government resoundingly college in scotland and carried by

a whisker in wales but still carried still carried i mean that night i'll never forget because the smaller urban. authorities were the ones that brought the results in first and these were all going against this is like a football match when you can have to have time to go goes to nil four nil seven will ten mil at half time on the sort of match then in the second half it came around and the final announcement was in good. old erica martin come on that you came through and in the swing what would otherwise have been a no vote and i wondered at that time whether tony blair would have all of the outcome of the referendum and he did to his credit and that reminds me in the present context that we also have to have an on a ring of what people voted for though i really hated the outcome of that referendum in scotland or in the fortunate position of people voted talking about intellects that yes the bracks vote we knew as

a course of voted for brics it's by more or less the same pattern as as in england that was a great blow but nonetheless battles go on and that but one must respect the view of the people you can't just ignore it. current. system. of. there's strong pressure by the security cabinets by the pentagon and by the media on down donald trump to do something about secret probably at some stage he might get into this pressure but i don't think it is his intention what i consider more likely than another u.s. military attack on syria is that the united states policy bill deep to wreck any

ethic by the russians to turks and iranians to find a political solution. is this is harlan kentucky. boys you can walk through street fanny's. a coma any city with almost no coal mines left. the jobs are gone all the coal miners the said i'd. love to see these people the survivors of a world disappearing before their eyes. i remember thinking when i was younger that if anything ever happened to the coal mines here that it would become a ghost town but i never thought in the million years i would see that and it's how it's happened. so

you headed to the one thousand nine hundred ninety the fust elections for a welsh national assembly that you know the head of your party you've got a head of steam behind you i knew a chief untasted result touching theft to the vote there's a lot of look in that i mean i couldn't believe that we had been just marginally ahead of the i said which i never expected to be in that position i think we were helped by the fact that labor chosen a leader in my. who although used a very competent person he didn't catch the imagination of the labor party let alone the wider electorate and because we were establishing a welsh parliament for the first time remember says oh england who were in fourteen hundred we go back six hundred years that made people think our plight have something to offer here this is played and they gave us the opportunity and we came back with seventy members labor had twenty eight members we had seventeen and we

had thirty percent of the vote you talk about the labor leadership equally crucial was your leadership you were at that point the best known politician in wales you were the leader of the opposition it was a household name but with a year you'd decided to step down what happened then well the worst thing that happened to me was that i had a awful shock the term there was a difficult my heart and i had to be rushed to manchester and i really rushed i went in for a scanning it and send it know and they looked at me and they said oh you're fine go oh no and they phoned immediately and got me through to mention i had a stent put in over time and i actually reminded one that we are all human mortals and that things can go wrong and there are also some divisions within the party in the assembly you know than in the normal run of things probably are taking that head on but given that i was under orders not to put additional stress on myself i thought probably that was the best time to pass the u.n.

on the only opposition leader who stood down i stood at that table well i reckon i came back again yeah obviously the s.n.p. moved into government in two thousand and seven then one resulting only in twenty eleven why wasn't the same position in one thousand nine hundred ninety. six s. i think one of the reasons was that labor ditched alan michael with our help we orchestrated the vote of confidence that it. gave labor the opportunity to elect the person. they wanted rhodri morgan now roger morgan was a charming person here he's dead now of course and. we wouldn't. pay every homage to him for the role he played what he did was to make the national assembly relevant to be put in there every day like it was he was seen as the man in the street in wales and labor benefited from that we were out of focus for

a while and also went to the place of power in wales as a junior partner in government never an easy position that was after two thousand and seven when we did have an opportunity then to form a coalition against labor and we were well on the road towards that played as the largest party and we would then have been leading a government with support of conservatives and lived. and the lib dems decided by a casting vote i think it was the literature lives cast that vote in their meeting against coming into a coalition now whether it worked or not i don't know i was out of the seventy by then of course you're in windows as leading played and the question was can you sustain with just a majority of one of the sustained with the. majority but i think we would we would have been challenged but we were we were up for it and the opposition didn't come so when that went by the wayside went into coalition with labor in order to deliver things for wales particularly the constitutional changes brought us up to the same

constitutional state as a scotland had the reserve model which we hadn't had before and it was necessary first to go through that step to get a real parliament as opposed to a little bit of a talking shop as the assembly was but then in two thousand and ten you have maps back again and this time reincarnated then they. host a lot of well yes waiting room to heaven it was a shock for a lot of people the background to that was this that as the constitutional model stood in two thousand and seven when the question arose and when i was elected by played. to be a nominee for the house of lords at that point in time. the only way that the national assembly could make primary legislation was if an order came through both the house of commons and the house of lords approving on each individual instance in other words the non-elected house of lords could head off the wishes of an elected government in wales and of course we were in coalition in that government

so we needed a voice there to speak up were that to happen in the in the fullness of time i didn't i didn't get those laws until two thousand and eleven in fact it was the end of two thousand and ten the announcement was made i took my seat in two thousand level because gordon brown had blocked me all the way through from two thousand and seven to two thousand and eleven here he was rumored to have said over his dead body would you see any nationals in the house of lords i think it's the same stance basically you're the one to be taking a self-fulfilling stance and the way we would fix that nomination but if we had ever i would've expected gordon bowed to be too favorable to such nominations but you know find yourself in that upper chamber unelected chamber in the middle of the maelstrom of this of the european union legislation the bracks that legislation and play a very prominent role in it well i found myself because i'm so passionately in favor of europe i believe now that we have to get a package that meets certain minimum. necessary steps for wales and for britain

