NICOLA Sturgeon has spent the past week giving high-profile interviews to the likes of ITV and BBC Breakfast.
But when it came to facing the Scottish press following her book launch on Thursday, she and her team left a sour taste in the mouths of many journalists.
I was among a pack of print journalists who turned up as instructed to a room inside the Edinburgh Futures Institute. When I arrived, I was told to “hover with intent” by a press officer as the broadcast journalists would be questioning the former first minister first, followed by a print huddle.
I was happy to wait, though I did feel confused as normally the print journalists would listen in to the broadcast interviews for any news lines that would later come out anyway.
As others joined me outside room 2.35, one of the journalists from The Sun emerged from the room to say we could go in. Happy days.
But as we all sat next to our broadcast colleagues, print journalists were then asked to leave the room, which sparked a bit of a row.
One by one reporters began to make their case this was the way we always did things, and Sturgeon had witnessed it many times before. One broadcast journalist stuck up for us and explained we were not about to get in the way or interject in their interviews, we would just be staying quiet and listening in before getting our turn to ask questions, which is standard procedure. She was more than happy to accommodate it and no one else argued. So, no issues right?
But we were told repeatedly this was the way it had to be, while being given little explanation as to why. The main argument seemed to be that Sturgeon was short on time. Surely though we would be saving time if we listened into the broadcast questions, so as not to repeat them? No?
No. The press officer duly left huffing and puffing before Sturgeon herself emerged to announce this would now be a “combined huddle” of broadcast and print, and she would only have time to take the odd question from print after broadcasters.
In more than three years of working for The National, I had never come across such an arrangement, because it simply doesn’t work, particularly when there is a clock to contend with. With bulky camera equipment set up, it is very difficult for print journalists to catch the attention of the interviewee as they struggle for space, so the result was that two or three print journalists got a question in, despite several more being present.
I should add that the broadcast journalists were also promised one-to-one time with Sturgeon but did not receive it after she turned up late.
In the end, all the papers and broadcasters in Scotland got a grand total of 14 minutes with Sturgeon, who seemed ready to leave before she arrived. She gave very short answers to questions and kept wanting to move on, saying things like “next question”. It felt like she was telling us she didn’t want to be there and we were wasting her time.
So, when you’re watching clips of Sturgeon this week from STV or Sky News or LBC, now you know what really happened the other side of the cameras.
