The battle for independence

Ken Ferguson Posted by on May 13, 2011. Filed under Elections,Scottish Parliament 2011. Posted with the tags:, ,
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The battle for independence

For supporters of Scottish independence the much overused term ‘historic’ really does apply to the Hoiyrood election result which saw the SNP not only victorious but winning an overall majority in the parliament.

Elsewhere on the website we look at some of the implications flowing from the result but what is clear is that we now stand at a potentially historic moment of great importance and rich in potential consequences.

On the face of it May 5th poll amply justifies the strategy of the SNP’s gradualists of governing well, looking responsible and gradually weaning the voters over to their side.

With 69 seats in Holyrood the temptation will be to continue this approach, bring forward more undoubtedly sensible measures such as minimum pricing on alcohol to further demonstrate government competence.

The disarray on the much depleted opposition benches will make it even easier for Salmond and his team to dominate the Holyrood scene and through it the media, adding to its apparent attractiveness.

However while this approach may serve the purposes of routine day to day politics it is going to be of limited value when it comes to the fight for a Yes vote in a independence referendum.

The ballots were hardly counted before the pro unionist pundits and politicians opened their offensive against independence and this will be an ever growing chorus.

It is a campaign with a number of strands including asserting that SNP voters don’t want independence on the one hand and that Salmond is frightened to put it to the vote on the other.

This latter claim is the more breathtaking coming from parties which spent the last four years blocking and independence referendum on the grounds that there were more important urgent issues.

Nonetheless it is a certainty that the backers of the imperialist British state will use every gambit in their book of dirty tricks in the period ahead to scare the Scots back to the Union Jack.

Unfortunately some of these forces will be those hopelessly muddled “internationalists” on the British left who will bleat about separatism as they fight to stay in Europe’s most belligerent junior partner in the US drive for global dominance and plunder.

They will have to work hard to explain why they would side with the Tories, City of London and their policies of plunder, war and cuts to keep Scotland inside the bloodstained British slash and burn state.

The SSP in contrast recognises that independence is not only a democratic necessity but also essential to opening up more favourable territory for a new society based on a socially just and sustainable future.

Armed with that recognition it is clear that if the powerful forces ranged against independence are to be defeated the battle cannot be confined to the chamber of Holyrood but must become a people’s fight.

Independence is a radical idea that requires a radical vision of a renewed and better Scotland to drive it forward not just debates about dividing the national debt and whose head is on the stamps.

It will need a vision driven by more than sober suited managerialism but fuelled by a plurality of socialist, feminist, green, cultural and other strands pointing to a more just, democratic Scotland.

On the face of it however, if judged by the elections, the forces of the broad progressive pro independence left which will have to provide the radical edge of a Yes campaign are limited.

But this of course would be to overlook the fact that in the poll all political sided were crushed under the SNP steamroller but some of those forces can view the outcome with more enthusiasm than others.

In the referendum the battle will be for ideas not seats and that will place both a responsibility on the left and provide an opportunity for vastly extending the audience for its vision for Scotland.

Another little noticed factor in this complex struggle will be situation in England where the defeat of AV has blocked voting reform there while boundary changes will give the Tories an extras 40 to 60 seats in the Commons.

We are looking at a UK with a virtually unshakeable Tory majority implementing policies detested in Scotland and a Labour Party incapable of removing them.

This raises the question—why vote Labour?
The election saw a seismic shift with Labour defeated in heartland citadels which at a minimum places a question mark over their long term ability to maintain unionism’s grip in working class Scotland.

Post election the prospects for independence are more open than ever before but it winning it will be no spectator sport but requires the building of a powerful mass movement to win the battle and open the way to the progressive , sustainable, democratic future on offer.

Breaking with the British state not only opens up new prospects for Scotland but would be major blow against the warmongers and speculators who treat people as expendable and point a new way for all those across the continent bowed under the burden of the rich.

This is a time of great opportunity and history will not forgive those who either stand in its way or fail to grasp it.