What Happened Yesterday on Clydeside?
On a day when Gordon Brown has announced his resignation from Parliament and the Scotsman newspaper declared that nothing has really changed in Scottish politics; when yesterday in Finnieston you could walk from the X Factor-esque rally for Nicola Sturgeon at the Hydro to the assembled Trots and Ne’er -do-wells at the Radical Independence Conference in the Armadillo…and then pop into the Country Living Christmas Fair to pick up some lovely designer soaps at the Exhibition Centre, it might be as well to ponder what on earth just happened on the banks of the Clyde. Did the water turn Red? Was that glitter shooting out of the cannons at the end of Dougie MacLean’s last chorus of “Caledonia” really gold?
Let’s remember, first of all, that these were gatherings of losers. Over and over again at both events, on the platform and off, people talked about how they couldn’t quite believe we were all here. But it does seem that the minute the votes were counted, something strange happened to both the No and Yes sides’ campaigners as soon as things were “back to normal”. The Old Normality turned out to be a consummation devoutly to be wished by one side and confidently denied on the other. The gulf between both sides, still, is as much a matter of temperament as logic and is as profound as ever. We seem to inhabit entirely different versions of reality and neither version of reality is particularly well-defined.
The division now is between to versions of what “normal” might mean in Scottish politics today. The gulf between rival realities has deepened rather than disappearing since September. For the former No campaign, this refusal of their reality seems like inexplicable arrogance and posturing. While for the Yes side, the “new reality” has become an article of absolutely necessary faith. Belief and hope have become aims in themselves to set against the nullity and hopelessness of other peoples’ “normal”. If they look at each other at all, the two sides stare in bewildered mutual contempt. And before I get to what I think is going on with “Our” side, let me put it in the context first of the extraordinary consequences that winning the referendum has had for “Them.”
(And me draw a preliminary line between those who voted No in good faith, in favour of the social and economic solidarity and stability of the UK and of the No Campaign Parties, in whom, unfortunately, those No voters have had no option but to put their faith as Trustees of that solidarity and security.)
First, as one might have expected, the No “alliance” immediately split into the war of each against each that passes for normal, political culture. At five minutes past ten on September 18th, the dominant UK branches of Better Together got back to being “grown-ups”. Scotland was irrelevant again, and with relief Cameron and company got back into the serious business of who gets whose nose in the Westminster trough in the second half of May next year. Again, as one might have expected, the Tories were better at this, exposing the comparative lack of focus and purpose of UK Labour who have gone on to spectacularly fail to take any strategic advantage of the Tories’ difficulties with UKIP. So far so titillating for the hacks and pundits whose own bored nihilism explains more than anything else the inane but energetic attraction of Nigel Farage. More seriously, it is the same lack of what an older generation of Britons called “bottom” and which Yeats might have called “conviction” that allows a retired second-rate pop singer to run rings round the Leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition in a discussion of taxation and has the “other ranks” of loyal Jocks in a bit of a pickle.
This is because, despite the Scotsman, Scotland has changed in the course of referendum campaign. The hope (and underlying anxiety) of both the events I attended yesterday on the banks of the Clyde is that this change is sustainable. The ineptitude and emptiness of British politics has been a tremendous help so far, of course, but what both events yesterday in Glasgow now signal is that the former “Yes” campaign understands that momentum of its own is required in order to keep a “movement” moving. And that we can’t rely on the UK parties being dickish clowns forever.
It isn’t rocket science. As Robin McAlpine pointed out most clearly in the strategic conversation at the RIC event, that our no longer having the simple question of Yes or No on a single identified future date leaves us with something of a vacuum around which to attempt to cohere. Normal politics, the stuff that politicians do, simply doesn’t have the same focus or energising clarity. On the other hand, the nitty-gritty of who is going to stand in what seat at the Westminster elections in May naturally brings with it rivalries and a clash of interests between the “Yes” parties…and at least part of what happened yesterday was the beginnings of a return to sectarian power display and posture taking on all sides.
There was danger as well as celebration in the air. Clearly, we can’t rely on “keeping “it” going. We have to redefine “it”, and re-cohere around whatever “it” turns out to be.
THE ELEPHANT IN TWO ROOMS
There were other predictable points of contrast between the SNP and RIC events, of course. The RIC Conference was longer on content and shorter on triumph. The SNP rally was short on nuance and big on bombast. These were partly the differences between the size as well as the nature of the crowds in the respective venues. Another key difference was that while one event referred fairly frequently to the other, the other made no mention at all of the one. Bet you can’t guess which way round that was.
However, both events were trying to seize on the same thing. Both were claiming custody of it, and both were struggling to define what “it” was. Because “it” was something that happened to us in August and September , something that felt like the engagement and empowerment that democracy is supposed to be. The SNP used music and lighting and numbers to attempt to embody and sustain that excitement, and to pretend, I think, that the 92000 membership they have now is the clearest demonstration that a defeated campaign is still going on and pretend that this movement can be easily and painlessly translated into their party political purposes. And if anyone makes a fuss about that it’s their fault.
The RIC conference, more cerebrally, tried to get it’s collective head around both the problems of definition and the sustainability of an exciting new lease of life for the Scottish left. Both events succeeded, I think, in their own terms, in imitating the engagement we all felt in the latter stages of the campaign. Emotionally speaking, each event cemented a good deal of that feeling, and, after all, we only have six months to go until the next big political “event”, and surely both the SNP and the wider movement can sustain a shared focus for six months? That was the question both events tried to answer, or rather, that one event pretended wasn’t a question, and the other pretended was a much easier question to answer than it really is
Because that future has yet to be pinned down, let alone agreed on as an aim, let alone cohered around as a single strategy. Rather, a whole bunch of specific futures are gradually taking shape in different peoples’ hearts and minds. Not just in terms of electoral strategy, the No side fragmented the moment the referendum vote was in. And it was clear to me yesterday that the assertion of togetherness of the Successor Yes Campaign yesterday in both arenas protested unity beyond credibility. The very intensity of our will to “keep it together” demonstrated that we are beginning to fragment, or at least to fear fragmentation.
