You know a political rammy has really kicked off when something happening in Scotland makes the UK news, so the hot topic this month has to be pushing ahead with a referendum on independence.
The SNP are a political party, some may say an overdeveloped pressure group, with a single unifying aim, Scottish independence. However, in the run up to the last election they became gradually quieter on their core motivation until, a year into their government, the only time we hear about the magical powers of an independent Scotland is when the SNP are blaming Westminster for their own inabilities to deliver any of their election commitments.
It must be very convenient to always have someone else to blame for your own shortcomings: ‘Sorry we didn’t build all those new schools, but due to only getting the largest settlement to date from the Treasury, we just don’t have the funds, now if we could just get our hands on that oil we’d have a leather swivel chair (complete with adjustable foot and head rests) for every Primary One and a personalised D&G satchel for taking their homework home.’
The SNP don’t want a referendum for two key reasons. First, they would almost certainly lose, as poll after poll shows the Scottish people simply don’t want separation. Second, if, by a series of bizarre events, Scotland did become a separate state, not only would the SNP lose their scapegoat, they’d be finished as a political entity. Alex Salmond would be forced to emigrate to East Anglia to spearhead their independence campaign in order to secure the supply of hot air required to keep his ego inflated.
No, far better to put off a referendum for as long as possible, hope Labour will block a last-minute, half-hearted attempt to bring forward a referendum bill, thus allowing you to go into the next Scottish parliament elections blaming Westminster for the SNP’s abysmal performance as a Scottish government, and claiming that you were desperate to hold a referendum, are still incredibly keen on the whole independence thing, but that Labour were too afraid of the ‘people’s verdict’, so, vote for us, and this time we really mean it.
In a twisted, self-serving, irresponsible and dishonest kind of a way, it does make sense.
Luckily, Scottish Labour is not that daft.
Instead, we’ve challenged the SNP to put their money where their mouth is and strangely, they don’t seem too keen. This is not about handing over a blank cheque to the SNP and passively surrendering to a referendum under any circumstances. This is about making clear that the SNP have left an entire country hanging for long enough and it’s time this issue was resolved. It’s about engaging in order to ensure that the wording of any referendum is fair, balanced and clear.
It is also about showing the SNP for who they truly are: calculating cowards.
There are those within our party who worry that calling for an early referendum will deflect energy away from the social policy issues which should rightly be dominating the priorities of MSPs. However, we are saddled with a government who ascribe every failure to deliver on those social policy issues, and indeed, the very existence of many of our social ills, to our current constitutional position.
We need to move on, but to do that, to hand the Scottish people the tools to finally slay the Nationalist sloth, we need to ask the people, definitively, for their answer. If the Nationalists aren’t willing to do this, then really, they are slaying the sloth for themselves.