I have just come back from a fortnight at my family home in Glasgow. The trip has left me with a few things, namely a stinking cold but also some reflections on Scottish independence. I spent my first afternoon up north hiding from the rain, binge-watching BBC One Scotland, BBC Two Scotland and STV, and I was surprised. Every second programme, every second conversation even, was to do with independence. How it will affect you, me and the neighbours. What Alex and Nicola are up to today. And nothing on what England, Westminster or the Conservatives were saying.
And they are not saying much. I understand the silence and the policy of national party leadership not debating independence. Let the leader of the Yes campaign debate the leader of the No. It is their debate. Yes, I know. But something is not working.
Across the UK we have our 106 target seats and our community-based strategy. Organising to win. It is a great plan. Grassroots politics and real community organising. It really might get us the majority. Only five of those seats are in Scotland so it really is not worth thinking about. Or is it? What we don’t have is a target list from the Scottish National party, for obvious reasons, but let us, for argument’s sake, add into the equation the 20 SNP target seats for the last general election.
The SNP was not very successful with its hitlist from 2009 but 2015 will be a completely different ball game with completely different attitudes from the Scottish people.
The narrative that is coming out of our party is not good enough. No matter what we think about the SNP’s plans, our response has been sub-par. Maybe we think the Yes campaign is fanciful but the reality is that it is raising genuine concerns, important concerns like endemic health inequalities, chronic unemployment and a disenfranchised population.
The SNP talks about a Scotland that is fairer versus a country that is still ruled by Westminster, that is still the fourth most unequal in the developed world. What do we have? Saying ‘better together’ is an insult coming from Westminster and the silence is even worse. The bid for Scottish independence is important and the response is the political equivalent of ‘because I said so’. Scotland deserves better.
The Labour party needs to start taking the call for independence seriously and responding with real policies and proper dialogue. The SNP cries that Scotland is being taken advantage of by a government that we did not even vote for and that staying in the union means being part of the United Kingdom where privilege rules. It encourages you to vote Yes so you can have a voice and vote to help build a better world.
Scotland is not going to gain us a majority by itself in 2015, but not taking it seriously could cost us a lot.
Working on the assumption that the result is No, we will have the 30-40 per cent of Scottish voters who voted yes feeling even more alienated than before. Labour must show that it is a viable alternative for Scotland and not just the party for the No-voting, Scottish middle class.
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Rhea Wolfson is a communications officer for London Young Labour. She tweets @RheaCaroline