The vagueness of what we were voting Yes or No to was the defining characteristic of the campaign. That vagueness was the greatest weakness of the Yes campaign for those inclined to vote No and, at the same time, it was the strongest glue for those who voted Yes.
On the one hand, we had the SNP acting as if the future was all about their success, their enormously enhanced membership, about their immediate strategy of “holding Westminster’s feet to the fire.”
Interestingly, they got much bigger cheers for the Red Lines of Principle they share with the wider movement, like no replacement for Trident and no deal with the Tories than they got for any engagement of any kind with the Smith Commission and its processes. The Party leadership know, of course, that a Party political view of reality is always partial, but we who are not Party leaders should not be remotely surprised at politicians acting like politicians.
On the other hand, over the way at the RIC, there was just the beginning of whining going on from the junior parties, the Greens and the SSP, that they were being crowded out of the first past the post scenarios being acted upon by Big Sister over the way. There was just the beginning of confusion between the emotionally satisfying impulse to take as many seats off Labour as is humanly possible in May and the need for the newly empowered allies in the Yes campaign to stake out their own territory.
In narrow terms, the moist urgent task of the broader movement, and one that was being constantly addressed yesterday – though mostly still between the lines – was exactly whether or not, in this new National/Poliical territory of “Scotland the Changed”, the temptation to retreat to the old, familiar political territoriality can be overcome. Can we find a replacement for the shared focus that the Yes/No question gave us? Can we come up with a form of words, some basic principles, around which we can unite as a movement that will sustain us through the next few years.
The elephant in both rooms was, of course, “the Yes Alliance.” and what now seems to be the certainty that what carried us into September 18th as one movement is not going to do the same at the Westminster elections. The urge to recrimination about this was palpable if largely unexpressed among the RIC delegates, and also, interestingly, lurked below the apparently triumphalist surface of the SNP event. From the perspective of the SNP juggernaut, the smaller parties might all too soon become irritants and not allies. After all, those Labour MPs are not sitting on small majorities in our cities, they are sitting on whopping great big ones. It may seem like long ago in a country far, far away, but Labour did extremely well in Scotland in the general election of 2010 and the SNP did pretty badly. The two versions of “normality” I referred to earlier now both nervously wonder which version is reality is real, and how the electorate in Scotland will now engage in a “British” political event. Our danger is that there are two opposing “realities” taking shape within the Yes movement as well.
Our trouble is emotional, though, not logical and we need to think ourselves past it. We wanted to substitute the elections in 2015 for the vote on Sept 18th, not as a strategic focus, but as an emotional one. Those of us who are beyond the most simple loyalty to the SNP need to be clear that this was completely predictable. Both that the emotional focus of the movement would latch onto the elections, and that this shared focus would not be sustainable because the purposes of the Yes allies could not ever hope to coalesce behind a first past the post-election campaign in the same way as they could for a referendum vote between Yes and No, Hope and Fear, Good and Evil, Life and Death. (To caricature how we felt about it, if not by much)
Our problem is that the visceral emotions which were good for cohesion in the referendum campaign now contain the seeds of destruction for a further alliance, but this danger will become real only if we try to put that shared focus where it doesn’t belong.
It is clear now that the SNP, understandably, are going to go into an un-nuanced and , they think, decisive fight with Labour for political hegemony in Scotland. This may well be disappointing to some of us but we’d be children if we found it surprising. It is also hardly surprising, in a first past the post-election, that there are SNP candidates who already resent the potential votes for the Greens and the SSP that might prevent them taking some devoutly wished for Labour scalps. These are both sentiments I heard expressed in the two big rooms on Clydeside yesterday.
The answer, I think, is not to ask the SNP not to act like the SNP. Part of it is, however, to ask that they take a little further their offer to parachute non or recent SNP members into candidature in certain constituencies. (Tommy Shephard, Aamar Anwar and Leslie Riddoch have all been asked, and only one of them said in public yesterday that they weren’t going to go for it.) Though this concession is already a big one for any political party, and has doubtless caused no little bitterness at these Johnny Come Latelies in some constituency parties, I don’t think I can exaggerate how positive an impact it would have on all those highly intelligent, articulate and motivated activists who gathered at the RIC Conference if the SNP could find room for Maggie Chapman (for example) to run for the Greens in even one constituency without the SNP standing against her.
That is probably a step too far, but that it is almost certainly too big an ask is itself a measure of the distance that we have already invisibly travelled since September back towards a version of political “reality” that is disconcertingly familiar to some of us, even while it is comforting to others. The buoyancy of the SNP is no longer felt to be a universal boon to the broader Yes Alliance, and that is the elephant that, like George Orwell, we need to face down and shoot. We should not expect the SNP to do it for us. And we should not blame them too much for not seeing it as their problem.
And if it is a forlorn hope to ask for a formal electoral pact, then we need another way to use the confidence we acquired in the campaign to come up with a vision that goes through and beyond the emotional focus of the next “big thing” in may next year.
The answer to our short and long terms problems, I think, is to do what we turned out to be good at in the referendum campaign. And that, to our cultural surprise, was the “vision thing.”