because there's a british argument to some extent with regards to having access to the single market i mean customs union of the sort of thing to to make it practical otherwise our manufacturing industry very close to my heart our farmers and so many other sectors tourism would be devastated and therefore by being in the second chamber and being able to put amendments down to legislation on these matters at least as an opportunity to highlight them from a welsh angle and i have to work with people in all parties to to do that and of course europe is a subject that cuts across party divisions so it's that much easier to form alliances so after all these years when as a young politician you defied the plight. come really late in the in the mid seventy's to be in favor of europe you know find yourself a suspect in the south of the referendum but i suspect sensing an opportunity for wales and the shooter p. and a bit i absolutely i'm respecting the vote that took place but i don't think people were voting for what would be the worst of

a hard rexx it if there was no agreement and we walked out having achieved nothing in the negotiations now if that happens then there has to be a second vote not a rerun of the previous referendum but a confirmation revote that people want to go out on that basis and if they did vote no we stay here so looking at your of your career should rightly say of the national assembly for wales of the the first. body parliament on wheels for six hundred years. imagining in the house of commons and feb seventy four be pretty pleased with the progress that wheels us made over these last forty years can i say that in one thousand nine hundred eighty nine in march nine hundred seventy nine have been very pleased because it looks so dream then in one thousand nine hundred four we thought the progress would have come more quickly but it didn't and one has to work within the context of one's time and one's resources as a nation and one's own party resources so we move forward there's so much more to

do with the greatest disappointment for me has been the failure of successive labor governments to make progress on the economic agenda for wales we really are not getting anywhere on that one and that is so close to my heart for my industrial past that that's the one thing i would like to be in that to sort out and the constitutional future for wales and the political future for bardhan wakely. as far as wales is concerned it does depend so much on whether we stay in a meaningful way in unison with the european union if not a full member of it if we are in what used to be called the outer seven i think it was in that there are countries like sweden or denmark of the like many people who are no outside the eurozone who might well as i understand something in continental europe is moving in that direction for a two speed europe then britain may well still go into that common market type europe as opposed to european union type europe in which case where else can find

its level of scotland what's important is that we don't have barriers between wales and england between wales or scotland or ireland that we're in together because we want to build self-government and self-determination within the broader world not kid ourselves off and look inwards on ourselves. thank you so much for the interview bugs alex. from firebrand young m.p. to a button on the benches of the house the logs definitely was the most successful leader in the history of ply comrie the breakthrough at the first of a democratic elections for the national assembly of wales equal death of the s.n.p. in scotland of the progress of the troop office has been remarkably different sense of the s.n.p. becoming the dominant force in scottish politics apply the struggle to the main and second place in wales constitutional change has not been so different between the two countries as a national assembly is acquired lawmaking pose with the welsh moves forward often

being but one step behind those of scotland. office the opportunity to redefine welsh nationals and for the next generation it would be ironic if leaving europe offered a fresh impetus to the cause of wales given that the principle of the itself not only voted for bret's it of us changing the landscape will belong to the party which is fleet of foot enough to seize the moment and definitely believes that will be coming. but just a walk before you go let's have a sneak preview of what's coming up next week. from america.

from the constitutional future wales crossed the atlantic to union square. and the next free alex salmond shows the contribution of scotland to modern day america believe me as pretty lively stuff. and the second a serious. one of us. in these united states i mean the flaws will be shocked to get the political joke of the united states of america atop the knoll the george washington really realized what he was what you will self in for fear that.

because the slowness of the blood of them so money. to build your school or local was before. much of those who heard it's a preview of the few who do so see him we will. we will. move. move with. more show you the stupid you are a liberal who meets those who glitter and who the. more misled most of his goals the good you films for good girls. go to school so look i do the same you belong to school the story of the us would go. to starbucks to order some to meet until it was the little missed dates to look at is it's.

himself snow understands just means it's the mashed on truck stop the president and he's been trying this morning stint. as we have petitions to go. let's move to snorkel move to new york because those the girls who. were used to cool just to whom she looks mission shouldn't. could do for one who's doing. fracking gave americans a lot of new job opportunities needed to come up here to make some money like me twenty five thousand dollars as a teacher or i could make fifty thousand dollars a year in trucks or chose to drive trucks people rush to a small town in north dakota was an unemployment rate of zero percent just like the

gold rush it is very very similar to a gold drum but this beautiful story ended with pollution and the bus station a lot of people have left here i don't know too many people here anymore slow down too much they lost their jobs got laid off the american dream is changing that's not what it used to be. and it's a tough reality to deal with. algorithms that guy the product of google also guides the actions of the employees within a google and they can stop the algorithm isn't this just like fantasia the disney movie with mickey mouse worry goes to war with the dancing groom any size to chop it down to creates more than a trance a flood whether in the wizard alice i mean these are algorithms that are out of fricken control and employees within the company can't stop them there who are driven by algorithm who's in charge of the algorithm or the head of google those

running the show now. after donald trump fires off a series of contradictory tweets first threatening russia but later toning down his rhetoric the white house spokeswoman had a hard job to pin down the president's men. our maintaining that we have a number of options and all those options are still in the table what is needed certainly means i think there's a lot there that you can read from but at the same time the president has a number of options. in a statement through british police so she will refrain from media calling times and has refused help from the russian embassy and the relatives at least for now we have all the facts behind the poisoning of the scripts in the u.k. it was a variety of the movie. a single drop the use it now to kill ten people ten people we didn't need it.