Leader of the Alba Party Alex Salmond Speaks to T&G on Scottish Independence and More

Scotland's former first minister, Alex Salmond, has told Times Radio the lack of a second independence referendum has left the country in a "time loop" similar to the film Groundhog Day.

In an interview with Tom Newton Dunn and Jack Blanchard on T&G on Sunday (10am this morning), the Alba Party leader said:

Listeners and viewers will remember that Bill Murray film, Groundhog Day. The poor man was caught up in a time loop and it took him weeks to get out of it. Unfortunately Nicola has placed Scotland in a referendum time loop and it's taken six years and we're making no progress whatsoever.

Now the Bill Murray film was a comedy. This is tragedy. This is Groundhog Scotland, Groundhog referendum. (We're) being led up to the top of the hill and then marched back down again. So the Alba message is, look let's get on with this and let's stop finding excuses for preparing and giving Scotland what they've voted for in five successive national elections.

And he's also challenged the idea that Boris Johnson can prevent a second referendum:

To all these people who say what are you going to do when Boris Johnson says no? Listen. If you can face down David Cameron and George Osborne you can certainly face down Boris Johnson and the disco-king Michael Gove.

The idea that Johnson and Gove can stop a Scottish referendum when Cameron and Osborne couldn't, I think is nonsense. But it requires political determination to face down Westminster. The Civil Service should have been working on the new prospectus for six years, but they need to get on with it. And it requires a diplomatic mobilisation of people, a legal campaign to assert Scotland's right to self determination, of the will of democracy and above all the case for independence has to be refurbished for the new world. This is not the world of 2014, this is 2021 and beyond. Most obviously, Britain has now Brexited. Therefore, there's huge work to be done on the European policy, of currency policy and borders policy.

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