20:20/2020 – THE VISION THING
People have been chucking around dates for the next referendum pretty wildly online, and some were even doing a bit of that yesterday at the RIC, +and I thought that was a bit daft until yesterday.
To explain why I’ve changed my mind, I want to focus first on something that Nicola Sturgeon said that I think we can all agree on as maybe being the foundation for the next stages of the campaign, for continuing and defining what “it” might be.
I started this year by latching on to the clarity of Jim Sillars’ line about the people of Scotland becoming sovereign for the first time in our history for 15 hours in September…and voting as to whether or not we wanted to give it back.
What happened, Nicola Sturgeon said is that we voted No but we kept the sovereignty. It turned out that the vote did not mean what any of us thought it did, The campaign itself established Scotland as a distinct democratic polity.
We must act, I take this to mean, not as if we won the vote, but as if we won something far more precious, something that always had to come first before we could start calling ourselves, and living in, a new nation. We won ourselves. We won autonomy. Power, or powers, are incidental. They come later. We lost the vote and achieved nationhood. The bean counting will wait till another day.
In order to make the case that is what we did to those who doubt us, let alone those who hate and despise us, we have to act as if it were undoubtedly already the case. We will win our sovereignty in exactly the same way as the suffragettes and the gay movement made their strides towards equality. By acting as if we’d already got it.
Now within that achievement, as an already sovereign people who lack the powers, as yet, to match that sovereignty, we can take the immediate heat off either the Westminster elections or some putative immediate re-run of the referendum. We can learn a new perspective and accustom ourselves to the light of a different normality. And say to ourselves that the 2015 election will be an indicator, a sign, of what that new reality looks like.
This acting “as if” may be an electoral strategy to Nicola Sturgeon. It is also a defining imperative for those who came to the RIC conference. It is the key of the vision thing. It means we can start taking the steps we need to address our problems of poverty and education and health within a vision, with a hope of fundamental change to come to inform and empower immediate action in the here and now, And, crucially, it means we can treat elections LESS seriously, in a way. As tactical staging posts…not as substitutes for another referendum, or wishes that the last one had gone differently.
Our focus as a movement has to go beyond and through political events, using them as they come up as staging posts towards the vision thing. May 2015, and then the Holyrood elections in 2016, then the local elections in 2017 and a possible EU referendum that same year, and beyond that to the congruence of both Westminster and Holyrood elections in 2020. Each of these “events” can be a staging post to what remains the common goal of independence. Each of them demands a specific idea to meet a specific tactical goal within the broader strategic campaign which is at least, I think, six years long.
In this way we can define “it” as being the same goal as the one we shared in September. Another Scotland is Possible. And there a series of steps we can take right now and in the short-term and the medium term not to magic it into existence with a single magical wave of the electoral wand, but to begin to build it here and now.
The SNP is a machine for winning elections. We need that. We also need the ideas that will hold ALL political parties to a standard of thought and hope. We need to be smart, but we should be confident enough in a defined and yet sufficiently distant common goal that we can agree, while also agreeing to disagree and to dream.
20:20 vision for a 2020 referendum. Why not, just for the sake of an organising focus, work back from there? It’s far enough away from agreement. It is numerically and symbolically appealing…It acknowledges that the two cultures that crystallised in this country in 2014 will take some work and time to coalesce into the absolutely decisive result (60% + Yes) that we would need.
“It” – the Road – Looks Like This.
With the 20:20 vision as an agreed, limited, and medium term focus, we can look at the upcoming political events as well as the crying social injustices we need to fight every day, from a perspective that acknowledges the need to a shared aim and the need to get on with life and hope and ideas in the meantime. If we take the weight of EVERYTHING off the 2015 election, then we can look to the 2016 election,to Holyrood, under a proportional system, as being the place for different and more generous aspirations than the sole and immediate aim in 2015.
The aim is 2015, from this perspective is to further signal and cement our transformation as a country, as a democratic polity a place where, to paraphrase a thought we heard a lot at the RIC yesterday, to hope doesn’t seem so radical any more.
But if hope for the medium term is not to hobble our chances in the immediate term, we must use the confidence and quality of the thought so often displayed from so many different and opposing voices yesterday to find an appropriate focus around which we can agree to agree while we agree to differ.
There was talk yesterday of identifiable shared values, of an agenda of attacking poverty and not the poor, of democratic engagement in education, housing, electoral reform It was the small practical ideas, like Leslie Riddoch’s idea of holding our own ballot for sixteen and seventeen year olds, that got the most convinced and convincing response. It was the aspiration to build public housing that young professionals would fight to be in (from Robin McAlpine) that seemed the best received to me. Because they were both smart both symbolically and practically. There is no way that our movement should sacrifice the radical vision thing that among other things, can be a litmus test against which all parties in the upcoming elections should feel obligated to address, and against which they can be measured and to which standard of hope we should encourage the electorate to hold them.
If what happened to us teaches us anything, it is that democracy and bean counting are not the same thing. Change is a culture, not an event, sovereignty is a state of being, not an act of counting, and elections and referenda only seem like the be all and end all to those whose vision of democracy is equivalent to buying this or that bar of soap at the Country Living Fair.
But even as we hold up that standard that partakes of our belief in the future, we should not lose sight of the present aim. And that means we take every seat we can off every Unionist party by whatever means necessary even if it means holding our noses to vote SNP in the same tactical way we used to hold our noses to vote Labour in the nobler, greater aim if kicking the Tories out.. It would be enormously helpful, in that context, to run someone other than the SNP in certain seats…that would mean we wouldn’t have to hold our noses quite so hard…but we should have the confidence, Greens, SSP or others, that all votes are tactical and determined by our greater shared aim…which is for a Scotland where pour aspirations can become more than aspirations. Our feelings of party loyalty must matter much less than accepting, for this one time only, perhaps,,, the nature of first past the post, which is that the winner takes all.
