Alyn Smith: This is not the end of our European story

First, in 2014 a majority of Scots voted to stick with the UK. We accepted that and, while we remained convinced independence is our best option, accepted it was off the table. The “once in a generation” stuff was just hyperbole. Boris Johnson called the election just passed a once in a lifetime opportunity. Does that mean we don’t have democracy any more?

It is beyond argument that a big percentage of the No vote was on the basis that people did not want to risk their EU status, and thought that a Yes vote might. I entirely disagree with that, but that’s history now. The fact remains lots of people, especially EU nationals who quite rightly had a vote, didn’t see the need to risk it.

In 2016 the facts changed. Scotland voted 62% across every counting region to remain. In the 2017 election we voted massively for remain parties. In the 2019 European election the SNP won with a whopping result and three out of six seats in an explicitly pro-EU platform. In the Westminster 2019 election we won again, with 80% of the seats and the pro-EU LibDems won four more.

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The Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Senedd, and the Northern Ireland Assembly have all formally objected to Boris Johnson’s shabby Withdrawal Agreement. It deals with the exit, nothing more, and is deeply flawed at that. The House of Lords too is uneasy. It proposed five meek and mild, common-sense amendments, but they were all rejected out of hand by a Tory UK administration that seems proud of its boneheadedness and proud to revel in its punteresque lack of knowledge.

But despite all that, it is happening. I was in Brussels yesterday. After 15 years in the place, I could not fail to be here to lend my support to friends and colleagues. I’m deeply sad that we failed to stop it. I feel I’ve let people down. I struggle to think of anything additional I, or Scotland, or the Scottish Government, could have done within the law, but I still feel sick to my stomach.

Yesterday the European Parliament in Brussels voted through the Withdrawal Agreement. I’m pleased that Team Scotland, the SNP’s Aileen McLeod, Christian Allard, Heather Anderson (who took up my seat when I was elected MP to Stirling) and I’d include Scotland’s LibDem MEP Sheila Ritchie, were all there to make their views known at the final vote.

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Scotland’s MEPs voted against this agreement, because it is a bad agreement and Scotland wants to remain. The rest of the EU’s representatives will vote for, with heavy hearts, because they know they cannot keep a member state in the EU against its declared will.

From left, Alyn Smith, Christian Allard and Aileen McLeod

There were tears, hugs and Auld Lang Syne. From the Brexit Party I daresay there was some rejoicing, whereupon they will crawl back under whatever stones they crawled out from, never to be seen again. That’s the one upside of Brexit there is that I can find.

We fly back to Scotland tonight, and I’ll be doing media in Edinburgh tomorrow morning, events in Stirling with Stirling4Europe in the evening and then over to GlasgowlovesEU’s event starting 10:30pm to mark the moment, 30 minutes later, when our EU status – I hope just for the moment – stops. I’ve been pleased to see so many people picking up on my “Leave a Light On” speech and I think it holds true for where we all are. We can’t expect the EU to solve our problems for us, but we can hope they’ll welcome us back in. I then have the SNP National Executive Committee in Glasgow on Saturday morning where we’ll be discussing what comes next.

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This week is not the end of the story. The fact is, we truly did do all we could to turn Brexit around for the whole of the UK. We proposed compromises (like leaving the EU but staying in the single market and customs union, as Norway do). We worked on innovative ideas like creating a special status for Northern Ireland and Scotland, essentially moving the NI border to Carlisle where we could work on technical solutions but without the complex politics.

We backed a second EU referendum even while the people involved were more interested in fighting themselves. We can look the people of Scotland in the eye and be open and honest – we tried.

We now have a choice. There is no way in hell the UK is redoing the EU – the trade-offs would be too great given the lack of knowledge of EU basics among the UK political and media class – just on Tuesday The Times newspaper no less had on its front page that the EU court is in Strasbourg (its in Luxembourg – the Court of Human Rights is in Strasbourg). Our only way back to the EU is independence.

So long term, the most significant thing happening in Brussels this week is the launch of the Friends of Scotland Group.

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Each accession state has a friendship group, so historically there was Friends of Croatia, Friends of Poland etc. Now there’s a Friends of Scotland and that is causing waves in Brussels.

THIS is a group of heavyweight MEPs from across the house who have recognised Scotland’s pro-EU sentiment and are committed to work with us to maintain close links. They’re explicitly neutral on our constitutional future, as we would expect them to be, but they are committed to working with us. That is more significant than might be apparent. Trust me, these groups don’t happen by accident.

The people of Scotland have a choice to make, and accession to the EU is going to dominate our discussion in Scotland just as the real choices the UK is making on our behalf, taking our advantages and limiting our choices, will make our case for us. Today is a sad day, but Scotland’s best days are still ahead.