The days ahead
We were going to get 2013 up and running with a piece on how we’d like to see the independence debate approached in the coming year, but Ewan Crawford has rather kindly done the job for us in The Scotsman, in a snappy 113 words:
“Labour has decided to mount a campaign based primarily on a combination of all-out personal attack against the First Minister and an assault on what they characterise as Scotland’s “something for nothing culture” typified by free personal care for the elderly and the abolition of university tuition fees.
In 2013 they should feel free to get on with this to see if this is indeed the platform that people in Scotland have been crying out for from a potential party of government.
The overwhelming focus of the independence campaign should instead be about a sense of possibility and a conversation with people concerned about jobs and the economic prospects for themselves and their families.”
In an ideal world, the last paragraph on its own would probably have sufficed. But it’s vitally important to understand the opposition’s position not just on the superficial political level, but also what it tells us about the consequences of a No vote.
If there’s one truth the independence movement really needs to get across to the people of Scotland in the next 12 months if it’s to build towards victory, it’s that there will be no additional powers for Holyrood within the UK should Scots reject the opportunity to run their own affairs. Indeed, the opposite is likely to be the case.
Helpfully, the message compresses down neatly to just four words – words the Yes movement must, for all its positivity, drum into the minds of the Scottish people if it wants them to fully understand the choice they face in 2014: Vote No, Get Nothing.
I think Ewan Crawford is a gret ambassador for independence. He always comes across as very thoughtful, intelligent and reasonable. His summary of Labour’s campaign tactics are spot on and will hopefully they will be rejected by the vast majority of Scots and turned into YES votes.
The thing is, that while a “Yes” vote gives us all of the pros and cons, a “No”. vote gives us less than nothing. In fact we may end up with the Scottish Government having REDUCED powers in certain areas. This is quite possibly more than mere scaremongering. Consider that although the Scottish Government is democratically elected after being democratically set up, its powers are there at the behest of Westminster. They can reduce or even totally eradicate them…remember the NI parliament which was repeatedly suspended?
Completely agree Rev. The Yes campaign should commission large posters with the simple message.
Vote No. Get 0. Zilch. Nowt.
Unfortunately the outcome in the event of a no vote is a lot worse than ‘get nothing’ . The cuts to the Barnet formula because of the austerity policy’s and the recommended changes to the formula to be based on a skewed claim of need ( which alone will result in cuts of £4.5bn or £1, 600 per person) and the likelihood that power will be stripped from our parliament will make life a lot harder for a majority of us. The message that has to be got across is ghat a no vote will NOT maintain ths status quo.
First written mistake of 2013. My post should read “I think Ewan Crawford is a gret ambassador for independence. He always comes across as very thoughtful, intelligent and reasonable. His summary of Labour’s campaign tactics are spot on and will hopefully be rejected by the vast majority of Scots and turned into YES votes.”
Bill – ‘gret’ is fine in Scots!
@Derick, Bill
Bit dubious about “His summary….are” though!
Refreshing to see that there remains thinkers still allowed to contribute & publish their work for comic titles such as The Scotsman and The Herald.
Regrettably, it won’t make any difference because their rare, balanced assessments are overwhelmed by the daily tsunami of sneering, peurile, illogical rants from the army of mad men & dogs who must surely be amazed that they are still allowed to craft whatever juvenile propaganda their lazy journalistic talents conjure up.
I urge all of you to avoid reading these rags so that they end up in the archive drawers of the Mitchell Library as soon as possible. Independent Scottish journalism doesn’t exist so no point in wishing for its resurrection. We never had it in the first place.
First, may I wish everyone a Happy New Year for 2013, and then second I fully agree with that last paragraph, I would like to see the YES campaign and our Scottish government look at methods of further increasing universal benefits for Scotland in the future.
lets show how a positive outlook is the way forward for our country and its people, lets have goals and dreams to aim for. No more should Scotland feel it has just to stand there and accept whatever Westminster hands out, lets show the unionist parties the real meaning of positive independence.
vote no, get nothing.
VOTE YES, FOR “NAE LIMITS”.
VOTE YES, FOR A SCOTTISH FUTURE.
Hail Alba Gu snooker loopy!
It’s pretty obvious that the NO campaign is being run by folk who don’t ‘get’ Scotland.
We Scots tend to push back hard when we are written off as no hope underdogs.
Long may the NO’s continue with their current strategy. I can see a lot of folk voting YES as a ‘get it right up ye’ statement.