Ironically, of course, Labour will appeal to the same anti Tory logic to what effect we still can’t know. But, a big part of the continuing case for Independence, after the 2015 election, will depend on how the SNP MPs, in whatever numbers, behave in relation to whatever shakes down at Westminster. Their conduct then will be decisive, I think, in converting No voters to a Yes in a future referendum. I think a statement of shared values and social priorities from the broad movement will be helpful, if not crucial, in informing that behaviour and those prospects.
In 2016, in complete strategic contrast, a proportional vote for Holyrood will, I sincerely hope, transform our parliament with the same sense of freshness and hope as did the election of all those Greens and SSP members in 2003, but this time with a sense of common purpose with the shared administration of the Scottish government. That is certainly what I’ll be working for. To be personal for a moment, I joined the SNP until May…I will do all I can to help them win the Scottish bit of the UK election in May, mainly to establish that now and forever elections in Scotland, in the UK constitutionally or not, are now games with entirely different set of rules. . After that? Different ball game. All bets are off. The greens? A new left party? A revived SSP? Could be! I understand how this kind of thinking will be difficult for those committed to a specific political party, but I think how I think will also be how the voters think and all the parties, the SNP included, better prepare themselves for the new normality having a few surprises in store.
Some of the animation in both big rooms on Clydeside yesterday was suspended. It needs direction both to cope with the economic and social crimes committed on our people every day and to keep hope and belief in change alive for as long as we’ll need to take the next step of our journey through the early, difficult days of a better country. I saw reasons to be wary, which I’ve identified in this article. but on the other hand, the wit and invention and the passion I saw gave me no grounds to doubt that difficulties, as Shakespeare put it, are but easy when they are known. For all we were indulging a little in wishful thinking yesterday, there is nowhere on earth I’d rather have been.
As more than one person said yesterday, there has been no better time to be in Scotland. And won’t be until next year, and the year after that and the year after that…
Reblogged this on chunkyfunkymunky.
Most of the NO campaign workers don’t seem to be saying anything positive …they are the ones who have crept back into from whence they came “the Hidden majority” as Brown said they certainly are ..where are their views on the commision ..all they seem to be doing is slagging off the SNP government or doing nothing to forward Scottish Media change etc.I come to the conclusion sad to say a lot of NOs in Scotland are happy to continue with WM power and the sneering attitude of of English home counties MPs who still treat Scotland as out in the sticks somewhere totally irrelevent to English politics…Finally i dont care who hears this…”what a shower the NO voters are and i hope they dont see that the chickens etc….”
But you know what I don’t think they really care and it will be to them a question of “ho hum….”
Al kerr
British politics is certainly plunging to new depths with the rise of UKIP and the mediocrity of the current crop of Westminster politicians. I feel sorry for English people as there is nothing to inspire them down there. There is a growing mood of optimism in Scotland despite the result of the referendum and events of this weekend just bear this out.
Generally a good article (barring the typos that Sean highlighted), but there is one massive elephant in the room between now and 2020 which Peter Arnott neglects to mention: the 2017 Brexit referendum. Surely, if the UK as a whole votes to leave, we in Scotland cannot just sit on our thumbs until 2020.
If Cameron is still PM after the May election, do you really think he’ll hold that Brexit referendum? Frankly, hardly anybody believes a word he says, such is his form for broken promises. (I certainly don’t believe Call Me Dave.) As for Miliband, he has made it clear that he won’t stage such a referendum at all. He doesn’t even pretend to favour a democratic process. This is strictly my personal view, but I simply don’t think that referendum is going to happen.
Firstly, Miliband can say whatever he wants, he has no chance of winning the GE in my view. I agree that Cameron doesn’t want to hold it, but if he doesn’t, his backbenchers will have the knives out, so his hands are pretty much tied. That, coupled with the BBC/Daily Mail adulation of UKIP will make sure that the referendum happens.
What remains to be seen is whether Cameron/Miliband can manage to make said referendum as much of a damp squib as they did with the AV vote, and thereby avoid the embarrassment of being dragged out of Europe against their better judgement.
That referendum was one step too far in the crystal ball for me,,,but you are right that that might well precipitate matters…
Very interesting article. I was not present at either of the two meetings but I do think Mr Arnott might be attaching too much importance to them. As morale-boosting exercises they seem to have been very successful.
I agree that the SNP must be the “bigger” party in the run-up to the May election and it has already offered non-members and recent members of public note a chance to stand. I also agree it would great if it could allow Maggie Chapman to stand without any SNP candidate opposing her.
I’m sure everyone at the two meetings enjoyed the experience of mingling with like-minded people. I believe, though obviously I can’t prove it, that the vast majority of both audiences know the vagaries of first post the post elections and also know when, if necessary, to vote tactically. I believe the majority of both audiences would welcome further co-operation between the Yes parties. I believe the leaders of Yes parties know this.
For example, reading Stewart Hosie’s appeal to voters in his deputy-leader bid it was obvious he saw the advantages of keeping the Yes alliance together. Perhaps the SNP could appoint Mr Hosie, or someone close to him, to liaise on a regular basis with Yes parties in the run-up to May.
There is, of course, a danger that the Yes alliance will go the same way as the No “alliance” [ lol ] but I am confident those who matter – the people – will do everything to keep the Yes momentum going. ,
Maggie Chapman is of course an excellent person. But do the Greens, standing as Greens, actually have any realistic chance of winning a Westminster seat against Labour, supposing the SNP don’t stand?
No offence, but that just seems complete fantasy to me.
Sorry to disagree here, I heard Maggie Chapman speak alongside Robin McAlpine and some others and I have to say her speech was dreadful. It was easily the worst I heard over two years of attending regular meetings.
Incoherent, no drive, poor delivery, muddled message, long winded. I have no faith that she would be elected in a Westminster election.
Very profoundly thought out article. Of which I found myself much in agreement . I too attended both RIC and the SNP gatherings. I would agree that the RIC was far more textured in content and as before, a very stimulating and moving experience with a variety of speakers and subjects.
The general impression was of the Yes Movement collectively analysing and formulating the future of both the movement and the country. I felt very much that here was the leading vanguard of the ‘Yes’ movement: positive; intellectual but brimming with practical ideas and strategies to realise ‘Another Scotland is possible’.
I left the RIC conference reluctantly, as I was immersed in the flow of ideas being generated, to attend the SNP conference. The contrast threw me at first: razzamataz and oily presenters; rap artists and Eddi Reader; but most importantly, a crowd that was truly working class unlike the predominantly middle class RIC attendees. The speeches were very polished, but ultimately soundbites, the crowd’s response was adulation, particularly with AS and NS. I joined in. I had finally joined the party that I had always voted for. But I felt worried.
Why?…because when NS talked about working with like minded political parties, she named Plaid and the Greens. Fine, but my thoughts drifted to my fellow comrades in the nearby building. What about working with them? I thought. On a personal level, I was heavily involved and committed to the ‘YES’ movement and I wanted that to continue. Our local group has started to fracture already because of party allegiances. This is tragic and as Peter points out in his article inevitable in some ways, but not completely beyond remedy.
The SNP must understand a tribal approach consisting of them only against Labour will fail at constituency level to produce the hoped for meltdown of Labour. Unionists may be squabbling now, but a ‘NO’ alliance will easily re-form in constituencies very quickly. Scots are way ahead in tactical voting. Added into this will be Labour supporters who voted Yes, but will not vote SNP unless presented with a viable left wing candidate e.g. Tommy Sheridan or Colin Fox .
The SNP are an excellent political party and I will stick with them. However, if they fail to understand that the Referendum ‘YES’ was driven to its incredible heights, at grassroots level, by the leading vanguard of RIC, who organised, energised and politicised the ordinary working people of this country, and they end up reverting to ‘Top down’ led political attitudes, they will fail ultimately.
I’m not in the SNP so I can’t comment from any insider perspective. But in that Stewart Hosie, Angela Constance and Keith Brown and indeed Nicola Sturgeon have all spoken about involving the wider Yes movement in the GE 2015 as SNP or Yes Aliance candidates, I really don’t see what the problem is that you are raising.
However, there is one thing that we have to think about, and that’s the voters. They are a varied lot, a spectrum. This goes for Yes voters too in any constituency. They are never of one single type. Whether SNP, SSP, Green, RIC, or what. So to be successful under first past the post, you have to pick somebody who is likely to appeal to most Yes voters – and a very large number of No voters, as these safe Labour seats have stonking majorities.
If you pick somebody who would appeal really well to RIC types, they might have no appeal whatsover to the other voters in a constituency. You have to pick people capable of appealing to the widest range possible, not just ‘your’ man/woman.
Cat Boyd, Jonathon Shafi, Suki Sangha any one of those three would make an excellent choice.
Radical strategist – With respect, I don’t think Cat, though an excellent and inspiring person, would appeal to the vote we would need to capture. She would get my vote, but then I’m not what’s important. I’m just one person, and so are you. Two votes, between us, not 20,000. What is important is the average kind of voter who are the majority in most constituencies whom we must convince. I also think she would be wasted at Westminster. The home front is far more important, and there she will find ample opportunities for her political talents, whereas Westminster is a desert.
In the absence of a formal alliance, I agree that voting SNP tactically is the most logical step for RIC members to achieve some of their aims. Or changing the SNP from within.
Most RIC ambitions can only be realised once Scotland has substantial new powers.
The Greens and Socialists actually have a chance of real influence at Holyrood.
But we need to work one step at a time, and get maximum powers first.
Realistically, a large block of SNP members is the best way to influence that – especially if they hold the balance of power. Splitting the vote would be pointless.
The SNP could use existing planning laws to ban Fracking. It was RIC’s message that was winning votes. hence why where they were strongest was where some of the highest votes for yes where.
Surely we should encourage another large pro independence party to rise and replace the Labour party on the Left in the Scottish political landscape
Depends on the timing. If the SNP is able to gain significant new powers for Holyrood, in terms of Devo max or something of that ilk, within the next few years, then that would probably be the time to think about it. However, if it is only moderate powers we gain, then the launching of a pro-independence left wing party has the potential to take votes off the SNP/SSP/Greens, thereby splitting the independence and change vote. I am still not sure how and why the launch of a new left wing pro-independence party would bring further benefits, given that the SSP and Greens already exist.
But RIC isn’t a party and if it does miraculously form a party and find the wherewithal to field candidates in May, it will just split the indy vote and Labour will get back in. These are stonking majorities of over 10,000. Labour is polling badly now, but it will recover. SNP would have to form an electoral pact to decide not to stand in constituencies where RIC reckon they have a good chance, but why would it be sensible to do so as long as RIC just doesn’t have its act together yet? If RIC was a party with a strong organisation sufficient to field candidates, then that would be a different story.
It like listening to someone shouting at their mummy and daddy, “look at me mummy look at me daddy, my article is clever isn’t it mummy, oh look daddy at how BIG my article is, I bet it more more cleverer than yours”. For goodness sake son lighten up…..it was all about dreams, and hopes, and wishes, it wasn’t about politics, it was about passion and smiling and laughing, things that have been missing from this country for a very very long time. It wasn’t called “hope over fear” for nothing, I have no doubt the shine will become tarnished as the press and TV piss all over it. It was a joy to see people with “hope”, I know I felt better for yesterday. Too soon back to the grudge of spin and lies, let up a little for god-sake!!
I’m 52.
Hey ‘bowandarrow’ you take out of it what you want. Let others take out of it what they want. You sound like a playground bully. Grow up.
I can see similarities in the endings of the referendum campaigns in 1997 and 2014. In 1997, there was a positive atmosphere because the SNP and Labour were able to campaign together effectively for the first time probably in their histories. When the Yes result came through the hostilities resumed. The situation during that campaign could not continue. With the independence referendum, the Yes campaign produced more positive feelings, as people from different parties (and no parties) came together, and campaigned really well. This situation could not continue either (although there is little reason for the hostility of the Labour-SNP relationship to develop between the different elements of the Yes campaign). Electoral politics are a fact of democratic life. The differences between the SNP, the SSP, the Greens were and are going to emerge with major elections approaching. That is normal.
One consolation is that the Scottish Independence Convention is still in existence. I heard Robin McAlpine mention it from a video of the RIC conference yesterday. This would really be the obvious organisation for people who want to maintain contact, communication, and discuss strategy in regards to independence etc. The desire to continue with the spirit of the Yes campaign could well find a good outlet in the SIC.
20:20 vision for a 2020 referendum sounds catchy but I for one don’t want to wait that long. When in 2017 the rUK takes us out of the EU THEN we should have another IR if opinion polls show we have a good YES majority which I am sure will be the case.
I really don’t understand why labour voters who voted YES can’t bring themselves to vote for SNP. Are they really going to waste their vote by sticking with labour, or a party who have no realistic chance of winning the seat? I have more faith in people’s common sense and expect they will vote SNP in order to keep the momentum going until the next IR. Some might not but that is their problem, so let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot by splitting the vote by attacking the SON.
For everyone In the 45, for goodness sake let’s rally round the party which will give us another shot at a referendum (SNP). There will be plenty of time post independence to work out the shape of the new Scotland. This is not the time for factionalism within our push for independence. The single simple message is that only the socially democratic positioning of the SNP’s vision for an independent Scotland will carry the majority of Scottish voters with us. Once freedom has been achieved then we talk about more radical routes to equality…..let’s be pragmatic.
“[F]or goodness sake let’s rally round the party which will give us another shot at a referendum (SNP) … Once freedom has been achieved then we talk about more radical routes to equality”.
This ^
I was at the RIC conference and was disappointed with only one thing Gerry Hassen trying to discount the SNP as not a social democratic party while most of us were here were not wanting a party conference but a pan left wing concensus. It was a great ocassion and great to debate about fracking land reform etc etc
What did he say the SNP were then?
As an ordinary member of the SNP, a self proclaimed socialist and a supporter of RIC, I would urge us all to keep together. The SNP, in particular, have to indulge in mainstream politics. It’s how we got the referendum and until we get another it’s how we devolve more powers and make independence a certainty. This doesn’t mean that most of us think it’s the only route to independence, we need to enunce our own personal visions of a self governing Scotland. Please keep the diversity of the Yes campaign going, target the Unionist (reactionary) parties at elections and keep the conversation going as to the Scotland we want after independence.
I do not have any issue with people exploring every avenue of discussion.
You cab be SNP and attend RIC events. You can be SNP and attend Woman for Independence events.
You can also be in the Greens or SSP and do the same.
My standing order to the Jimmy Reid Foundation is larger than my SNP membership.
We are exploring “what could be”
I hope most will use the SNP as a vehicle to deliver independence minded MP’s to Westminster. However I also hope that we continue to explore new ideas and that the SNP listen to any group who put forward good ideas.
Let us continue to work together for a fairer Scotland.
Goodness me, do you really need so many words to get your point across? Or did you not have time to write something shorter?
Hey, ain’t it good we’re all heading in the same direction?
Yes it is mate. Long may it continue.
” there are SNP candidates who already resent the potential votes for the Greens and the SSP that might prevent them taking some devoutly wished for Labour scalps.”
I very much doubt it. There is not one single constituency where that is possible. Conversely, there is not one single constituency where giving all Green and SSP votes to the SNP would affect the result.
Let’s remember who our common enemy is here. It’s not the SNP, the Greens or the SSP. Do we not all essentially want the same thing for our people. The Briish State is threatened in a way it has never been before. We know that they react to such threats by infiltrating and causing division. Yes, we will have differences of opinion and while we will argue these on occasion, real acrimony and conflict have no place in our movement.
I will personally question the authenticity and integrity of anyone excessively highlighting sources of conflict in our movement.
Not that I’m suggesting this is the case with this excellent article but we need to be aware that they are probably walking among us and probing for weaknesses already. They’re The British. It’s what they do.
Spot on. It’s what they do
2015 and 2016 constituencies favour the party with the best chance of winning. That is the SNP
2016 regional list is where votes for the other independence supporting parties can best be placed.
