WATCH: First Minister hopes to talk with the UK Government over universal basic income idea, following Fife pilot

The First Minister has told Kingdom FM News she hopes to have talks with the UK Government over progressing the implementation of a future universal basic income scheme.

Nicola Sturgeon said at today's Scottish Government coronavirus briefing her sympathy for the idea has strengthened during the pandemic.

It's after North East Fife MSP and Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie yesterday called on the government at Holyrood to hold an intergovernmental summit with its counterparts across the UK over the concept.

Fife was one of four council areas across Scotland where pilots of a citizen's basic income scheme were held.

The others were Edinburgh, Glasgow and North Ayrshire.

An interim report was published in November last year by partners involved in exploring the feasibility of the pilots in the four local authority areas.

A final report is expected later this year.

But Ms Sturgeon said this afternoon her government can't introduce such a policy unilaterally, because it lacks the necessary tax and welfare powers to do so.

We've contacted the Treasury for comment.

Meanwhile, you can watch Nicola Sturgeon's response to our reporter Anas Hassan's question from today's Scottish Government briefing:

Image from Arctic Circle released under Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic