Lesley Riddoch: Folk like Professor Murphy remain gold dust for our Yes movement

Robin McAlpine’s classically colourful verdict – “utter pish” – was highlighted by the Daily Express. Professor Richard Murphy’s response – “enough to make me vote No” – made the front page of The Herald.

So, should these critics “wheesht for indy”?

No, they shouldn’t.

And does that then mean the First Minister’s economic strategy is completely defective?

No, it doesn’t. Because this week’s publication was essentially a political paper – not an economic one. A placeholder – devised at a time when two and two still made four but delivered on a day the pensions industry almost collapsed.

Nicola Sturgeon seems to have decided that folk are too trauchled by the Liz Truss meltdown to face another inconvenient truth. Namely that Scotland will have to cut the fiscal apron strings with the Bank of England, the pound and all things financially familiar within one year of independence.

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If we don’t, as Messrs Murphy, McAlpine and others have outlined in great detail, iScotland will be left perilously betwixt and between, with the Bank of England potentially freezing transactions and disastrous Treasury/Whitehall moves blighting our new country, giving us a weaker chance of re-entering the EU or EFTA.

We didn’t hear the FM acknowledge this, but we may also not have heard her last or even her penultimate word on currency and a Scottish pound. Monday may just have been a holding statement designed to grab no headlines, deliver no hostages to fortune and distract not one iota from the collapse of governance at Westminster, leaving Ms Sturgeon free to do what she likes best – and bide her time.

Might she privately accept the need for greater speed than her paper outlined?

She might.

Or Nicola Sturgeon might still be on a slow “journey” from Salmond’s old policy of sharing the pound.

It’s possible her instinct for caution means that whatever the question, the answer is always half-speed – not full steam ahead.

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It’s possible she doesn’t like being lectured.

It’s possible she doesn’t want Project Fear 2 unleashed this early in the game.

It’s possible she doesn’t envisage an indyref any time soon.

It’s also possible she privately agrees 95% with the Scottish Currency Group but doesn’t think this is the time to spell out details.

It’s both a strength and weakness of her political style that so few people know what Nicola Sturgeon is really thinking.

Still, the net result of her economic policy launch was next to nothing.

And a low-key launch might have been the right tactic – for now.

But not for long.

No democracy should subject such an important idea as independence to so little scrutiny – and that’s why critics like Robin McAlpine, Tim Rideout and Prof Richard Murphy are vitally important. They ARE the opposition since pro-Union parties won’t even engage lest they validate the FM’s papers and breathe life into the whole exciting independence proposition.

Without internal critics – people who care enough about the future of this country to invite certain pelters – there IS no constructive opposition. And therefore, no warning of shoogly wheels that could yet come spinning off. Yet criticism is vital for proofing ideas which may soon be implemented.

As things stand – since Unionists will not engage –there is only the automatic presumption on their side that any FM idea is mince and on ours that Nicola Sturgeon must always be right, or at least – never shown to be wrong.

What kind of thin-skinned democracy and Yes movement is that?

Sure – the lack of insightful comment by Labour and the Tories means right-wing, pro-Union papers end up quoting left-wing pro-indy commentators whose main beef is that Nicola Sturgeon isn’t leaving the mechanisms of the Union fast enough. What an irony.

But at least they have something interesting to say.

They could be right – or they could be wrong.

Time will tell.

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But if they can’t sound alarm bells – who will? And when? If there’s a snap General Election, we may all be swept into a de facto referendum campaign and a slow, unclear transition from sterling that becomes as big a liability as the shared currency of 2014 (which apparently wasn’t even discussed in Cabinet before being announced).

Are we really saying no one can question this key Scottish Government policy in this feisty, confident, democratic country?

It’s especially disappointing to see people like Sheffield-based Prof Richard Murphy attacked as a “traitor” and unwanted outsider “poking his nose in”.

Of course, if critics can question Scottish Government policy, their arguments can also be challenged. But not their very existence.

Richard Murphy’s role in discrediting GERS has been invaluable to the independence cause. So what if he lives outside Scotland? That means he won’t directly benefit from independence and doesn’t need to wrap his heid around any of our thorny economic dilemmas. But he still does. How brilliant and precious is that? Folk like Prof Murphy are gold dust for our movement.

Still, folk will ask, did he and Robin have to be quite so apocalyptic and colourful in their language?

Well, yes.

It’s what they’re for and it’s what they’re like. No point trying to change them.

Just as the First Minister is cautious and non-collaborative – it’s what she’s like.

And that’s part of the reason her critics are so outspoken. They – we – have been completely ignored by the SNP leadership, completely uninvolved in areas of genuine expertise and thoroughly left outside the tent.

A decade of exclusion is hard to thole – and that’s one big reason indy critics get so despairing and shout so loud. But that reality won’t suddenly change.

Genuine collaboration is not Nicola’s style. That’s one weakness to be set against massive strengths.

She’s still massively popular.

She still looks and sounds like the only adult in the room. She still gets elected. And that’s a huge achievement.

But she can still be wrong.

Would it totally frighten Scots to know we must transition within one year of independence to a Scottish pound, which might yet prove stronger than the English pound, according to Richard Murphy? That question sits at the centre of the whole independence debate.

The First Minister’s attitude conditions the way voters respond.

If they sense hesitation, they also hesitate, and that’s used to justify caution, which becomes habit-forming.

So it’s possible this week’s economic statement was really a piece of political reassurance for Scottish voters at a time of panic and meltdown.

It’s possible that was the right decision. It’s possible the FM’s stance on currency is not yet final.

And maybe the issue doesn’t need to be settled right now. But since she is human, Nicola Sturgeon could also be wrong.

That’s not terminal. It’s fixable.

But only indy supporters care enough to carry the tools. So let’s not go shooting those messengers.