Horses for courses
It’s 5 months and two weeks to the General Election. It’s also not about what the YES parties do between now and then, It is also what the NO parties do between now and then, or what they don’t do, to be precise. The No parties are NOT going to honour the VOW. There will be no devo-max, no federalism. The MSM have no Salmond to villify despite Lewes’ dual pyres. UKIP now have 2 MPs, having taken votes proportionally on an equal basis, from all three NO parties in Rochester & Stroud, The Smith Commission (an unelected, millionaire, Tory, NO champion) will produce a toothless ‘recommendation’ which the next Westminster Govt (of whatever hue) will forget, just as they forget each time in office to reform or abolish the House of Lords. It’s all ‘Child Catcher’ promises of sweets, but to catch votes. Then once you’ve voted, the sweets are forgotten and you’re stuck in the cage until the next GE, when the whole ‘Child Catcher/Vote Catcher’ dance, begins again.
Bibbit,
Liked your comment about the abolition or not of the House of Lords. They certainly do have form in not doing anything they don’t want to do.
While I am on the left of the SNP and can see the benefits of the RIC meeting’s discussions there remains an all consuming problem of those on the ‘left’; the inability of their ‘own’ parties such as the SSP to hold themselves together without going to bits faster than a chocolate hand grenade.
I was hoping to see a coherent party of the left emerge from the RIC conference but instead the meeting had a tone of ‘How dare the SNP take the limelight’ and a sort of smug cleverness that the SNP are not much different from their Westminster opposition, the subliminal message being the SNP are not really ‘left wing’ and only the RIC intellectuals can save Scotland from itself.
The message for the left in Scotland is simply this, if you want change in Scotland we need 40+ ‘Yes’ MPs at Westminster. A quick look at the opinion polls in Scotland indicates how this will be best achieved – by voting SNP in May 2015. If the RIC is serious about ‘unity’ and retaining cohesiveness then this has to be all of the old ‘Yes Campaign’s’ focus.
Scottish Independence will be gained by eating the Westminster elephant one piece at a time – the Wesminster elephant has had one leg eaten by devolution and we are halfway through the second one as a result of the referendum. To ensure the Smith Commission does not go the same way as the Calman Commission we need to remove Labour’s Westminster strangle hold on Scotland. Intellectual belly button gazing is not enough, mapping out a Scotland that does not yet exist is no help – deciding what action to take in the run up to May 2015 does.
Apart from voting SNP in May – how are we going to achieve independence?
You call for RIC to stand united behind the SNP etc
Why was RIC specifically left out AS speech to party conference when he was praising pro Yes groups WFI/National Collective etc.
Why was there not a single mention of RIC at the Hydro event?
Radical strategist – I believe he stated “and many others’.
Really good article that is thought through. I’m an SNP party member but really want to keep the cohesion of the Yes campaign alive. We do need to engage with all of what is still the Yes Alliance. It is essential that the smaller parties are given enough sunlight to participate in 2015 and are fully supported by SNP activists in some constituencies to provide a mixed phalanx in Westminster.
SNP have agreed that they will accept non party candidates, provided they are accepted by the constituency, to run under an SNP banner with a qualification in the name. It is imperative that we have several good candidates running under maybe names like “SNP Socialists” or “SNP Greens” maybe even “Old Labour SNP”.
I campaigned and canvassed with RIC and with Labour For Indy. We do see a different future in an independent Scotland but we are all certain that first we must achieve that independence and only then we can build the pluralist democracy we all want.
I was at the Hydro as a new member of the SNP and enjoyed it thoroughly.
It wasn’t until I read bowanarra that I realised why.
It wasn’t about adulation of AS and NS, it was a celebration that we survived a bruising encounter with the British Establishment, to thank all involved but especially AS for getting us this far and for enduring the most despicable personal campaign and for being invigorated into wanting to carry on with the ‘movement’.
We know there is a Yes movement and we know to support all the different parties.
We have to be practical, the SNP are the most likely to win in a FPTP election but if one of the other parties were most likely to win I would have no hesitation in supporting them.
The best chance the ‘smaller’ parties have of winning is in the 2016 Holyrood election.
I am also a member of the local WfI group and there we have a mix of all these parties, most of us will work together to achieve a maximum of Yes MPs at Westminster and Holyrood.
I agree with all you say, despite what I say below about being slightly discomfitted by the slickness. Very well put, thank you.
It is brilliant how diverse the Yes movement is. That is where its strength lies together with its one unifying aim – independence. Of course we have been infiltrated – which is why we must reject all attempts to create a formal arrangement which controls the movement and thereby allows those who want to destroy us to control us through such an arrangement. I am absolutely committed to the creation of a ‘good enough’ Scotland. That concept does not need everyone to be tied to dogma. We can take in our stride the assertions that there are divisions in our ranks – of course there are and there always will be because there are trolls in our midst.. But the power of the Yes movement, arising from its diversity, lies in maintaining the dynamism that keeps making the waves that are constantly re-energising the issue of Scottish independence. The process will never be ‘perfect’. Let’s avoid the pitfall of even trying to make it so.
With regard to the 2015 election, I think there may be some tactical voting. I’ll vote Green if they’re standing in my constituency, unless it looks like it’ll be close between the SNP and Labour to win the seat. I think it’d be great to see a substantial rise in the Green vote in the 2015 election, to make them more of a viable alternative to the SNP going forwards. I would also consider voting for a left coalition party if they emerge from RIC at some point.
Matthew,
I will vote for both Nichola Sturgeon and Patrick Harvie if that proves possible.
I’m a bit sad that you feel that way Peter as I think we all have to stick together, and though I wasn’t at either event, I caught up with them on Youtube and Livestream. The oily triumphalism of the SNP event made me feel uncomfortable though. But it was a rally, to enthuse the faithful, not a workshop. The RIC one was more purposeful, and I felt far more in tune with that. I really like the energy and practicality of Robin MacAlpine. I don’t know if he wants to be an MP, but if he did, I’d be horrified, as he’s far too good to waste on the desert of hope that is Westminster. We need him here, sowing the seeds of the new independent Scotland. He’s an ideas man, and a builder, not an attack warrior.
