A majority in Scotland still want change

Should the Westminster parties fail to listen to the Scottish people they will pay a heavy price at the polls.

Should the Westminster parties fail to listen to the Scottish people they will pay a heavy price at the polls

In less than a month, Scotland has become a different country. The referendum may have – narrowly – delivered a No vote, but new and progressive forces have been unleashed which promise that things will never be the same again.

Westminster may have hung on to its political stewardship and breathed an enormous sigh of relief as a result, but it cannot afford to settle back into a comfortable slumber. Things have changed, changed utterly.

The referendum process saw Scots become more politically engaged and assertive than ever before. We are in a new era of civic politics, where it is ordinary people rather than political parties who set the agenda and drive the outcomes.

This is hugely exciting, bringing a freshness and vibrancy to democracy not just in Scotland, but across these islands.

The genesis of this lies in the Yes campaign. It created the biggest popular political movement in Scottish history. Members of different parties joined with those with no party affiliation in a hugely energising, uplifting and positive drive for a fairer, better, greener and more equal Scotland.

This broad, ecumenical campaign encompassed more than 300 local groups across the country as well as sectoral bodies such as Women for Independence, Business for Scotland, Generation Yes for younger people, the artist-led National Collective and Radical Independence.

There was a renaissance of community, street and doorstep politics, bringing both a new confidence and a sense of expectation. This was at its most visible in the few days before the vote, when thousands of people packed into civic spaces across Scotland in an exuberant and good-natured display of flags, dancing and singing.

The vision of Yes ultimately appealed to 1.6 million Scottish voters – 45 per cent of the total – but unfortunately, that wasn’t quite enough to win. And while I will always make the case for independence – and believe that Scotland will become independent – I accept that a majority have not chosen that future at this time.

But a majority – in my view – do want change and so I will work to ensure that the promises of substantial additional powers, made by the Westminster parties days before the vote in an attempt to head off a Yes, are upheld.

It is critical that their pledges are kept. Many people who voted No did so because they believed these vows would be honoured. Polling since the referendum has shown that most people in Scotland want the Scottish Parliament to have control over welfare, pensions and taxation and two thirds want Devo Max – that is, control in Scotland of everything except defence and foreign affairs.

This would not be independence – it would not, for instance, allow us to get rid of Trident, or give us EU member state status – but it would be a major step forward, delivering our chosen levels of public spending, powers to create jobs, the protection of our distinctive NHS and decent social security, and transformative childcare.

This is the settlement, then, that the Scottish people now demand. Should I be elected first minister, I shall work relentlessly for its delivery as well as ensuring that our existing devolved public services – schools, hospitals, police and other services – are of the highest quality.

Should the Westminster parties fail to listen to the voice of the Scottish people on this call for more powers – and it is a loud and clear one – then in my view one thing is certain: they will pay a heavy electoral price at the polls.

High quality service provision and social protections matter in Scotland. This is a country where the consensus between the parties which increasingly defines politics south of the border has been overwhelmingly rejected in favour of a society built on fairness, cohesion and social democracy.

With the rise of UKIP and Tory and Labour parties which continue to move ever rightward, the political gap between Scotland and the UK party establishment continues to grow. It is imperative that Scots are able to make their own choices about how they wish to build their society.

I still believe that independence offers the best way forward, and remain disappointed that it was not the choice we made last month. But these are still good times for Scotland. We are in a period of hope and belief, and the opportunities we now have are unprecedented.

This is a challenge that the Westminster parties must rise to. We can replace poverty with opportunity and austerity with prosperity. The Scottish people are waiting. We are claiming our right, and we expect that claim to be honoured.

Not in the breach, but in the promise.

Nicola Sturgeon MSP is deputy first minister of Scotland and a candidate to replace Alex Salmond as leader of the Scottish National Party

42 Responses to “A majority in Scotland still want change”

  1. Dave Stewart

    I find the idea that a 10% majority voted no is a “narrowly delivered” no vote a bit odd. Labour won a 12% majority (in terms of number of votes) over the Tories in 97 and that was considered a historic landslide victory. So how a 10% majority can be consider narrow is beyond me.

    Having said that the political brinkmanship of both the Tories and Labour after the No vote has been disgraceful. Cameron should never have linked devolution for Scotland with English votes for English laws as this is not what was offered at the end of the campaign and Milliband although right in not linking the two things clearly doesn’t want to loose Scottish MPs when it comes to voting for English legislation. All major parties should support and push through what they promised for Scotland and then deal with the West Lothian problem separately (in parallel if need be but still separately).

  2. Bill Cruickshank

    The people of Scotland were cheated out of their independence by a dirty tricks campaign orchestrated by Perfidious Albion. This included an unprecedented campaign of negativity and lies waged by the mainstream media both in Scotland and across the UK. Unionist politicians bullied, bribed and blackmailed the people of Scotland into voting No. Examples being: 1. Gordon Brown who terrorised Scotland’s pensioners into believing that they would lose their pensions if they voted YES. It was a downright lie. Even the UK Government itself said pensions were safe in an independent Scotland. 2. Alistair Darling who never tired of telling Scots their oil was running out. Another lie, only days after 18th September, Scots were being told that new technologies would keep their oil running for decades to come. 3. George Osborne who lied when he said Scots would not be allowed to keep the pound. We now know that the Bank of England had contingency plans to back the Scottish pound in the vent of a YES vote.
    There is now much bitterness in Scotland not least among many No voters who now feel they were duped into voting No. Bitterness is also present among many of the 1.6 million Scots who voted YES. They know they have been cheated out of their independence. This bitterness will translate into a massive swing to the SNP and possibly the Greens and the SSP. All three parties have had a substantial increase in their membership. The SNP has gone from 25,000 on the day of the referendum to over 80,000 today.
    Scotland will be independent sooner rather than later and those who betrayed their country and the people of Scotland will never be forgiven or forgotten!

  3. Craig Stewart

    Let me quantify narrow 190,000 votes the other way and Yes would have won. Considering mainstream media and Westminster tugging Big Businesses to create a multitude of scare storys. I thought Sir Ian Woods 20yrs of oil was the peach as, its now claimed that there is at least 100yrs

  4. CharlesPtwo

    You make an error in your assessment in that this was not an ‘Election’ whereby swings could have been shared between a number of Parties. This was a referendum between Two opposing views where a swing of 5% from ‘No’ would have given victory to the other side!
    That the 10% difference was achieved by the foulest of means, and, continues by means of the present chicanery in Westminster, has caused a backlash in Scotland that will see Independence sooner rather than later!

  5. Alistair Sheehy Hutton

    Because the interpretation of margin that applies to a single yes/no question should be different to that of a multi-party election.

    If 6 percentage points less people voted for Labour and switched to other parties that would not have resulted in a majority of votes for the Conservatives as those votes would have been spread amongst all the parties – Labour would still be multiple percentage points clear of second place. In the referendum if 6% had switched from No it would have been a ‘clear’ Yes result by ‘1.4%’

    The result of one-question-two-answer referendums have to be analysed in terms of how close to 50% the results are rather than the difference between the two results as looking at the difference magnifies variation. A 1% higher Yes result means a 2% smaller gap.

    The AV Referendum Result was decisive, the Independence result was close.

Comments are closed.