WESTMINSTER POLITICS DECAYS BEFORE OUR EYES Klaudia Lenčišová MV4 – 2. ročník 2017/2018

The explanation PHRASES – in bold 1) – the most simple phrases 2) – more difficult - useful phrases 3) – the most diplomatic / the most difficult phrases

INTRODUCTION Good morning to everyone and thank you all for coming! My name is .... and – 1) It is my happy task today to introduce / Let me say a huge welcome to / I am privileged to welcome / Join me in welcoming / It is an enormous pleasure this morning to be welcoming... 2) Let me extend a sincere welcome to / I am delighted to welcome bona fide expert / It is an absolute honour to be hosting the brilliant and inspirational man... 3) Distinguished guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, let me, on behalf of FPVMV UMB and myself, extend a very warm welcome to the ... / Let me at the outset extend a warm welcome to the distinguished speaker that is joining us today ... ... Mr. Alexander Salmond - who used to work as the First Minister of Scotland from 2007 – 2014.

GIVING THE CREDENTIALS - in another words = to mention his / her achievements ALEX SALMOND - one of the formers and leader of the SNP - was the member of Parliament - during the 2015 – 2017 = the SNP International Affairs and Europe spokesperson in the House of Commons - one of the foremost proponents of Scottish independence

GIVING THE FLOOR Today, we have a great pleasure and privilege of listening to Mr. Salmond – talking about the current situation in Westminster parliament. We are honoured that you have found a time in your busy schedule to come and indeed by your presence here – so thank you very much for your coming. 1) Now I would like to give the floor... 2) I would like to turn it over to... / It is my great pleasure to turn it over to... / So, without further ado – I´m giving you the floor. 3) Without further ado, I shall give you the floor. / Without any further delay, I´m going to give you the floor....

THE START OF THE SPEECH : „Thank you...“ ...FOR INTRODUCTION : Thank you very much for those nice remarks. Thank you very much for your indeed kind introduction. ...FOR INVITING : Thank you for having me. / Thank you for inviting me here. ...EXPRESSING THE DELIGHT : I am very honored to be here. It is a pleasure to be here at the FPVMV UMB for the first time. It is nice to be here. It is a great delight to be back here. ...FOR COMING : Thank you very much for coming this morning.

VERY BRIEF OUTLINE 1) Today´s topic will be about / Today´s talk will be about / Today´s talk is going to be about / The subject of this talk is .... 2) Today´s talk is concerned by / The subject I want to talk about is a subject that, it is believed, will dominate / The talk examines chances of Scotland in becoming independent country. But before we get to the heart and soul of this talk / before we get to the nuts and bolts of this talk, let‘ s make one preliminary point. The point is that if we look at the state, in which is Britain politics right now – we find out that timing has never looked better for this speech and also for the Scottish revolutionary people.

OUTLINE 1) Ladies and gentlemen, today´s talk is / this talk will be / this talk is going to be divided into 4 parts. 2) Basically / Briefly, there are 3 things to be presented / to be discussed. 3) There are number of points that are needed to be made : ______________________________________________________________________________ First, we are going to do a brief overview of / Firstly of all, there´s going to be  little bit of background on history of Scotland and it‘ s attempts for independence. Next, the speech would like to focus on / Initially, a word or two will be given to / Next, we will go on to the description of nowadays British politics and condition. The final point will - would be dedicated / The final point would briefly highlight / In the final point we would touch on / In the final point we will spend a few minutes talking about next possible moves of Scotland and about different possibilities for the country.

THE FIRST SECTION Let´s start with / Maybe we should begin with / First of all, let´s begin – start by / First, let´s do a brief overview of / First of all, let´s give a little bit of background on history of attempts that were created in good faith of receiving the independence. Of course, all of it started by some pretty strong voices of the ones, who were not satisfied with living in the country, which is not free at all. It is understandable, that by doing such a thing, the courage of all the others had risen and as a matter of fact – the first bigger organisations were created. FINISHING THE SECTION : All of it led to a national referendum, which was held in Scotland on 18 September 2014. Voters were asked to answer either „Yes“ or „No“ to the question : „Should Scotland be an independent country?“ Well, it turned out that Scottish people do not want to be independent (because 55% voted for NO, while only 44% voted for YES). We can say that this is now still reality in the Britain and so that´s all, that it´s needed to be said about it. / So much for the history. / We´ve looked at the history of the attempts – and now, it is time to continue with something else.

STARTING A NEW SECTION Moving on now to / Turning to / Let´s turn now to / The next issue – topic – area we are going to focus on is / It would be appropiate to expand – elaborate on / Let´s look now at the state, in which is the British politics right now. We can say that we have never had a chance to see the Britain in a state of more disorientation and chaos. It has got no mates in Europe – just not a single friend across the continent. As it has been already said , the structures of Westminster politics are decaying before our eyes - simply put / in other words / so what it is saying is / to put it more simply / to put it another way / another way of putting it is that right this is a matter of their weakness - that is needed to be used. So let me just finish by asking : where does that lead us? / Why is this important? / Translated into real terms, the significance of this is that right this moment is the perfect moment for Scotland to start with a new campaign.

THE THIRD SECTION Now, let´s turn briefly to / Let´s say a word about / Now a couple of words on / The next issue is what can we do about this situation? How can we use it for our own good? Well - a few steps have been already made. What are we talking about is bringing together about 1 600 activists at Edingburgh‘ s Usher Hall to explore the future of the movement. Obviously, the strength of the Scotland activists is great, while we can still feel the weakness of the opponents. That mean that right this is the point, which dictates the timing of the campaign and the timing has never looked better for the national cause of Scotland. The next step is going to be creating a referendum – although it may not appeal to the citizens right now – because they may feel for example / as an illustration / to give you an example / to illustrate this point that they are not ready for independence right now, they are not ready for another referendum....We can say that the case in point is Brexit. BUT the only way, how to overcome these reservations is by leadership going into the campaign. So let‘ s end these remarks on a realist vision : this needed referendum is probably going to be succesfull – because all of the mentioned factors.

SUMMARISING AND CONCLUDING 1) To sum up / To summarise / To conclude / In conclusion / LETS RECAP - SUM UP, WHAT HAS BEEN SAID – COVERED IN TODAY‘S TALK. 2) Let´s just conclude with / Let´s conclude by suggesting / Let´s sum up, shall we? /So, to remind you of what we´ve covered in this talk . 3) Unfortunately, it seems we have run out of time, so I´ll conclude very briefly by saying that / Let´s summarise briefly what we have looked at / If it is possible to just sum up the main points... While in the first section we have covered the history of the attempts for reaching the independence, in the second one we analyzed the political state of Britain. In the final section we touched – we moved to – we spent a few minutes talking about – a few words were given to / Finally the issue of next possible steps for Scotland in general, were mentioned.

Q & A 1) Would you like to ask any questions? / Any questions? 2) Let´s open up now the space for question session / Let´s open up now the floor for Q&A session / Please, feel free to ask questions. 3) And now, if you would like me to elaborate on any point, please ask. POSSIBLE REACTIONS : Thank you for your question, because it leads to a good summary of what has been said here today. On the first question I think .... On the question of ... Let me talk about the second point first ...

THE END If nobody has the question : 1) I would like to thank ... 2) Please join me in thanking ... ...Mr. Salmond for an terrific hour / though-provoking lecture. We hope you will visit our faculty ever again in the future. EXPRESSING THE GRATITUDE Thank you for having me here.