It’s completely clear to me that we need a range of independence parties forming some sort of rainbow coalition, and that post-independence, if we ever get there (and we’re closer than we’ve ever been, and I canvassed in ’79) then there will be a range of new left wing parties. But until we reach that goal we all have to work together. And that will mean a) realism and b) compromise.
The GE2015 is a totally different kettle of fish from our referendum. That was our show, but GE2015 is Westminster’s show. If we pin any hopes on it, we need a fight team that is capable of winning under first-past-the-post. Which means picking candidates capable of appealing to the largest numbers of voters in all the constituencies. We are not going to overturn those stonking Labour majorities fielding exotic and deeply interesting candidates that no matter how they might appeal to you and I, might not appeal to the majority. Besides, such visionaries are not fighters; they have other gifts. And are more valuable on the home front. We need candidates that are presentable to a variety of audiences, whilst being totally on-message and capable of being attack dogs at Westminster.
I’m an SNP member who attended RIC2014 (and ’13) and was rather glad to avoid the Sheffield Rally atmosphere of the Hydro event. I would prefer RIC to continue as an open-ended forum for people of the left, cross-party and no-party, rather than re-constitute itself as a political party. RIC’s strength and its capacity to act comes from its diversity. Ironically, it has become successful by mimicking the SNP it sometimes critiicises: a group of people of quite assorted opinion, united behind a shared goal. Don’t lose it.
I watched the Glasgow Hydro event online from Australia. It seemed more like a celebration – a party – and why not?
If it was up to Glasgow – Scotland would be an independent country.
I’ve never voted SNP or been a member – but cannot help thinking that in relation to the core issue – independence – they truly deserve to be the lead voice of the Independence movement.
Without being aware of political and ideological nuances which to be honest seem really trivial to me in the light of what the Yes collective movement stood together for and almost achieved in September.
The pre-referendum SNP is a different party to the one today …and tomorrow. How can it NOT be -heading towards 100,000 memberships – 80,000 new opinions of how the party should proceed to advance the cause of independence? New leadership, new cabinet, new real opportunities to shake up Westminster.
How silly to judge this party from its even recent past – when its present is so remarkably revitalised.
The notion that it is only SNP supporters who will express resentment if the smaller parties were to stand in opposition to the SNP to split the pro-independence vote is inaccurate. The majority of Yes supporters would feel disappointed if ideological stances and old resentments cost Scotland a critical opportunity to advance on the road to autonomy.
It would not surprise me if it cost the minorities some of their natural supporters because the passion for Independence and the desperate wish to be free of Westminster so dominates as a uniting force. The SNP are realistically the only party big enough to make any impact at all.
The more sovereign power they can borrow from all pro independents – the more power Scotland can take back in one giant step up.
In- fighting is exactly the best scenario for the union supporting parties. Their very best hope for survival, and you’ll save them the cost of a fear and smear campaign.
Scotland has for four decades voted strategically.Don’t vote for what you want – vote to keep the worst at bay. Lend your wee bit power to a party that is only marginally less repugnant.
It is ironic that it seems to be ‘on the nose’ to vote for the most positive chance for advancement towards the greatest outcome for Scotland in centuries.
Self-defeating, and myopic.
We need to be sure this is not another false dawn for the Left and the Independence movement. We all hope the crisis of politics and Labour in Scotland is organic and will rupture its hold on left of centre voters but it may not be. We saw a return to the fold of wavers after Brown’s incoherent rhetoric. In 2015 many will be looking for a reason to go back to labour. It still has an emotional hold which will be difficult to break and we can be sure they will use Cameron’s aphorism on voting UKIP and getting . .. .
Some of the factors undermining Labour also undercut any other Left grouping – the weakness of TUs, the recomposition of classes, the inclusion and exclusion of factions of classes from power, the dominance of key ideological memes in society which define who is deserving and who is not.
And we still have the dominant media dismissing the SNP, never mind RIC, as a political force that can transform. Just as all hell was let loose in September so it will be again in May 2015. We will have sensible, trustworth, realistic, pragmatic Murphy presented to us on a daily basis and contrasted with Sturgeon, the small town, anti Thatcher an so anti progress narrow nationalist offering nothing for the 21 century.
We do need to bask in the glow of 15,000 people discussing politics in Glasgow and hope it show us glimmers of the future. However, I hope someone is working on the plans to deal with the coming attacks and a resurgence of Labour.
Given that there isn’t a Yes Alliance (which is fair enough, given where the SNP are now), I think it’s healthy to have a plurality of pro-independence parties standing where they want to raise their profile, engage the new members and test the waters. It can hopefully be done in a spirit of mutual respect rather than rancour.
Voters will make up their minds if they want to cast a tactical vote or not: I suspect there are very few areas where another pro-independence party would split the vote enough to cost the SNP a seat (McAlpines, Riddochs, Boyds etc. might have been another story, but as I understand it none of them are planning to stand now in the absence of a Yes Alliance). And the strategy of parties not standing in seats can have the opposite effect to what was intended: remember John McAllion and the SSP in Dundee East in 2003.
No, that’s incorrect. Most Labour seats have stonking majorities of over 10,000. Polls are bad now but will recover. Every vote will count. There can be no tactical voting as SSP and Greens do not have sufficient level of support. SNP could field a Green or SSP candidate, if constituencies agree, but as an SNP seat.