Juteman,
Ain’t that the truth.
Surely Labour must be private-polling and focus-grouping the effectiveness of this scorched earth strategy. I guess it must be working with their target demographic (or they wouldn’t continue) though I see no major shift in public polling that evinces this.
.
“Unfortunately the outcome in the event of a no vote is a lot worse than ’get nothing’”
All of that’s covered by the posts in the new tag, and indeed in the penultimate paragraph of the post itself. But it’s a much less snappy slogan.
Just listened to ‘Call Kaye’ this morning, and it was a tad interesting. Her guests were a lady from Finland, a Scot who lives in Sweden (Stockholm), and a Professor from Norway. She also had Iain McWhirter from The Herald.
When Kaye asked why Scotland should adopt the Scandinavian model, I think she was thrown by ALL of her guests, as to ‘why not’. Even Iain from The Herald said that by being a small nation with a small population, it made things easier to control when raising tax, or see what your money is being spent on.
The Scandinavians highly praised our NHS, and wish that they had such a brilliant system.
Kaye after an hour or so is now scrambling. No one is condemning the Scandinavian model. In fact, the Scandinavians are actually saying that with the current setup that Scotland has, by adding to it with Scandinavian values, Scotland would be seriously enhanced.
Kaye panicking now, asks the Scandinavians that if it is so good …why did they leave there to live here in Scotland. And they pointed out that they wanted to see the world. They love Scotland, and think we’re brilliant, but they pointed out, that if Scotland did do teh Scandinavian model, then what a country we would be. Even Iain, who was slightly more guarded on this, basically endorsed it. You could hear Kaye swearing in her mind that the show has not gone according to plan. At that point, she ended the show so she could post a recording of an interview with the Scots boy from the film, The Angels Share.
Not a great morning for Kaye herself. For Independent minded folk … a brilliant show !!!
Nae Limits sung by Hazel Lewry (Weegiewarbler)
link to youtube.com
@Bill C
Agree with you re. Ewan Crawford. The contrast between him and the raddled and somewhat spirituous Simon Pia on Newsnicht recently was stark.
Vote No – Get Nowt is probably sharper.
Juteman is right. They don’t understand Scotland. This is hugely to our advantage. We now have a ridiculous situation that the officials of Scotland’s unionist parties are probably sending self serving nonsense to their London leaders who want to believe it and they are determining their media campaign on the back of this.
You are drowning when you start to believe your own spin. The grass roots of these parties know they are being expected to serve up this mince and are walking away. The media in fact is unwittingly complicit in the imminent implosion of Scotland’s Labour Party by helpfully distributing rubbish on Labour’s behalf.
Has anybody else noted the huge amount of TV exposure the LibDems are getting?
We are seeing more of Wullie Rennie than we are of Davidson and Lamont (and indeed of Salmond and Sturgeon). This probably means two things. The media have realised that Davidson and Lamont are bust. And the LibDem vote has been the one that has done most damage to the SNP vote in the past and needs to be brought back into play to save the union.
Yes, a No vote is unfortunately going to be worse, probably significantly, than the status quo at present. We would almost certainly have to privatise the NHS in Scotland, no additional powers for Scotland, and ironically, a likely withdrawal from the EU. Given that the Tories are already looking to privatise the police in England and Wales, the No parties, (given that the Tories and Labour are now so close), would no doubt look to do the same thing here.
In fact, when I think about it ….I don’t think I’ve ever heard ‘Call Kaye’ shut down a topic at 10am, and then spend the last 30 minutes of her show, with a pre-recording of an interview done days earlier. It was almost as if this was ‘Plan B’ if the topic did not go well for the Unionist Station.
As I said, she certainly was spitting the dummy out when she practically demanded of the Scandinavians ‘If it is so GOOD …why did you LEAVE Scandinavia?’.
Like I said – hilarious, especially when the Scandinavians quietly replied that they left as they wanted to see what the rest of the world was like, and when they came here, they absolutely fell in love with Scotland and its people. They held us seriously high regard! And then they added that what a place Scotland really could be if it adopted the Scandinavian system, and added it onto the best bits of Scottish life (free tuition, brilliant NHS, etc).
You could hear Kaye screeching in her head at what was meant to be a question to stump the Scandinavians, but ended up actually backfiring and walloping the Unionist Station right between the eyes !!!
