Last night I was at a YES rally featuring Jean Urquhart and
John Finnie, both Independent MSP’s, both defectors from the SNP.
The evening began with this:
An amusing little piece, but a somewhat vacuous contribution
to the indy debate. The connotation is
that only news in London is news and somehow independence will rid us of this
imbalance. I’m an avid reader of the
Northern Times, well maybe 10% of it – the rest is all about what’s happening
in Golspie and Brora – of very little interest to me. It was the first of many cheap shots.
After another video describing the implosion of the NHS in
England Jean made her opening address.
She began by describing the lack of democracy at the time of the Act of
Union, and riots on the streets of Edinburgh.
She said that Scotland was once great, and that the genetic
inventiveness of the Scots is still around, if only we were independent.
John Finnie gave us a discourse on the evils of Westminster
and English public schools and trumpeted the tolerance of the Scots to
in-migration. Apparently Poles, people
from the Indian sub-continent, Africans, Europeans - they’ve all been welcomed. He failed to mention one of the biggest
in-migrations to Scotland over the last few decades – the English. I wondered why. He bemoaned the London economy sucking the
life out of the rest of the UK.
Between his nationalistic ramblings he gave an interesting
analysis of the decline of conservatism, the labour party and latterly the
liberals in Scotland and pointed out that independence was the only way
Scotland could get the Government it wanted.
But much of his incogent presentation erred into the party political –
cheap shots at other parties and their policies, and vague promises of
something for everyone after independence.
For me the evening epitomised what is wrong with the YES
campaign. In my little social media
bubble I’ve been drawn to the more radical vision of Independence, of an
inclusive society underscored by a written constitution empowering and
resourcing local decision-making. A chance
to be rid of the establishment dinosaurs centred around Westminster and to bring
power to the people.
These MSPs presented the oh-so-nearly anti-English Scottish
nationalism that I’ve spent much of my 30 years in Scotland banging my head
against. Last night was almost enough to
drive me back into the NO camp.
But it didn’t. If we
get a YES vote the work begins on September 19th – and a priority is
to get to grips with that constitution, and rid ourselves of those dinosaurs: -
including John Finnie and Jean Urquhart and others of their ilk who who think
that Scottish people are somehow better than others. They are not, but they do deserve to control
who governs them, and have a direct say in what happens.
1 comment:
Glad to see you are blogging again...
I really hope that Scotland does manage independence, without the sillier ideas becoming a part of the identity...
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