We can pin down what our next steps to Scottish independence must be

Unsurprisingly, the British state did exactly that, and there was broad agreement across Yes on the de facto referendum, with the debate focused around whether to fight on the “away” ground of Westminster, or have a “home” tie at Holyrood .

Now a few siren voices are suggesting a back-down over the de facto referendum, whispering, like Wormtongue in The Lord Of The Rings, that “it can’t be won” and that waiting for a constant 60% in the opinion polls is “forever our friend”.

So, what’s their plan?

Allow the Westminster veto to continue and NEVER get independence, or maybe sometime in a month of Sundays?

If we use a Holyrood election as the de facto referendum that has been promised, we can win a majority of pro-independence MSPs and a majority of the popular vote on both the constituency count and the list.

Here’s how it would work. Every pro-independence candidate and party stands on one policy only – independence – and seeking one mandate: for an immediate declaration of independence and immediate negotiations with Westminster. And we have a cross-party and non-party Scottish Constitutional Convention to ensure that we have agreed candidate lists.

If the BritNat establishment ignores the democratic result, we take our case to the UN.

Perhaps the reason some careerist politicians with their bums truly wedded to the Westminster leather don’t want that, is that it means putting movement before party, and using the “Max the YES” strategy at that Holyrood de facto election. That means voting for an agreed single indy candidate in each constituency (mainly or wholly SNP), and then voting for Alba or Greens on the list.

Too many people – either through ignorance or deliberately for their own selfish ends – still think a vote for the SNP and a vote for independence are the same thing. People are right to say the SNP can’t get more than 50% on their own – but if you add in Alba votes, Green votes, Labour pro-independence votes and non-aligned pro-independence votes, it is more than doable. A de facto referendum won’t win if it is just seeking another “mandate” for the SNP to pursue independence – we’ve done that already seven times.

It needs to be a broad, cross-party YES campaign that says to people: Because the UK Government won’t allow us a referendum like last time, on this ONE occasion, to get independence, vote for these candidates and parties who are standing solely for independence – again, emphasising, on this ONE occasion.

And important – but divisive – issues, such as the EU, gender ideology, the monarchy, Nato etc, need to be parked and decided on democratically only once we have independence secured.

That doesn’t mean people can’t talk about their issues and state their view – but it does mean always, always saying to the Scottish people that “independence is about making YOU sovereign over your own affairs. Once independence is achieved YOU can decide on all these other issues for yourselves, rather than have Westminster decide them for you.”

Forward to freedom! Forward to an independent Scotland! Together.
Steve Arnott
Inverness

THE writer Eric Blair advised against the use of foreign languages. “De facto” just means in fact or actual.

Thus every vote for an SNP/Green/Alba member of either parliament is in fact a vote for independence. Every referendum, either informal or formal, is actually a poll for freedom. Every letter or article pointing out the significance of the Treaty of Union being repeatedly broken, and the international law against nuclear weapons being ignored, and the UN rulings regarding independence being overlooked by Westminster, is actually a vote for Scottish self-determination.

Every march is voting with your feet. Hanging even a tattered saltire is a sign of resistance. Every meeting attended is a mark of dissatisfaction. Everything counts. So less of this “de facto” stuff.
Iain W D Forde
Scotlandwell

READING Jim Cassidy’s letter in the Sunday National last week prompted me to write this. I fully understand Airdrie’s sense of being unable to advance our aim at this particular time. I have no doubt they have done valuable work/activism before deciding the position they now take.

To have come so far then to give up or pause their work is a gift to the forces of Unionism, who will continue their work relentlessly. That is only one reason to continue. The other is that nobody can predict how political circumstances will change in the coming months, and when they do, our movement needs to be prepared to react speedily.

To give an example of change, when the 2014 referendum was agreed, I attended two independence meetings in Castlemilk. The first was addressed by Nicola Sturgeon. The attendance was 50, as was that of the second addressed by Jeane Freeman. Further into the campaign, I spoke from the floor at a meeting of 500. After the referendum, Nicola Sturgeon addressed a meeting of more than a thousand at the SECC, and at the May General Election, Labour lost all but one of their MPs. A period of two-and-a-half years.