@JLT
Kaye Adams, like the rest of the No campaign, does not want the people of Scotland to think about new possibilities, vision for their country, new political parties. This is because they have nothing to offer, no vision, no ideas to improve Scotland, just the same tired old Westminster, first-past-the-post, unelected House of Lords etc system.
Muttley,
It was hilarious mate. I already knew her show was a massive fan of the ‘No’ campaign. I listen to her nonsense show each day in the van as I travel from site to site fixing PC’s. That’s why it was such a brilliant show today as she tripped over her own questions. The Scandinavians on the show hold Scotland in such a high regard, that they seem to think that we are very much like them, historically and culturally, and that we should be part of the Nordic setup. They mentioned about how they value community spirit, but what astonished them was just how much better our community spirit is. It was way better than theirs as they said that we were more open, while they felt that their own cultures were slightly more reserved. They praised our sense of equality, and how we value it.
Honestly, they only had high praise for us. They want us to go our own way, and join them in a trading and cultural society that is equality based. So, it was no surprise that ‘Call Kaye’ killed the show at 10am instead of 10.30 by playing a pre-recorded tape. They’ve never done that before !!!
Unionists who occasionally appear on this blog have been asked repeatedly what is their positive vision for Scotland under the Union post a No vote? They have repeatedly – and conspicuously – failed to provide any answer. Well, let me do their job for them.
The plan is that the Scottish Parliament must never again be allowed to pass meaningful legislation which diverges from the Westmnister agenda or, heaven forfend, propose another referendum. Therefore, under the guise of improving accountability and promoting democracy, the Unionist parties will amend the electoral system to Holyrood to ensure no abolute majorities are possible again, and thus stymie the Parliament. It will gradually become – and be perceived as – a pointless talking shop, making the transition of such reduced powers as exist at that point to the dead hand of Labour municipalism via agglomerated local authorities much more presentable to the electorate.
It isn’t much of a plan, as it presupposes that a Unionist coalition will be elected in 2016 (hence, though, the ‘amendments’ to the electoral system above). It also does not take account of how an existing Nationalist majority which has 18 months to run in the Parliament might react in the aftermath of a No vote. But it’s all they’ve got.
Finally, it is almost a year since I asked Angus Robertson MP in a public meeting whether there was an intention to spell out publicly the consequences of a No vote. His answer was evasive, saying it was a ‘good point’ before moving swiftly on. I trust the thinking in the Yes camp has advanced since then.
@JLT
I can guess what her reaction would be!
I find it very annoying, if amusing in a way, that the No campaign is so vehement that we cannot afford universalist benefits, but can afford Trident, wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, bankers bailouts etc. It is almost as if they have completely the wrong priorities… 
Muttley,
Exactly mate …exactly…
Training Day,
I don’t think that scenario will truly happen. I have a feeling that even if the No vote wins, that this will not go away – not this time. I think the cat is truly out of the bag. What can Westminster do. Say the SNP win by another huge majority in 2018, I bet the first thing they will do is make noises about a new referendum – especially if it is a Tory/UKIP coalition from 2015 onwards. Scots could be so sick of Tory rule, that they might jump at the second asking.
This is not 1979, and this time, I can’t see what Westminster can do to stop this Nationalist feeling. Scots Law would block them again and again. If they tried to end our Parliament, then I think Scotland would go nuts.
I could be wrong, but I think we’ve moved on too much since the Parliament was built – there is no way we are going back to a Tory dominated 1980’s Scotland.
@JLT
I agree that it’s unlikely to succeed (my point about the 18 months remaining for the present Government), but nevertheless it really is the extent of Unionist planning and ‘vision’. To get into the impoverished mindset of the Unionists you have to think like them, even be like them for a while..
Now I’m off for a shower
‘vote no – get nothing’ could easily be misinterpreted as ‘get nothing new’, i.e. everything stays the same, when we can guess that is unlikely. The slogan should be:
‘Vote No – Barnett Goes’
Vote yes, Barnett goes as well. It’s not much of a slogan.
Exactly
Still better than ‘vote no, get nothing.’
What about ‘vote no – NHS goes’ ? Doesnt scan quite as well but conveys the dangers of a no vote
“Still better than ‘vote no, get nothing.’
What about ‘vote no – NHS goes’ ? Doesnt scan quite as well but conveys the dangers of a no vote”
Feel free to choose your own slogans for your own website.
Ach I’ve got my own site – nae politics allowed though