Scotland’s independence – the debate widens, the intensity grows …

Phoney war is over – UK in full onslaught mode against YES

A contemptible spectacle - a Scottish Labour MP, Jim Sheridan, attempting to enlist his Tory BetterTogether boss Cameron into persuading Scottish business bosses to intimidate their workers - for that's what it would be, given power relationship - into voting against the independence of their country.

Between them, in just over a minute, Sheridan and Cameron manage to cram in just about every BT canard and false assertion - about business investment, about alleged Scottish Government bullying, about borders, etc.

I am appalled that many Scots cannot see the democratic threat in employers, holding the careers and livelihood of vulnerable employees in challenging economic times in their hands, trying to influence their democratic vote in a vital, historic constitutional referendum by making negative assertions about the impact on the employers business.

And this at the urging of a failing Prime Minister fighting for his political life, enmeshed in scandal (Coulson) and allegations of incompetence of Europe and management of his shaky Coalition.

 

Gemma Doyle: "What joy do you have in moving the nuclear deterrent 100 miles or so south? I mean - I really fail to grasp that argument ..."

We know you fail to grasp it, Gemma, or you wouldn't have asked such an inane question. That's why Labour is a busted flush.

But let me help you ...

Labour has been either unwilling or incapable of doing a damn thing about either UK nuclear disarmament or world multi-lateral disarmament.

Scottish Labour is even more powerless.

The Labour Party is committed to WMDs and a number of its most senior figures have had glittering careers and amassed considerable wealth by their association with UK defence posts, the MOD, the armaments trade and NATO.

No one in an independent Scotland's politics is going to get rich that way - if they even thought of it, the electorate would show them the door.

An independent Scotland will do what it can, which is to insist on the removal of these obscenities from Scotland, from proximity to our largest population centre, making us a prime target and a prime disaster zone in a major accident.

It is then for rUK to make its own political decisions, but we believe that the Scottish unilateral action may result in rUK being forced to abandon its WMDs, and the possibility that Scotland's action may act as a catalyst for world disarmament.

Meanwhile, a major scandal seems likely to engulf Westminster, with allegations of a paedophile ring in the heart of Government in the 1980,  a cover-up, a dossier mysteriously lost, and the possibility of a police investigation and enquiry.

The minister at the centre of this at the time, Leon Brittan, has changed his story about what he knew, and what he did about allegations submitted to him

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Jim Sillars and Michael Forsyth grilled by young Scots – and Glenn Campbell

Neither Jim Sillars nor Michael Forsyth are representative of the core positions of YES and No.

They in fact hold certain core views in common, e.g. on Europe and on currency, and this led to Jim Sillars having to avoid making the easy point  that independence isn’t the main threat to our EU membership - the UK government is.

Forsyth confined himself to repeating key Better Together soundbytes, but this could not conceal the gaping contradictions on his position on tax, on EU, on currency and on Scotland's ability to go it alone.

It ended in an atmosphere of consensus on the Margo dictum - "We're all still Scots after the vote", but a sour note was then injected by a No voter in the audience, who raised anti-English fears, which she laid at the door of YES. The Better Together young ‘uns have got the lingo off pat!

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BBC anti-bias demo–Pacific Quay–29th June 2014

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Letter to a friend in England about Scotland’s independent future

A friend in England who takes a keen interest in Scottish affairs, and has lived and worked in Scotland, said that I should not expect too much from independence, and that it might not be Shangri La. I replied as follows -

REPLY

Whatever an independent Scotland's future is, it will have a few certainties -

1. It won't have weapons of mass destruction based in its waters, threatening the environment and the largest population centre in Scotland.

2. It won't have to bear the cost of the irrelevant weapons system.

3. It won't have a support a proportion of the corrupt, inflated and undemocratic House of Lords.

4. It will have located in Scotland a large number of a offices, functions and services with associated jobs that we currently pay for, but are located in S.E.E.

5. It will have a defence force that is truly a defence force, not an attack force, one that is proportionate to our needs and to real threats, not the "induced paranoia threats" required to justify the armaments industry and grease the lucrative revolving doors between the MOD, private industry and government.

6. It will prioritise its spending and use of resources on the needs of the people, especially the poor, sick and vulnerable, however limited its budgets and resources are.

7. It will continue to run an NHS that is free at the point of need, and not privatised by the back door to line the pockets of politicians and their partners in private healthcare.

8. It will recognise its role in protecting the environment and the planet, not pay lip service to it while despoiling it.

9. It will maintain an education system based on ability to learn, not ability to pay.

10. And lastly, whatever it does will be done to itself, by itself, with the governments it elects - every time, not the ones chosen by rUK. In a word, it will be an independent  nation.

I'll settle for that.

regards,

Peter

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Why I’m voting YES on September 18th 2014

This appeared in National collective’s newsletter of today’s date, 27th June 2014.

Peter Curran: I Want A Just And Equitable Society

I’ll be voting for an independent Scotland in 2014 because, from 1997 onwards, four watershed events led to a shift in my political perspective and loyalties and inexorably to the conclusion that only the full independence of Scotland would meet my criteria for a just and equitable Scottish society.

They were the election of the Blair/Brown Labour Government in 1997, 9/11 in 2001, Afghanistan, and the Iraq invasion in 2003.

These four events crystallised doubts that had existed since the mid-1960s (with older roots) on nuclear disarmament, the real nature of the Union and Scotland’s place in it, of Britishness, the Labour Party’s core beliefs in multi-lateral disarmament, membership of the UK in a context of internationalism and the Westminster system, and Scottish Labour’s belief that they could influence Westminster as representatives of Scottish voters while sustaining an internationalist perspective and values.

My perspective of British and UK industry and commerce, the financial/banking sector and the military/industrial complex and its influence on democratic governments widened dramatically after establishing my own consulting and training business in 1988, after many decades in industrial management. These fears also crystallised from 1997 onwards, and the likelihood of a financial crash was evident to me from the millennium year 2000.

I had never entertained romantic ideas about Scotland, and I was – and still am – the antithesis of a blood-and soil-nationalist.

