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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Now another poll this morning shows the Liberal Democrats in fourth place behind UKIP. With 18 months until the general election, can Nick Clegg reignite enthusiasm to ensure the party plays king maker again in 2015? Well the former Lib Dem leader, Charles Kennedy, joins me now, a very good morning to you Mr Kennedy. That’s the overarching, that’s the burning problem isn’t it for the Liberal Democrats as an election begins to loom? Fourth place in the polls and quite frankly it’s languishing.

CHARLES KENNEDY: Well I think we put the beginning of the building blocks in place at the conference but you’re right, the second half of parliaments tend to accelerate and go much more quickly than the first half psychologically, particularly for those of us inhabiting the place who want to be back in the next one but also the second half of this parliament is going to be unique in two features. First of all we know now the date of the general election, barring an act of God we now when it’s going to be but secondly we’re going to have the most seismic constitutional event in one part of the United Kingdom that is going to affect politics in all parts of the United Kingdom.

DM: In your part of the United Kingdom.

CHARLES KENNEDY: In my back yard, in Scotland, and in a sense everything through the prism, not being parochial but the impact that’s going to have on UK politics either if Scotland decides to stay which I hope we will, I think we’re better together or if Scotland decides to go its own way, England, Wales and Northern Ireland, no man is an island, well these entities are not an island either.

DM: But why is a no to independence, why is that seismic as well? Won’t it just go away and we’re back as we were?

CHARLES KENNEDY: No, it doesn’t. The argument has never gone away for 300 years in Scotland. I was never much good at physics in school but I do remember my teacher explaining in words of one syllable one law of physics and if you think about the unwritten UK constitution, it’s like a water mattress. If you press down on one bit of the water mattress, the only thing you can be sure of is that there will be an instantaneous reaction of an unpredictable nature somewhere else so when we push down on one part of the UK, other things are going to flow and if it’s independence that’s one thing and that’s got big ramifications for the European debate as well but if it’s not independence, it doesn’t cap the argument because rather like Quebec, ourselves, the Labour party and the Conservatives have all said if we vote to stay in the Union, we have to keep reforming the Union. Well you can only tinker at that the way that we have been without addressing bigger issues at Westminster to do with England in particular, so it’s going to have a knock-on effect.

DM: What of the Lib Dems, to refocus on that? Do the Lib Dems just have to sit there and hope for the cards to fall in the right way come 2015 and then once again can play some kind of significant role in forming the next government and if they don’t fall that way and it’s not a hung parliament, there’s not much they can do.

CHARLES KENNEDY: Well as you know, I forsake ever trying to give advice from a back seat driver, ex-leader’s position. I agree with David Steel, people like us should be seen occasionally but not heard too often. What I do think is the case is that there is no alternative – I hate that phrase for historical connotations – no alternative from our position. The minute we took the coalition decision, because it was going to be tough, it always is for the junior partner the world over, we’ve got to rely on patience, on persistence and on persuasion. There’s no getting away from that but we’ve also got to, on certain issues – and I think Europe is one and I think immigration is another – we’ve got to be quite bold. We were bold, and I was worried about it when I was leader at the time, over Iraq. People agree or disagree with stances you take on very divisive issues but if they know precisely where you’re coming from you can get an element of respect for that as well.

DM: Well just let me ask you about that, you’re right, you took a stance on Iraq and it was seen as a brave and bold stance, it definitely was, from the Liberal Democrats. What about Syria this time round? The Lib Dems threw their lot in with the Conservatives that could well have ended up with an attack on Assad.

CHARLES KENNEDY: Well I’m in the abstaining category on that one, I thought it was all premature and I didn’t think there was a need for the recall and I didn’t think there was a need for … Yes, Nick Clegg went along with that strategy, not all Lib Dems did of course and that has now moved on dramatically. Let’s hope against hope almost that somehow the mechanism that has now been deployed internationally will lead to progress. I’m crossing my fingers and toes, I am not over-hopeful because I think it is such a big ask, this one but I don't think in the way in which the ferment from Moscow to Washington with Paris and London in between, I don't think the position the Lib Dems took, or the official position the Lib Dems government ministers took at the time of that initial vote, I don't think that is going to carry much resonance.

DM: A couple of questions flowing from the Lib Dems and the reshuffle, some of the most significant moves were on the Liberal Democrat side, in Scotland of course with Michael Moore. What signals are sent out by Jeremy Browne in the Foreign Office, seen as on the yellow book side, the right side of the party, am I reading too much into this or is this a sign of the Lib Dems beginning to position themselves to show a bit of ankle to the Labour party?

CHARLES KENNEDY: I don't think it’s to do with that, I think it’s probably – and I’m not party to this, I’m not in the loop thank God, when it comes to allocating jobs for colleagues. I think if you look at the changes I was very surprised, and this is no reflection on Alistair Carmichael at all, I think he’ll be first class in the job but I thought Mike Moore was doing a very good job as Scottish Secretary and I think he’s right, in his usual modest way he described himself as feeling ‘disappointed’. I think I’d have been kicking the cat quite frankly behind closed doors and as for Jeremy, well that was a surprise too. His replacement in Norman Baker is somebody ….

DM: Well, that was a surprise as well.

CHARLES KENNEDY: … who is seen at the other end of the spectrum in terms of Liberal democracy and it may just be that there’s an element here – I think the Scottish decision was very much just to do with Scotland – I think that is maybe more to do with showing that the spectrum of Lib Dem opinion can be accommodated within a wise leadership.

DM: And the other dimension flowing from it, it is particularly acute for the Lib Dems given their pronouncements on this issue, it’s about gender – you don’t have very many female MPs, we know you’re losing one of them at the next general election, Sarah Teather has decided not to stand again. Wasn’t this an opportunity to promote some of the women from within your party or effectively what you are saying is that they are just not good enough?

CHARLES KENNEDY: No, I think if you look at the proportions, and we are dealing with small proportions still in our parliamentary party, a) we don’t have enough women in the way that we don’t have anyone representing or a representative of any of the ethnic minorities within our country at the moment as well, I’m not lumping the two together and I know people get upset if you imply that’s what you’re doing but we do have shortcomings, big shortcomings which we’ve tried to address over the years under successive leaders and we just haven’t been able to deliver unfortunately. I think Nick has actually, within the cards available to him, has done almost as well as he can in terms of finding good posts for very capable women parliamentarians but the truth of the matter is that we need more Lib Dems and we certainly need more female Lib Dems if we are going to make better progress.

DM: And can I just ask you, 2015, we’ve heard from Sir Ming Campbell, he’s not going to stand in 2015, what about you? Another ex-leader, are you going to be there on the hustings?

CHARLES KENNEDY: God and the electorate willing, I’ll be back to talk another day but I am no longer a parliamentary Peter Pan as I was thirty years ago when I started out but at the same time you’ve got to recognise you can’t teach this old dog new tricks so my hat’s in the ring. But only for re-election in that post, not for re-election for anybody else

DM: All right Mr Kennedy, thank you very much indeed, very good to see you. Charles Kennedy there.