THIS week, a bit of a plug for a project I’ve been involved in that’s first episode aired on Wednesday on Channel 4, titled Carry On Brussels.

In the aftermath of the EU referendum in which Scotland and Northern Ireland voted to remain but England and Wales didn’t, October Films was asked by Channel 4 to produce a documentary on MEPs and the Parliament.

They followed me for a Scottish perspective – I am the only Scottish MEP to take part – largely I suspect on the back of my own “sherkaleg” speech which won an unheard-of standing ovation from my colleagues. Others portrayed in the documentary include Martina Anderson from Sinn Fein for her work on protecting the peace process in Northern Ireland, Seb Dance of Labour and his push to have the rights of citizens recognised, Catherine Bearder of the LibDems and her efforts to inject some sense to it all, and new boy Wajid Khan of Labour as he arrives after his by election and gets to work.

There are other pro-Brexit MEPs, the ones who raised six points of order against me when I called their like “shysters, charlatans and useful idiots” in the Chamber, but hey, watch and draw your own conclusions. October Films have distilled all this down into three-hour long programmes.

Apologies in a advance that it turns out I’m a little on the sweary side. That Brexit could turn a Glaswegian to bad language will be a shock for many, but I hope it indicates that I actually care!

It is always a risk, and especially just now, to do anything with TV, radio or social media. There’s an army of folk just watching for any slip, any words that might be taken out of context or any chance to have a pop at someone they would view as their opposition. There’s a hostile environment that encourages politicians of all sorts to say nothing more than vanilla sound bites, or indeed to say nothing at all. I’ve always taken the view that my job is to communicate with people in order to persuade them, I’ll sometimes make mistakes but the person who never made a mistake never made anything.

MEPs have always worked pretty well together, by virtue of being a bit further away and in a different sort of politics where you get more done by focusing on where you can work together, but since the vote we’re franker, more vocal and less tribal than before. We’ve been working together across party lines, sharing information, trying to help the debates in other parties, sometimes by saying things, sometimes by staying quiet.

Of those of us who are dug in to do a shift, I don’t think anyone could dispute that we have a better understanding of the reality of Brussels than most, and yet, I understand even within their own parties, MEPs are not front and centre of Brexit thinking.

In the SNP we have always had our wider world as part of our DNA, from Winnie Ewing’s “Stop the world Scotland wants to get on” onwards, independence in Europe has always been part of how we do things. Our two MEPs are both on the SNP National Executive Committee, Ian Hudghton as Party president and me to represent the European Group. The First Minster’s Standing Council on Europe also has two MEPs actively involved, David Martin (Scotland’s longest serving MEP, and second-longest serving MEP in the whole House) and me. Scotland’s European debate is different, in various ways, to the debate in England.

So the programmes should, hopefully, show the human side to the headlines. It still staggers me that not one single Scottish media operation has a Brussels correspondent – the UK press is little better. The BBC has a Brussels bureau but in my experience they, let me be as diplomatic as I can, don’t get out much, and when

they do they view things from a BBC-HQ perspective.

If nothing else this programme will show that there’s real people doing real work they really care about. And the rest. I don’t doubt that there are some folk in Ukip, and now the Tories, who believe they are doing something useful. But facts are facts, and “that’s not the Brexit I want” won’t cut it. They opened the box, they need to own what came out of it. The Leave campaigns lied to the electorate, abused campaign finance rules, data protection legislation and electoral law, and made false promise after false promise. No wonder they’re all so angry. I still think we can see Brexit off.

Scotland voted to remain and my job is to uphold that. The Brexit palace of lies is built on sand, and after watching this series you’ll be a bit more familiar with the few of us who are going to knock it down.