But I do believe the ancient nation of Scotland has, in its history, culture, scientific and intellectual achievements and political and social values, created a 21st century social entity comprised of Scots old and new, from a widely diverse range of backgrounds and ethnic origins, that exhibits values and beliefs about politics, the rule of law, the role of representative government in a democracy, the role of a nation state in the interdependent global community and the rights and obligations of its people that, in their totality, can only be satisfied in a sovereign, independent state.

As someone committed to live and work in Scotland, I want a just and equitable Scottish society, not just for myself but for all those similarly committed to the geographical entity called Scotland. I also want a just and equitable society, not just for myself and those who are part of Scottish society, but for all peoples across the globe – but I now believe that any influence, however small, that I and other residents of Scotland can have on that wider global objective can only come from within a nation state.

I believe that true internationalism begins with, and must be rooted in nationalism in the autonomous nation state.

I believe the nation state that can deliver the closest match to my political and social values is Scotland, and that the state of which I have been a member all of my life, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, is a manifestly failing and dysfunctional conglomerate – the rump of a vanished empire – that cannot deliver those political and social values to any of its component nations.

What do I want from my nation state?

I want it to abandon, totally and unequivocally, the irrational obscenity of nuclear weapons, for which no intellectual or moral case exists or can exist in my view. (Given that premise, the strategic case is irrelevant to me, but I believe it is totally untenable even if the moral conditions are ignored or denied.)

I want it to be close to a truly representative democracy, close to the people, with a national constitution that protects their fundamental and sovereign rights. The UK in my view is demonstrably not such a democracy, given the unelected House of Lords, the current role of the monarch and the web of inherited and awarded undemocratic privileges that flow from such a monarchy.

I want a close but flexible association politically and for mutual defence with my European, Scandinavian and Nordic neighbours, but one that leaves the final sovereign decisions with my nation on armed intervention in the affairs of other nations outside of any such alliances.

I want an economically successful nation where the rewards of success are equitably distributed, and the price of economic success is not at the expense of the people’s quality of life and the natural environment.

I believe that the UK fails these criteria, has always failed them and will never match them, and that the Scottish unionist parties are impotent in Westminster to change that.

I will not regurgitate all the complex arguments and rebuttals that makes me believe Scotland has the people, the values, the will, the capacity and the resources to be the nation I want it to be. I’ve listened, evaluated and made my decision, as other Scots, old and new, must and will finally on September 18th 2014.

Peter Curran
National Collective

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Simon Schama’s Radio Times doublethink - how to be a romantic British nationalist while opposing nationalism

The BBC does its anti-independence propaganda obliquely in Radio Times – it sneaks it in blandly.

On pages 28-29 of the current edition, it carries an article by a Charles Laurence entitled “I’m a Jewish sea dog!” The eponymous Jewish sea dog is Simon Schama, historian, and relates ostensibly to his History of Britain series on BBC Four.

The article is a sort of profile-cum-interview with Schama, who, despite living half his life in America, holding his professorship at Princeton and bringing his family up there,  refuses to become an American citizen.

“I’ve told my son I want to be thrown in the Thames when I die. No, not my ashes. All of me!”

An extreme manifestation of English – or British – nationalism? Perhaps, but he then comes out quite gratuitously with this sort of thing, through the words of Charles Laurence -

“His vision of the Britain forged by this history makes him adamantly opposed to Scottish independence and the break-up of the Union. If Scotland goes, he wrote in the FT, “something precious, to this historian at any rate, will have been irreparably destroyed: a nation state whose glory over the centuries has been that it does not correspond with some imagined romance of tribal singularity but has been made up of many peoples, languages, customs, all jumbled together within the expansive, inclusive British home”

This is romantic, woolly and historically inaccurate and offensive nonsense.

The British “nation state” that exists today is the rump of brutal, exploitative colonial empire, corrupt and venal in all of its institutions, incompetent, brutally uncaring to the poor and vulnerable, desperately trying to hang on Scotland as the last symbol of its former power, hoping to preserve what his fellow historian Andrew Davies calls in The Isles

“a dysfunctional dynastic conglomerate” – the United Kingdom of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Or take this view attributed to him by Charles Laurence -

‘He adds that the same forces threatening to tear Britain apart are “happening in dreadful places, causing ethnic and tribal wars, immense massacres.”’

Given his earlier remarks about Scottish independence, one may conclude that the peaceful, broad-based, multi-nationality, multi-ethnic and legally agreed Scottish independence campaign is one of the “forces threatening to tear Britain apart”.

This is inflammatory nonsense from an apparently extreme, romantic British nationalist.

He is strangely obscure - almost silent - on the State of Israel, its extreme brand of religious and secular nationalism, and its behaviour towards the Palestinian people. A word about that situation, which does threaten the peace and stability of the world, and has done for 66 years, would be most welcome,  Simon Schama.

Labour and Iraq

Extract from my 2013 blog –

Blair, Brown and Mandelson created New Labour and it worked – Labour was elected and re-elected. The results, over 13 years, are now history.

Two wars, one illegal, the deaths of hundreds of thousands, terrorism brought to UK by the Iraq War, the gap between rich and poor widened, corruption of Parliamentary institutions, the prosecution and imprisonment of Labour MPs, the resignation of the Labour Speaker of the House of Commons in disgrace, the corruption of the Press and the Metropolitan Police, the banking and financial collapse, cash for access, etc.

Hardly a success, except in one key aspect – Blair, Mandelson, Brown, Labour defence secretaries, Labour ministers and many Labour MPs got very rich indeed, in the case of Blair and Mandelson, egregiously rich.

The revolving door between government ministers, civil servants and industry – especially the defence industry – spun ever faster and more profitably.

And the military/industrial complex rejoiced and celebrated New Labour’s achievements.

And now, in 2014?

We have the key figures in the Blair Government that led us to war – Gordon Brown, John Reid,  Alistair Darling, Jim Murphy, et al leading the war against Scotland’s independence.

Iraq has exploded into chaos and near-collapse of the Iraq‘democracy’ set up by the United States and the United Kingdom

What of the report of the Chilcot Enquiry? Delay in publication, talk of redaction of major conclusions and fact.

