Should Yes movement switch to being a civil rights movement?

It is really clear to me from this poll that support for the right to vote on independence exceeds the support for independence itself. Recent polls for independence have stubbornly remained around 50%. This new poll on the powers around independence also has the “in favour” a comfortable 25% ahead of those who oppose it. These are the sorts of figure the Yes movement would love to have.

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A simple change of tactic is clear. Change from being a Yes movement to being a civil rights movement – not “we support independence” but “we support the right to vote on it”. When we look around the world, the civil rights movement over the last 100-plus years has had markedly more success than politely asking a dysfunctional parliament for permission to leave.

As part of this broader civil rights movement, which would include liberal-minded Unionists – who I assume are part of the 8% that support the principle of the right to legislate on independence but who aren’t coming through in the polling figures for Yes – we could also link up with our colleagues in Wales and possibly even those in England who favour a more modern democracy, with a fully elected upper house.

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Not only would a civil-rights-oriented movement supportive of independence as a right be more popular in Scotland, the polling clearly shows this, but by linking up with others across the whole UK wanting meaningful reform of the UK parliamentary museum piece, it could seriously start to hurt marginal constituencies in England – and that would be a force that the Tories and Labour could no longer afford to ignore.

Look at the power Ukip wielded to force Brexit on us, yet they only ever got one MP elected at a UK General Election. This is tiny in comparison to the the number of SNP MPs we return, yet nothing changes.

The Yes movement is running out of road, and asking for permission will be a very long wait. We need to think differently and consider the opportunity that a civil rights movement would create, and see what political leverage this would create in England.

Craig Cockburn
Edinburgh

BRIAN Boyce is spot on when he says that London will never co-operate with anything which could lead to Scotland leaving the UK (Long Letter, Jan 25). However, if it were to be shown, by a formal democratic vote, that independence was the will of the Scottish people and that Scotland was prepared to take the step of independence through the perfectly constitutional power of its own MPs, then and only then might they enter into practical negotiations to arrive at the best scenario for both nations.

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How then can we, the people of Scotland, show that a majority of us wish to leave the UK? Opinion polls won’t cut it, it has to be a democratic election which is used as a plebiscite. As Brian says, the current SNP position does not do that, therefore we are not taking independence into our own hands. We have the chance to do this at the next General Election by turning it into a plebiscite, which will be the only way to get more than 50% of Scottish voters to vote unequivocally to leave the UK.

The SNP would actually benefit greatly, in terms of the number of seats won, by doing this. Right now it would appear, as Brian suggests, that their current policy could be a train crash not just for the party but by extension for the independence movement.

Can you imagine the lead-up to the next Holyrood election if the SNP have little more than a bare majority or worse yet, a minority of Scottish MPs? Voters like winners, not losers.

Ian Roberts
Wishaw

WHILE not wishing to get “into it” with Tim Jones (Letters, Jan 25), as I know that can be tiresome for readers of The National’s letters pages, I do wish to point out that I made no comment, in my letter of January 24 about Plaid Cymru, how they operate or indeed the Welsh independence movement. Unlike Mr Jones, I am not in a position to do that.

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I do stand by my opinion, however, that to have a cross-party paper – ie one in which Plaid Cymru as well as the Unionist parties participated, which declares, on the back of a rigorous two-year-long exercise (in which the public’s feedback and views also played a part) that independence is viable – is an enviable position to have for any independence movement. It can be quoted for as long as it takes.

That Scotland’s MSPs and MPs have failed in 10 years to create such a document of evidence, and therefore what we continue to miss from our sparse armoury, I see as deeply regrettable.

Jenny Pearson
Edinburgh

LESLEY Riddoch was her usual incisive self on Thursday and made a number of excellent points (The SNP must build momentum – and remember ‘national’ is not a dirty word, Jan 25). I personally I have never felt the “National” part of the SNP to be a “drawback”, although Humza Yousaf, along with the previous First Minister, appear to have other perceptions of it.

However, I take some exception to Lesley’s quote from Thrive (though otherwise an excellent read). She says: “The United Kingdom is a state of four nations”. I disagree, the UK is a state of three nations. I presume she is numbering Northern Ireland as the fourth “nation”. NI is historically part of the nation of Ireland and is therefore not a “nation” in its own right, but part of the nation of Ireland and not of the UK, although the UK typically may like to think so (and in so quoting she has fallen into a UK trap).

Otherwise her article is sharp and to the point.

Paul Gillon
Baintown, Leven