I accept the present period of our fight is more complex with greater challenges, but to pause is not the answer. I am 81 and nowadays the sum total of my activism is letters to our paper and attendance at the retired members branch of my union.

I wish to impress upon the Airdrie organisation the importance of constant organisation and activism and putting aside feelings of political impotence and hopelessness. I write as someone who has been an activist all my adult life through high and low moments in various areas and spheres.
Bobby Brennan
Glasgow

THERE was a report on BBC News that made my blood boil ... well, maybe even more than it usually boils!

Apparently, as much as £50 million of government support for fuel bills has been left unclaimed. Two million households with traditional physical pre-payment meters are sent vouchers monthly by the energy companies in the post or by email. They then need to take them to a local shop to be credited on to their meter.

However. figures from Paypoint and the Post Office show that during October and November 2022, 19% of the vouchers (380,000 homes) were not cashed before the expiry date. The BBC interviewed a British Gas customer who had still not received the October voucher. She said she had contacted British Gas a few times but they kept blaming the problem on Royal Mail. She had also complained in writing but to no avail. Also, a representative from the Citizens Advice Bureau said some people had been told by their energy company to check their emails, even though these customers aren’t online!

What the hell is wrong with the world? Those poorer, more vulnerable folk not only have to pay more per unit for energy but also have to jump through hoops to get the extra money they badly need, while those better off, paying by direct debit, don’t need to lift their little finger! The amount owed is automatically credited to their energy account or deducted from their bill. To be honest, there will be some comfortably off folk that won’t even have bothered to check if it’s been credited or not!

In this harsh, brutal climate (and I’m not on aboot the weather) in Brexit right-wing Tory Britain, if, say, you have loads of shares in Shell or BP, you are laughing all the way to the bank. You can lie back in your nice luxury state-of-the-art bath full of bubbles, with a glass of champagne in one hand, a Havana cigar in the other, in the smug knowledge that those share dividends will automatically roll into your bank account, boosting it to an extortionate level.

Aye, but in reality land, for those at the other end of the economic spectrum, many on pre-payment meters won’t even be able to afford hot water for a guid wash ower the sink!

Methinks any future independent Scottish Government has to decide what side it is on. Trying to appease both these totally polarised sides of society ain’t gonna cut the mustard!
Ivor Telfer
Dalgety Bay, Fife

TO have UK energy ownership in private hands is as daft as having the money supply in private hands, and only nationalisation would now remedy both of these positions.

The huge profits made by the oil companies are similar to those made by the banks, and Westminster even paid the windmill makers to come here by means of subsidy, without which windfarms would never have been built, and even allowed them to remain in private – and often foreign – ownership.

Now we pay a high price for energy in response to world markets and other speculative functions, all beyond our control.

There is surely an opportunity ahead for a future Scottish Government to grasp with both hands.
Malcolm Parkin
Kinross

IT was good to see yesterday in The National that the City of Edinburgh Council is to commemorate Jane Haining who courageously helped to protect Jewish children who were in her care in the Church of Scotland’s Mission School in Budapest.

Although Jane Haining’s name is marked on a plaque, along with a mention of others who were victims of fascism, on the “Cairn to Scottish Democracy” on Calton Hill, she deserves to be recognised in her own right.

In 1991, I organised a visit for an Edinburgh school group to see an exhibition about Jane Haining at the Church of Scotland Mission in Budapest.

Esther Balazs, who had been one the girls in Jane’s care, gave a talk to my pupils in one of the classrooms in the old “Scottish School”.

The school pupils from Edinburgh then raised funds to bring Esther over from Hungary to visit Scotland.

I would highly recommend to readers the biography of Jane by Mary Miller which is called Jane Haining: A Life Of Love And Courage. I was pleased to see that my friend Esther Balazs was quoted a number of times in the biography. Esther told me several times that Jane Haining should have a book written about her.

Perhaps the banks could further mark Jane’s devotion by putting her image on a bank note?
Graham Sutherland
Edinburgh