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Some older anti-Scots and anti-independence YouTube video clips

Commonwealth City Part One–and the Ardenlea Street outrage.

This outrage was perpetrated on a Glasgow grandmother and her family by the combined force of Glasgow City Council in the name of the Commonwealth Games, 80 police officers, 15 riot vans and masked council workers, who broke into her family home in a dawn raid.

This didn't happen in a third world banana republic, it happened in Glasgow, Scotland.

No politician, no political party, no government agency offered any significant or meaningful help  - there was some SNP involvement - before it, during it or after it. Celtic Football Club, on the doorstep of this appalling event, boasting of its role of Celtic in the Community, offered nothing. No rich athlete offered help.

The only real professional help came from film-makers, an Australian academic at Glasgow University who is a world expert in urban regeneration schemes and Mike Dailly of Govan Law Centre.

The Scottish press and media offered superficial and often distorted and close to hostile coverage - with one honourable exception - the Scottish Sun, with significant input from journalist  Paul  Drury.

I personally approached major media contacts begging them to cover the story fully, including Private Eye, the Guardian and Channel Four News. None offered any significant response. They are still silent.

Two more episodes will be shown - I have have no knowledge of content or treatment, but I know that a major story has yet to be told, and the this fine piece of filmaking from Stephen Bennett is only the start.

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Alex Salmond – the most popular political leader in the UK–but not with Daily Record and Better Together–or Jim Sillars!

 

Hard to escape the conclusion that this interview is just part of a Better Together, Daily Record-fuelled "Get Salmond" last ditch initiative, doomed to failure as all the others have been. That's because they're based on three false premises, i.e.

1. All YES supporters like Alex Salmond.
(They don't - large blocks of them don't want him as a leader of an independent Scotland - but they recognise the main reason they will have a choice at all on the future of their country is Alex Salmond - and they'll vote YES).

2. Alex Salmond is unpopular.
(He's not - his popularity rating are higher than any other Scottish or UK leader, and higher than most EU leaders)

3. The YES campaign's success is totally down to Alex Salmond.
(It's not - it's down to hard core, passionate commitment across of range of political parties, organisations and individuals, all working dynamically in a wide range of initiatives and grassroots organisation for a YES vote.)

Given that something upwards of 45% of Scots say they are No voters at the moment, it would be a minor miracle of at least 32% of them didn't like Alex Salmond.

But if Better Together really believe that the undecideds and No voters contain 32% who are only held back from voting YES by a dislike of Alex Salmond, then they have real trouble in River City!

What the increasingly desperate faux concern addressed to the First Minister to change his style is based on is a transparent attempt to knobble a style that has been spectacularly successful.

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The New West Lothian question–the status of Scottish MPs in Westminster after a YES vote

Baroness Jay has put the cat among the pigeons with her Lord’s Committee views on the status and rights of Scottish MPs after a YES vote in the negotiation period up to independence in 2016. The YES pigeons are fluttering agitatedly, and huffing and puffing about unelected Lord, etc. instead of addressing the issue properly, something that is long overdue from both YES and No camps. (I can’t stand Baroness Jay or unelected Lords, but somebody had to say something half-intelligent about this issue, and she has at least stirred a stagnant pot.)

On the MPs question, there are mixed messages coming in both directions, and the conflicting arguments are many.

 

The Scottish Government's position, as I understand it, is that since the UK remains in existence after a YES vote till March 2016, representative government continues, and the SNP will field candidates for the election and take up seats - if elected - until Scotland becomes independent in 2016. They will continue their present practice of abstaining from Westminster votes on purely English matters, e.g. NHS, education (effectively The West Lothian Question).

There is some difference of opinion in the wider YES campaign over this position. I am inclined to think they shouldn't, for reasons that oddly are shared with the No camp (see below) but I haven't made up my mind yet.
Other parties plan to field candidates from Scottish constituencies.

TWO CRUCIAL ARGUMENTS

1. UK remains in existence after a YES vote till March 2016, representative government continues, and therefore constituents cannot be left in a representative vacuum. It would be a denial of democracy for them to be unrepresented.

There are various problems with this argument. Firstly, the Scottish Government will be negotiating with the UK Government, but a UK government effectively acting as the rUK Government on behalf of England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

How can SNP MPs who may well be part of the Scottish Government negotiating team sit across the table from them and at the same time be part of UK Government?

One answer to this is that the totality of Westminster MPs is not the UK Government (the Tory/LibDem Coalition), it is the UK Parliament, and therefore SNP MPs have the right to participate in the UK Parliament while the UK still exists.

2. The 2015 election would represent a democratic distortion if Scottish MPs from the SNP and the Scottish Labour, Tory, Green, and LibDem parties, from a country that had just voted to leave the UK and was negotiating its exit terms, was allowed to influence - perhaps crucially influence - the selection of a UK Government that one year on (2016) became the rUK Government? For example, what if Labour was elected only because of Scottish votes?

The other astonishing proposal, currently being discussed in Westminster, is that Scottish Unionist MPs elected in the 2015 general election (SNP MPs will vacate their seat in 2016) should be allowed to retain the seats (despite having no constituents!) and salaries and perks for the full life of the 2015 rUK Parliament.

However, a ancient Union is not dissolved without there being complex questions such as these to be addressed. Not the least of the problem is that the Scottish Government, the Scottish electorate and the Scottish media have been discussing these matters for several years and are highly aware of the complexities and the argument, but the rest of UK, having been in denial over the possibility of a YES vote for years, are just now beginning the appreciate the magnitude of the change that may occur, and are approaching the issue in a Ladybird Book of Politics, naive mode, not unmixed with astonishment, resentment and pique - emotions not conducive to grown-up politics, which will be vitally needed if there is a YES vote.

But at the moment, the No Campaign is still significantly ahead, the polls vary quite radically, and the outcome is unknown. 124 days is a short time, yet a week is a long time in politics, the world is a deeply unstable place, and there are always. as Harold Macmillan said "Events, dear boy, events ..."
.

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Norway celebrates the 200th anniversary of its exit from a 434 year Union with Denmark – with a speech of congratulation and friendship from Denmark.

