Nicola Sturgeon was forced to defend her plans for an independent Scotland after Piers Morgan grilled her relentlessly on the issue of a hard border. The First Minister insists she wants a free border between countries in the event of a successful referendum. However the ITV Good Morning Britain host explained why this would be “almost impossible” for the SNP to achieve.
Mr Morgan asked: “If you’re successful, you have a good election, you force through a referendum, Scotland this time votes to leave, have you worked out what to do about the border yet?”
Ms Sturgeon told him: “I want a free border between Scotland and England, just as I want free borders with the UK and the single market.
“But you can’t answer these questions because we don’t yet know what the border is going to be between the UK and the EU.”
The ITV host shot back: “We don’t know because actually, it’s almost impossible to do it without a hard border, that’s why it’s not been resolved.”
READ MORE: Sturgeon blasted for ‘criminalising’ Scots as MSP exposes travel ban
During the wide-ranging interview ahead of Ms Sturgeon’s speech to the SNP conference later today, the First Minister also clashed ITV Good Morning Britain host Susanna Reid over the “devastating” mistakes made, as the SNP leader was accused of having a “worse record” than England on the handling of coronavirus in care homes.
Ms Reid pointed to a research report that had analysed the SNP’s approach to the care home sector.
She told the Scottish leader: “If you look at the figures for care homes, you do appear to have a worse record than England.
“The University of Stirling report found that in Scotland 47 percent of deaths attributed to COVID-19 occurred in care homes. That compares to 30 percent in England.
“What did you get wrong there when it came to sending people home from hospital to care homes?”
Ms Sturgeon defended herself, claiming that the number of excess deaths was actually lower in Scotland than in England.
She said: “I just have to give a bit of context to those figures you’ve used.
“When you look at excess deaths in care homes over the course of this pandemic, actually the figure is lower in Scotland than in England.
“But what we see is that more of those deaths have been attributed to COVID.
“So there are a number of excess deaths that have happened in England which, for whatever reason, have not been attributed to COVID, and it would be for others to explain why that is not the case.”
