The Scotsman Bulletin Monday April 21 2025 #PopeFrancis
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Hello and welcome to the Scotsman's Daily Video Bulletin for this Easter Monday.
00:04My name's Dale Miller, I'm Deputy Editor of the Scotsman and I'm joined by our Arts and Culture Correspondent Jane Bradley.
00:11And Jane, we thought it might be quite a day to finish off the Easter weekend, but some significant news to talk about with confirmation of Pope Francis' death.
00:23I want to ask you about just some of the details around that shortly, but we'll pull up a copy of the front page of today's paper first.
00:33And we led on a story from education correspondent Calum Ross, just saying it was an investigation run by him showing the number of university staff earning six figures.
00:44So this is an excess of £100,000, had risen dramatically over the past couple of years.
00:51In fact, a 50% rise in total.
00:56And some of the universities that are contemplating considering cuts, including Edinburgh, are reflected in those figures and amongst the rises.
01:06So obviously cost to staff going up now.
01:10Some of the universities have been quick to stress that these figures were recorded before some of the recent cost cutting or amalgamation measures have been initiated.
01:25And so the picture could look very different in 12 months' time, but still a bit of an alarming statistic and a strong news story there from Calum.
01:35You can read that at scotsman.com.
01:38Jane, the Pope's death, we had that confirmed this morning.
01:43Can you just take us through the basic details?
01:46Yeah.
01:46So the news came out really quite quickly after it happened.
01:50The Pope passed away at 7.30 this morning, I believe, at his residence in the Vatican.
01:55And it was just a couple of hours later when Vatican officials confirmed that that had happened.
02:01As most people probably know, he's been unwell for the past few months.
02:06He was in hospital a couple of months ago.
02:08And then he did seem to rally and he was out of hospital.
02:11And, in fact, I think yesterday he was greeting worshippers in St. Peter's Square and, you know, seemed in good spirits.
02:19Everybody was happy to see him.
02:21I think it was quite a surprise appearance by him because everyone was concerned about his health.
02:25Obviously, he was a very elderly man.
02:27And then, obviously, this morning, we've had the sad news that he has died.
02:33And coming across the Easter weekend as well will be a significant moment in terms of the timing for a lot of people that follow the church.
02:43Obviously, we've had First Minister John Swinney alongside a host of other people paying tribute to the Pope this morning.
02:51And if you want to know exactly what happens next, how the Papal Conclave go about selecting a new Pope, we've got an article up at scotsman.com.
03:01You can read throughout the whole process there as well as ongoing tributes to the Pope, what he achieved during his time and how he came to the role as well.
03:11That will all be available at scotsman.com.
03:13Jane, away from that, the arts and culture sector never sleeps.
03:19You did a bit of a sit-down interview with the new Fringe Society chief executive that we ran towards the back end of last week.
03:27And what he had to say was pretty fascinating.
03:30Yeah, so I spoke to Tony Lancaster.
03:33It was his eighth day, I believe, in the role when I met him.
03:37So he hasn't had much time.
03:38He's just arrived in Edinburgh.
03:40He is South African.
03:42He's got a background in most recently in arts.
03:44He was at Riverside Studios in London for the past few years.
03:48But before that, he was chief executive of a big arts festival in South Africa.
03:52So, you know, he has got a background in, you know, huge arts festivals, not quite on the same scale as the Fringe, which, as we know, is the world's biggest arts festival.
04:01But, you know, he is very dedicated to the arts.
04:05He also, interestingly, has a business background.
04:08So he was on the side of sort of corporate sponsorship in a big financial firm in South Africa before he moved into the arts world.
04:14And it's interesting speaking to him that that's what he wants to take forward for the Fringe.
04:19He's obviously also very passionate about the actual, you know, the culture and the arts performance side of the Fringe.
04:26But he says he really wants to make sure that the Fringe realises its corporate value.
04:31He talked quite a lot about how arts organisations are quite timid in realising their value.
04:36He said, you know, when he was on the other side and he was a sponsorship manager, sports organisations would come to him and say, you know, this is great.
04:43We've got this big event.
04:45We can give you sponsorship for this.
04:46We can put your name on the shirts of the players.
04:48We can, you know, we're going to be broadcast to so many people on TV and so on and so on.
04:52And he said, arts organisations come and go, please, can you help us out?
04:55And he said he wants to change that and he wants to make it clear to everybody what sponsorship of the Fringe can do them as a company.
05:05Unfortunately, just a couple of days after I spoke to him, we discovered and ran an exclusive on the fact that the Fringe has actually lost one of its main sponsors, Johnny Walker,
05:15which has been a sponsor of the Fringe for the last number of years and has been one of its main sponsors.
05:21So it is going to be challenging times ahead and quite a sort of baptism of fire for Tony Lancaster, who's just started in the job.
05:28Fair to say, Edinburgh, as much as there's a love-hate relationship, and I know he addresses that as well in the interview amongst locals,
05:37the Fringe has always been a massive selling point for the city.
05:40We know how many domestic and international tourists it pulls in.
05:44And so the argument about the commercial value of the festival, I think, is undeniable.
05:51So it'll be interesting to see what he can realise while he's in that role, having taken over from Sean McCarthy,
05:58who has been a mainstay of the head of the society for some time.
06:02You can read that full interview from Jane at scotsman.com,
06:06and you can read the news on Johnny Walker as well and the path forward there.
06:11Jane, thanks very much for joining us.
06:14You can get all the very latest across arts and culture, politics and news,
06:19both here in Scotland, the UK and abroad at scotsman.com.
06:23And please go out and pick up a copy of the paper tomorrow.
06:26We'll have a full wrap, including setting up what will be a big statement on gender this week,
06:33taking place at the Scottish Parliament in the wake of last week's Supreme Court verdict.
06:39Thanks for joining us.