Today at 12:30, the Speaker of the Folketing (The Danish parliament) delivered a speech to the Storting (the Norwegian parliament) in anticipation of the 200th anniversary of the Norwegian constitution on Saturday. Mogens Lykketoft is only the second foreign person to the Storting: the first was Winston Churchill.

(I am indebted to my Danish contact and friend Troels Just for this translation. and for much else besides over an extended period of time. Troels takes a keen and perceptive interest in European and Scottish affairs.)

Speech to the Storting on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the Norwegian constitution, Tuesday the 15th of May 2014.
(translation by Troels Just.)

Your majesties, Your royal highnesses, Mr. President (of the Storting) and Norwegian colleagues, Storting representatives, Ladies and gentlemen.

Congratulations Norway!

Congratulations for it, this week, being 200 years since 112 Norwegian men at Eidsvoll conceived and passed a constitution for the Norwegian people.

The Eidsvoll Constitution became Norway's letter of freedom.

The Constitution's founding idea of civil rights and popular elections set the course towards the modern democracy, and not just in Norway. Since then the rest of the Nordic countries set the same course, and in the most of Europe.

Preceding were 434 years of a common Danish-Norwegian realm.

Many of our common historical characters - such as, for example, Holberg and Tordenskjold - defined themselves neither as Norwegian or Danish. We were twins. We belonged together.
But Norway was governed from Copenhagen by civil servants who were educated down there, no matter whether they were Danish or Norwegian by birth.

The absolutist central government did not secure for Norway real equality with Denmark.

Therefore, the thought of an independent Norway had long quietly resided in many Norwegian hearts. The thought flared up in full bloom when the Great Powers at the Peace of Kiel in January 1814 decided, that Norway were to be separated from Denmark to be with Sweden.

It says a lot about the cohesion between Danish and Norwegian that Norway - both during the struggle for the free constitution in 1814 and by the dissolution of the union in 1905 - chose a Danish prince as king.

Today - 200 years after our divorce - Danes and Norwegians have at least just as much in common as we did back then when we were a common realm. Our mutual relationship is far more equal. Yes, Norway has become the rich relative.

It is deeply anchored in the souls of our peoples that, that which comes from the sister country is OK. We hold no mutual mistrust and we make it a premise that the people of the sister country think, believe and act as we do ourselves. This immediate understanding, a stronger case of which is unlikely to be found between other nations in the world, is based on

that we so easily understand each other's speech,

that we are deeply shaped by the common history and  culture,

that we socially, economically and politically has so much in common

and

that we trade a lot more between ourselves than with the rest of the world.

This community is not just something made up of Danes and Norwegians. It encompasses all of us in the Nordic countries, and it is not slowed down by Norway and Iceland being outside the EU, and Sweden and Finland being outside of NATO.

Since 1952 we have had the Nordic Council, and before the rest of Europe we developed the right to travel and work freely in our countries.

We are among the world's richest societies, and we have a shared agenda of welfare and sustainability. We are strong advocates of a commitment to international cooperation.

Together we are proportionally the world's biggest donor of humanitarian assistance and development projects.

We are at the forefront of international conflict resolution and we are furthering our cooperation also in areas of defence.

In the area of culture we have a lot of trans-national productions in the areas of motion picture, literature, music and art.

All of these examples underline the deep understanding between the peoples of the Nordic countries. With the events of 1814, the wild and warring years of our youth came to an end. The Nordic countries never again became an internal scene for war.

The last 200 years has certainly not been without challenges, but internally in the Nordic countries we have together created remarkably rich and strong societies. We will also in the future need Nordic cooperation to shape the international community. New agendas rapidly appear with strength. For example our common initiative in the Arctic area.

Norwegian democracy has over the past 200 years grown big, beautiful and strong.

In the middle of the unbelievable cruelty that hit the Norwegian people on the 22nd of July in 2011, the Norwegian democracy showed in unique and admirable ways to the world that, even the most horrible and evil impacts can be dealt with, so that the cohesion and sanity of soceity is strengthened.

Dear all Norwegian sisters and brothers:

It is with great joy and honour to be here today. Thanks yet again for the invitation to deliver the Folketing's and the Danish people's congratulations from the podium of the Storting to the Norwegian democracy and the Norwegian people.

From an honest heart, a giant congratulations!

Civil Service Committee into impartiality in the Civil Service loses its impartiality

This entire two-hour-long Committee into impartiality in the Civil Service was one long, concerted attempt to obliquely - and sometimes blatantly - attack the integrity of the Scottish independence referendum, the Scottish government, and Sir Peter Housden - one which has been orchestrated by, amongst other, Labour MP Gregg McClymont - with a Scotsman trailer  for the event by David Maddox, a witness at the Committee today.

We had the spectacle of an interrogation of the Head of the UK Civil Service, Sir Bob Kerslake, civil service boss of Sir Peter Housden, Head of Scotland's civil service by Patrick Jenkin MP, then by Lindsay Roy, Scottish Labour MP.

This clip shows the astonishing - and humiliating - spectacle of Lindsay Roy, Scottish Labour MP, sitting silently while a Welsh Labour MP Paul Flynn, excoriates Sir Bob Kerslake for failing to censure Sir Nicholas Macpherson for 'leaking' his advice on currency union, and for attacking the Scottish independence referendum. then walks out of the Committee.

This is a UK Government that is losing control of a situation and a country it never understood, and never tried to understand. As for the Scottish Labour Party - they are beneath contempt …

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JOURNALISTS, NEWSPAPERS AND MEDIA – and my expectations of them

I expect journalists to be objective, but not neutral. I expect news reporting to be factual, and not to spin the facts, but I do not expect balance, e.g. if there are ten facts that day for one side of an argument and five for another, I don’t expect the journalist to trawl for another five facts to achieve ‘balance’.

I expect a sharp distinction to be made between news reporting and commentary. I never expect neutrality, only objectivity. I expect individual journalists to have a viewpoint and an interpretation of events. I accept that entire newspapers and magazines have a viewpoint, a position, and editors that identify with that position, providing they observe good journalistic practice in relation to factual reporting and veracity.

I deeply distrust newspapers and periodicals where the viewpoint is that of the owners, rather than the journalist.

