Yes or No?

The Scottish Independence debate is the most vital one that we have seen since 1707, yet it remains curiously muted, perhaps because there is the best part of a year to go. Our efforts to find a supporter of the No faction have again come to nothing, but David Donnison, an Emeritus Professor of Glasgow University who knows Arran well, has written the following thoughtful account of his position. Like many, he finds himself somewhere in the middle, which perhaps accounts for the title to his piece.

Referendum blues

A year ago I would have voted “No” to independence – and “Yes” to “devomax” had we been given the opportunity to do so. Among other good reasons for my “No” vote was my feeling that at the western end of Scotland’s central belt (where I have lived for 33 years) we have suffered one of Europe’s biggest industrial disasters, and now have the biggest concentrations of unemployment, sickness and poverty that follow such disasters.

Can we bring the people of this area – which includes Ardrossan – into Scotland’s mainstream? Will they have the opportunities that every Scot should be entitled to? Those are the most important questions facing our country, whether independent or not. It should be easier to get the right answers if the resources of the whole of the U.K. can be brought to bear on them. Although I could give other good reasons for a “No” vote, that was the most important one for me.

But over the past year the English – or some of them – have swung to UKIP, and their main political parties have responded in a panicky way. If they elect a Tory Government, or a Tory-Lib-Dem coalition, there will be more cuts in the services on which our poorest people depend; more privatisations of public services; the building of a monstrous new prison; a referendum that seems likely to take us out of Europe; and the repeal of the Human Rights Act. Meanwhile there are to be tax cuts for millionaires, massive investment in the poisonous fracking industry, and the replacement of our pointless and hugely expensive nuclear submarine fleet. Even if Labour wins the next Westminster elections much of this programme seems likely to go ahead.

If that’s to be the U.K. we have to live in, I shall want to get out of it.

Unfortunately, the referendum and the general election come in the wrong order. So I shall have to make my best guess at the UK’s political future as the referendum approaches without the evidence a general election would provide.

Until then, mark me down as a “Don’t know”.