I am not, and never have been a journalist, and I have never worked for a newspaper or magazine in any capacity, nor in media. I believe strongly in a free press and media, especially in print journalism and public service broadcasting.

A “bereft” commentator says Westminster must not recognise a YES vote!

This Michael Ignatieff interview of 2012 continues to attract comments. One today prompted me to a vigorous response …

 

from Nathaniel Brisbane

As a child of Scottish and English parents I would be totally bereft if my historic homeland was to split and two states were to go their own ways. Whatever the SNP say it needs to be realised that there is bound to be friction between England and Scotland which will disadvantage the Scots. I am dismayed that staried-eyed 16 and 17 year olds can vote in the referendum. Westminister must not recognise a yes vote. Give greater devolution to Scotland as in Quebec but hold the union together. 

Reply
from Peter Curran

I am a child of Scottish and Irish parents, like many Scots. That "historic homeland" of Great Britain and Ireland was split in the 1920s after a bitter conflict with England, followed by a civil war in the South and partition of the country. Despite this, family relationships continued, trade continued, a shared currency was maintained for decades, and very recently the Queen visited the Republic of Ireland: even more recently, the head of the Northern Irish government visited the Queen in Buckingham Palace. The Royal Albert Hall recently celebrated the Irish and English relationship with a great musical event.

I think that Scotland, a country that will achieve its independence without violence through a democratic referendum agreed by the UK Government, and which will continue to have the Queen as constitutional monarch might just manage to maintain amicable relationships after independence.

In a word, you are talking sentimental nonsense, Nathaniel - you don't live here, and whether you feel "bereft" or not is not really a subject of much concern to Scottish voters. I am not a starry-eyed teenager - I am in my seventies and have lived in Scotland for most of my life, with about a decade in England, a country I love, and will continue to love, with ties of family, friendship and business.

What you are nostalgic for is a long-lost dream of British Empire - a brutal, exploitative imperialist construction that its component countries have long-since shaken free of, with Scotland soon to follow.

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Speech – Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon Friday 11 April – SNP Conference

Speech – Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon
15:00- 15:35, Friday 11 April – SNP Conference
Check against delivery

Fellow nationalists,

We gather here in Aberdeen today with just over five months to go to the biggest and best opportunity we will ever have to build a better country. I doubt if our predecessors, presiding over the birth of our Party exactly 80 years ago this week, would have intended it to take us quite so long to get here. ut, friends, here we are, standing at last on the threshold of our nation's independence.

Of course, we wouldn't and couldn't have come this far without the toil, the occasional tears and the hard-won triumphs of generations of nationalists who have gone before us.

Last year, we said farewell to Aberdeen’s very own Brian Adam and to my dear friend and election agent, Allison Hunter - two nationalists who, in my book, are simply irreplaceable.

And just last week we lost an icon of our movement, the one and only Margo MacDonald. Margo electrified Scottish politics when she won Govan in 1973. Her contribution to Scotland and to our cause has been immeasurable. She was, truly, an independent spirit and we will not see her like again.

Conference, let us pay tribute to Margo MacDonald.

Brian, Allison and Margo - dear to us as they were - are three names amongst many. There are countless nationalists who paved the way but who didn't live to see the final stage of this journey. To each and every one of them who worked so hard for so long to give our generation the chance to see our dream realised, let us say a simple and heartfelt 'thank you'.

Of course, the best way to say 'thank you' is to win. So let us also make this declaration today.

On the 18 September, we do intend to win a Yes vote.

We are going to win our independence.

Delegates.

The momentum is now clearly and firmly with Yes. But if we are going to deliver on that declaration, we have much work still to do. Our job is to persuade our fellow Scots - with facts, with reason and with passion - what we know in our hearts and in our heads to be true.

The best way, the only way, to build a wealthier Scotland, a fairer Scotland and a more confident Scotland is to equip ourselves with the full powers of independence.

Friends,

When the First Minister named the date of the referendum just over a year ago, I made a quiet but firm promise to myself. I resolved that I will not wake up on 19 September wishing I had done more or worked harder.

Let us all, today, make that same promise.

Over these next months, we will re-double our efforts.

We will work harder than we have ever done before.

We will go that extra mile.

Because the prize is this:

Not the end of the journey.

But the beginning of a better future.

Scotland – an independent, free and equal member of the family of nations.

Delegates,

I have no doubt that the energy, the commitment and the sheer numbers of people dedicated to winning a Yes vote will be a major factor in the outcome of this referendum.
Yes Scotland is already the biggest and most exciting grassroots campaign our country has ever seen and it is an absolute privilege to be part of it.
We have Women for Independence, Business for Scotland, National Collective, Generation Yes, Farming for Yes, Trade Unionists for Yes, Academics for Yes, Scots Asians for Yes, Seniors for Yes, Radical Independence, Wealthy Nation and many, many more.

We have local Yes campaign groups in every corner of our country.

Our positive movement for change is growing with every single day that passes and let me predict today that by the time we reach September, our momentum will be simply unstoppable.

Each and every one of us has a vital part to play.

And play it we must.

Because, make no mistake, the Westminster establishment is fighting hard too. There will be no scare, no threat, no smear that they will not deploy.
Just this week, we've been warned, by none other than our dear, old friend, Lord George Robertson, that independence will be 'cataclysmic' and a boost to the 'forces of darkness'.

According to George, we are now a threat to the stability of the entire Western world.

Which, you've got to admit, is no mean achievement for a party that was supposed to have been killed stone dead by devolution.

Delegates,

With friends like Lord George, it's no wonder the No campaign is in trouble. And it is in deep trouble.

We've had the currency confession.

I don't often quote UK government ministers, but I'm going to make an exception for the one who was caught telling the truth. 'Of course, there would be a currency union'.
That quote sent Alistair Darling into a tailspin. His response to it prompted a Downing Street source to say this: “I don’t know what thought process he was going through.”

I say, welcome to the club. It speaks volumes that the blame game in the No campaign has already begun. The Liberals say Labour isn’t working hard enough. Labour says no-one believes the Liberals anymore.

And the Tories?

Well, the lecture tour continues.
But I can report today that the Prime Minister, who promised to fight for the union with heart, head, body and soul, is still struggling to locate that part of his anatomy that will allow him to agree to a debate with Alex Salmond.

Delegates,

The blunders of the No campaign are undoubtedly a bonus for Yes. But if I was a supporter of the Union, I would be in despair. Project Fear has not only failed to make a positive case for the Union. It has destroyed the very foundation on which that case might have been based.
In their attempts to scare and threaten the Scottish people, the No campaign has torn apart the notion of the UK as an equal partnership.

We are told that if we vote for independence, we'll have to stump up for a share of Westminster's debt. But we will have no right to any of the assets that we have helped to build and pay for through our taxes, our National Insurance contributions and our licence fees.
As long as we stay with Westminster, they will allow us to benefit.

But if we vote Yes they will decide what we are entitled to.

Delegates,

That attitude demonstrates precisely why Scotland must be independent. The idea of the UK as an equal partnership has been shown up to be a sham. To vote No is to endorse a partnership in which Westminster calls all the shots and Scotland knows her place.

We cannot - we must not - allow that to happen.

If we want a real partnership of equals between Scotland and the other nations of our islands, be in no doubt.

We must vote Yes.

We must choose independence.

Friends,

I was struck earlier this week by these words:

"Our nations share a unique proximity. We also share a common narrative, woven through the manifold connections between our people and our heritage."

These words were spoken by Michael Higgins, the President of Ireland, during his state visit to the UK this week. And what they demonstrate - through the example of independent Ireland - is that political independence and a strong, enduring, social union can, and do, go hand in hand.

Delegates,

I joined the SNP back in the late 1980s. I was motivated to do so by the damage I saw being done to the community I lived in, by a government Scotland didn’t vote for. That government was eventually defeated by a Labour Party that had become little more than a pale imitation of the Tories it replaced. And now nearly 30 years later, the fabric of our society is again under threat from a government that has no mandate in Scotland.

The positive message at the heart of the Yes campaign is that it does not have to be this way. So let this ring out from our conference today.

Scotland can be independent.
Scotland should be independent.
And Scotland must be independent.

We are one of the wealthiest countries on the planet. No-one now seriously disputes that fact. If we were independent today, we would be the 14th richest country in the world. The UK would be 18th.

So the big question is not whether Scotland is wealthy enough to be independent.

The real question is why so many people in this rich nation of ours don’t feel the benefit of our great wealth.

And that is the burning question that should follow each and every Westminster politician every single day between now and 18 September. One of the most disgraceful and distressing developments of the past few years has been the rapid rise of food poverty in Scotland.
In 2010, the Trussell Trust - the country's biggest provider of food banks - gave emergency food parcels to just over 4,000 people.

By last year, that number had increased to more than 56,000. So many children are now reliant on food aid, that one provider in Glasgow includes nappies in its emergency parcels. The thought of that makes me want to cry.

In one of the richest countries in the world, we have parents - many of them in work - who can't afford the basics for their children.

Delegates,

That is an utter scandal.

And, make no mistake, there is a direct causal link between the growing reliance on food aid and the Tory welfare cuts.

The Tories actually seem quite proud of it. For them, cutting benefits for poor people is a moral crusade. Well, let us say this loudly and clearly to the Tories - your morality is not our morality. And with a Yes vote in September, we will put that beyond any shadow of doubt.

Delegates,

There is no silver lining to the cloud of food banks. But if there is anything at all to be optimistic about it is the way in which people across the country have pulled together to gather and distribute food for those in need.

I want today to pay tribute to all of those people and organisations - including some of our major supermarkets - who are doing this vital work.

The Scottish Government will continue to do all we can to mitigate the worst impact of the Tory assault on the poor and vulnerable.

I can announce today that we will provide an additional £1 million over the next two years to support the efforts of those working so hard to combat the scandal of food poverty in our country.

Delegates.

Earlier this week the Scottish Government published an analysis showing that the cumulative impact of Tory welfare cuts in Scotland is £6 billion.

The Tories pretend that the cuts are all directed at the so-called 'scroungers'. But in truth it is the working poor, children and the disabled who are hardest hit.

One of the services being affected is the Independent Living Fund. It provides financial support to disabled people so that they can live in the community and participate in work, training or education. Back in 2010, one of the first acts of a certain Maria Miller was to announce the closure of this Fund to new applicants.

Then the decision was taken to close it altogether. But I can announce today that the Scottish Government will establish a Scottish Independent Living Fund. It will support the more than 3,000 people in Scotland who depend on the existing fund. And we will invest an extra £5m a year to open up the Fund to new applicants, so that people with disabilities can live full, active and independent lives.

Friends,

Our Scottish Government will never walk by on the other side. But let me say this from the heart. I didn't come into politics to mitigate miserable Tory policies. Like you, I came into politics because I wanted to help build a better country.

And with independence, that is exactly what we will do. 

Of course, there are still many people across our country who, despite its record, retain a loyalty to Labour and who believe that the answer to a Tory government is not independence, but another UK Labour government. I want to speak directly to them today. I ask them to look at the evidence.

For half the time since the end of the Second World War we have been saddled with governments we did not vote for. Even when Scotland votes Labour, there is no guarantee that we end up with a Labour government at Westminster. That decision is made by others. It is out of our hands.

And all too often even when there is a UK Labour government, it is the priorities of Westminster, not of Scotland, which prevail. That is why more and more Labour voters are voting Yes.

The chair of Yes Scotland is Dennis Canavan – a former Labour MP who has spent his life campaigning for social justice. Dennis is voting Yes. And, conference, let us thank him today for the outstanding job he is doing. And Dennis is not the only one.

Charles Gray, the former Labour leader of Strathclyde Regional Council is voting Yes.

Alex Mosson, a one time Labour Lord Provost of Glasgow is voting Yes.

Carol Fox, a former Labour candidate, is voting Yes.
Ian Newton, who used to be Alistair Darling's election agent, is voting Yes.

Bob Holman, a Labour member of 53 years standing, the founder of the Easterhouse Project and someone who has devoted his entire life to fighting poverty - he is voting Yes too.

Delegates,

To every Labour voter in the country, I say this. The Yes campaign is not asking you to leave your party. Instead, it offers you the chance to get your party back. A Labour Party free to make its own decisions. No longer dancing to a Westminster tune.

For everyone out there with Labour in your heart, the message is clear.

Don't vote No to stop the SNP.
Vote Yes to reclaim the Labour Party.

Friends,

The Yes campaign is about hope and optimism. If we win a Yes vote on September 18, Scotland will become an independent country on 24 March 2016 Scottish Independence Day. How good does that sound? A few weeks ago, to mark two years to go to that date, Yes supporters took to social media to give their reasons for voting Yes. The indyreasons hashtag was born. It was truly inspiring. The determination to build a better, fairer country. The sense of ambition. Hundreds of different reasons but a common belief in independence. Not for its own sake - but because of what it will enable us to do. It is a belief founded on democracy.

As deputy leader of the SNP, I want the first government of an independent Scotland to be an SNP government and I will campaign with all my energy to make it so. But to everyone in Scotland, let us make this clear.

A vote for independence is not a vote for the SNP.
A vote for independence is a vote for democracy.

Delegates,

Since 1999, we’ve seen the real benefits of taking decisions here in Scotland.

We’ve passed world-leading climate change and housing legislation.

We've restored the principle of free education.

We've abolished prescription charges.

And we have protected the NHS as a public service.

And make no mistake. It is only because we hold the power to decide in our own hands that I can stand here proudly and say this: for as long as we are in government, there will be no privatisation of the NHS in Scotland.

Delegates,

These are big gains for families and communities. But there are too many things that we can’t do. We can't give our businesses the competitive edge they need to compete with the pull of London. We can't set an immigration policy that meets our priorities as a country.
We can't stop the destruction of our welfare state by a Tory government we didn't want.

And we can't rid our country of weapons of mass destruction.

Last weekend, I spoke at yet another rally in Glasgow, protesting against the presence of Trident nuclear weapons on the Clyde. I was proud to do so.But, friends,

I'm fed up protesting against Trident.
I want to see the back of Trident.

And just think about this.

In less than six months’ time, if we vote Yes, we won’t be in the protest business anymore. We'll be in the removal business. After years of campaigning, we will have the power.

And be in no doubt - we will use that power to remove Trident from Scotland once and for all.

Friends,

When I think of the choice we face on 18 September, I think first and foremost of children. Not of this generation but of the next. I think of the kids in my own life, my niece and nephews. I want them to grow up as confident citizens in a confident country. I want them to take the independence of their country for granted, to look back and wonder how we could ever have been anything but independent.

And if they choose to live and work overseas, I want it to be because that's what they've decided to do, not because they lack opportunities here at home. I think too of the children in my wonderful, multi-cultural constituency, learning in primary schools where upwards of 20 different languages are spoken. I want them, even though they may not have been born here, to feel that Scotland is where they belong.

And, let me be clear: I want the loudest voices they hear as they grow up to be voices of love and welcome, not those of Nigel Farage, UKIP and the Westminster politicians who so disgracefully pander to them.

Delegates,

With independence, we can do things differently. We can chart our own course. Sing our own song. That is the point. If we vote Yes, I will be as proud as anyone to see the Saltire fly above the United Nations. But, for me, that's not the purpose of independence.

The purpose is to make our country a better and fairer place to live.

I want us to rediscover the spirit that made us home to the great innovators, writers, philosophers and entrepreneurs of the world.

I want us to have the powers to energise our economy. To be a hotbed of enterprise so that we can create the jobs, the opportunities and the wealth that we need to build a better society.

I want us to have the ability to protect and sustain a welfare state that gives people a hand up and provides a safety net for the times when life knocks us down.

And I want us to demonstrate, not by our words, but by our actions, that giving our children the best start in life will alway be - must always be - a much higher priority than obscene and senseless weapons of mass destruction.

Delegates,

These are the essential differences between yes and no.
And these are the reasons we must vote Yes.

Friends,

I am often asked to sum up why I believe that Scotland should be independent. The truth is there are many reasons. But when I boil it all down, it always comes back to my own life experience. I grew up in a working class family, in the west of Scotland, during the darkest days of Thatcherism. It wasn't inevitable that I would go to university, qualify as a lawyer and end up standing here before you as Deputy First Minister.

I was lucky. I had parents who escaped the misery of unemployment that affected so many others during those years; parents who encouraged and believed in me and who worked hard to make sure I wanted for nothing. And, of course, I had the benefit of a free university education.

And let me pause here just to say this: I will never, ever, in politics, be part of anything that robs future generations of the same access to university that I had. For me, that principle is personal. So I was lucky. But I was surrounded by people who weren't so lucky. Friends and classmates who were just as able as me and who worked just as hard but whose life circumstances conspired against them.

I want to live in a country where it doesn't just come down to luck.

I want to live in a country that uses its vast wealth to ensure that every child, regardless of their background, gets the chance to do what I did.

The chance to follow their dreams and reach their full potential - whatever that might be.

I know that voting yes won't achieve that by magic - we will have to work for it and earn it. We will have to make it happen. But I also know, from decades of experience, that voting No means we won't achieve it at all. And that, in a nutshell, is why I'll be voting Yes.

Friends,

One of my favourite songs is the beautiful 'Wild Mountainside' sung by Eddi Reader at the opening of the Scottish Parliament building in 2004. I heard her sing it again, two weeks ago, at a memorial service in Govan for the late Hugh MacDonald, another stalwart of our movement. You'll be relieved to hear that I'm not going to sing it to you, but the song includes these words:

'The last mile is upon us. I'll carry you if you fall."

Well, my fellow nationalists, after 80 years of campaigning, the last mile of our journey to independence is upon us. It may well be the hardest mile of all. So we will encourage each other, cheer each other and, yes, if needs be, we will carry each other over the finishing line.

But, friends, we will not fall. I want you to hear this and believe it in your heart. As a tribute to those no longer with us, for everyone lucky enough to be alive at this moment in history and, above all else, for the sake of generations to come, we are going to win.

Scotland is going to be independent.

Or to paraphrase a very special lady, more than 40 years ago:

On 18 September this year, we are going to stop the world.
Scotland is going to get on.

And then, when we do, the next phase of our journey will begin. We will regain our strength, renew our resolve, and we will get on with the job of building a country that our children, our grandchildren and their children will be proud to call home.

A prosperous country.
A fair country.
A confident country.
        An independent country.

The media discovers the nuclear negotiating issues at last - “It’s the nukes, stupid!”

The media, as ever well behind the curve on the essence of the independence debate, has suddenly discovered that defence, the nuclear deterrent and negotiation are the big issues, and that they had it wrong all along! Flushed with their new insight, they now claim that everybody else had it wrong too, and nobody else had considered the egregious fact of WMD as  important until they did.

Having spent a couple of weeks touting the risible idea that the Scottish Government would use the nuclear deterrent and the removal of Trident from Faslane “as a bargaining chip”, they are now lost in admiration at themselves for discovering that such a proposition is nonsense.

What brought them to such Damascean conclusions? Why, Lord George Robertson’s ravings at Brookings! The Wee Laird o’ Islay at least broke in to the somnolent consciousness of the media. Thanks for that, George.

Here’s the breathtaking conclusion of Kate Devlin in the Herald, based on, God help us, David Mundell’s realisation that negotiations on Trident – as touted by his colleagues and London press – is a non-starter with the SNP -

“His comments are the first insight into how talks to break up the UK could progress.”

Is that a fact, Kate? The first insight only if you ignore the blindingly obvious, and the many detailed analyses, including my own of the issue, especially during the great SNP conference debate of 2012 on NATO.

But, hey, I’m only one old Scottish voter, without the massive research resources and expertise of a national news paper …

Currency creates crisis – the Better Together meltdown after Guardian leak

A few facts -

QUESTION: What is the “optimal currency arrangement" for Scotland and the rest of the UK (rUK)?

Murdo Fraser put this question to five experts on 12th March. They disagreed on the answer. This on the same day that the Treasury Committee was grilling Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England and doing their level best – unsuccessfully - to bounce him out of his neutrality and objectivity on the the shape of a currency union after a YES vote, and on Scotland’s independence, as re-confirmed and re-asserted to Stewart Hosie MP.

UK’s answer is “The present arrangement is the best. Stay with the UK and keep the present arrangement – vote No!”

Scottish Government’s answer is “We like many aspects of the present arrangement but we don’t like a host of other aspects of UK – let’s keep the best of the present currency arrangement, improve it - and vote YES to Scotland’s independence!”

Currency: Scotland’s currency after independence will be the pound sterling, either in a currency union with rUK (99% probability) or under sterlingisation - i.e. we will carry on using the pound as a tradable currency and peg it on a fixed rate to sterling.

HTTP://COUNTINGDOWNTO.COM

A YouTube response to a Don’t Know’s questions “that haven’t been answered”

Djoly

Djoly (Please note the 'D' is silent, like the night)
I'm not so concerned about the impartiality of the different reporting bodies, (BBC and ITV) just their inability to get clear answers from our elected representatives. As the day's turned to weeks and the weeks to month, it is now clear that the explanation's I was hoping for, so I could make a balanced informed choice on: (security, borders, Europe, currency and how we elect our head of state, Queen? and so forth) are unclear.

Much of the major decisions will only become clear after the vote. (Europe and currency)

That is not satisfactory for the serious minded voters that want to make an informed decision. I asked my bank the other day what was to happen if the vote is Yes, they did not have a scooby. I've just bought a passport for £80, will it be valid for 10 years, and will I need it to travel down to London to visit my Brother. Will there be a General Election in 2015 if there is a Yes vote?

Being governed by parties we did not vote for, is a good enough reason for Independence, but why keep their head of state and currency.

People do not have long memories, a lot a people that have the vote will not remember the Second World War, and how Britain stood alone against an evil and powerful foe, together the United Kingdom managed to withstand the onslaught.

I'm a Democrat, so I believe the head of state should be elected. (sorry Queenie)

I have not yet decided my vote.

MY REPLY

I'm not surprised you're undecided if you think no one has offered answers to your questions, Djoly: they have ALL been answered - to the degree that they CAN be answered, given that we're remaking a country under intense hostility from UK parties and institutions - to my satisfaction and to that of around 1.5m "serious-minded" YES voters, based on polls (more to come).

It seems to me you are either afraid of change, and prefer to be locked in a dysfunctional and rapidly decaying UK status quo, or you are looking for a certainty that no one can give you in a rapidly changing world, least of all the present government and political parties.

But let me try to help -

Security: Scotland will be MORE secure, because we won't have a WMD base as a prime target in our country, making us a candidate for a first strike in a nuclear war - and nobody will have any reason to attack us since we won't be engaged in illegal wars and invading other countries. We will have our own defence force for domestic security, and will be a member, but not a nuclear member of NATO.

Borders/passports: There will be no border, no border posts, and no passport required to travel to England since we will be in the EU and covered by existing rules.

Europe: We are currently a member of the EU, and will still be one after a YES vote under UK till 2016. During the period Sept 2014 till March 2016 we will be negotiating a range of matters including our new status in Europe. No informed commentator or expert seriously believes we won't continue in membership.

Currency: Our currency will be the pound sterling, either in a currency union with rUK or under sterlingisation - i.e. we will carry on using the pound as a tradable currency and peg it on a fixed rate to sterling.

Head of state: Our Head of state will be the Queen - a commitment already given and one that cannot be changed without a referendum after independence - and there won't be one, because all opinion polls show about a two thirds majority in favour of monarchy across UK (that's why they don't hold a referendum on it!) I'm a republican, by the way - but I'm also a democrat and a realist.

2015 General election: The 2015 election will be held after a No vote - no one questions that, since there will still be a UK till 2016 and an rUK and a Westminster Parliament after 2016

(If your bank can't answer simple questions on currency, etc. I suggest you change your bank.)

Get your own copy of the White Paper, at least scan it, use it for reference and contact information sources who know what they're talking about, instead of listening to Better Together scare stories. Be part of the future, the new Scotland. Be on the right side of history - don't go down in history as a frightened Scot who voted No to his/her country's independence.

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