Dear Alex,Late is the hour when this non dom Scot forces his way into the role of your digital corner man. I know it's unlikely you'll see these words before battle is joined this evening, but there are a few things we need to discuss.
1. The odds. Alex, I want to say a huge thank you as a Scot and as someone who loves politics for your willingness to lead. Knowing the numbers you have tried to carry a public sceptical of most things that come out of a politician's mouth and sold them an idea, and not an easy idea at that. You have done this in the face of odds that most observers would surely agree to be nigh insurmountable. You have taken on the UK government, the BBC (Whose reporting bias was revealed by this research in case anyone doubted it, https://www.youtube.com/watch?
2. The semantics. Any half reasonable person can understand that nobody can predict the future. Scotland currently lies within a union that has one hundred detailed constitutional arrangements within it. Alex, you are being asked to provide the same level of certainty about an arrangement that does not yet exist, and can only exist through protracted negotiations with parties opposing the basis upon which the discussion would take place. It is therefore impossible to provide such certainty and you should say so. People are not stupid and straight talking is what will be ultimately respected. If I may suggest a line - "The pound belongs to Scotland as much as to England. An independent Scotland will fight like a tiger to keep the pound as our national currency and given the asset position of Scotland upon separation from the UK, it is likely that we will succeed in keeping it. If the UK government is unwilling to countenance this arrangement and moves to block us, we will extract via negotiations, substantive compensation as to offset any currency transition. A new currency is not something to fear. The pound whilst familiar, warm and cuddly is not a friendly currency for exports, nor for tourism. Were we to create a new currency we could do so in such a way as to mirror the pound or something different that was advantageous for the state we intend to build."
Incidentally. We will not break up Britain by becoming independent. We will still be British, or indeed Britons if you want to go back to the Romans. Britain as a geographical expression for our Islands will be the same as Scandinavia serves to describe and define four distinct nations. The United Kingdom does not own Britain. It is only 300. Britain has been on maps for two thousand years. Alex, please tell them that cos it's doing my head in.
3. The reasons for independence. There is more to a national identity than money. There is more to it than GDP or oil or even the NHS. There is more to it even than getting rid of the Tories and staying within Europe. There is more to it even than the assets of Scotland staying in Scotland to serve and benefit the people of Scotland. It is about building something new. It is about doing business in a different way. It is about taking a high, hard road to building a nation state from a white paper up. It is a once in a lifetime opportunity for a stable, democratic, potentially prosperous nation to become a country of its own volition. It is a chance to focus on our strengths, to innovate, design, open up our land with proper roads, pull in investment, develop our infrastructure. It is to be determined - self determined as a nation and to embark upon a journey that will begin with yes not end with it. There will be challenges and issues and problems. There will likely be moments where we think sod it, we should have stayed in but the destination is what motivates us not the journey. The journey is the bit we must have the stomach for. Guts is something of a national characteristic, and I'm not just referring to our obesity stats...
4. We can do this. The only remaining question is the how to convince those who are still open to any form of convincing. The best way is to play to the strengths of Scotland, the strengths of its calm, rational open parliament. The reason for independence is change. People are hungry for change. They need to stop being told that under independence everything will stay the same. It won't and that's ok. We want to be different or we wouldn't be having this conversation. The people who want the easiest road will not vote yes. Not in the cold light of the ballet box. Independence is not the vote for a peaceful life... not at first anyway. A vote for independence is a vote for a generation of hard work. Not sound bite politics but hard politics of the kind the UK simply does not have the stomach for. This will likely be the Edinburgh trams x100, in no small part due to the army of people who will, like the oft quoted Darian Scheme, want to see us fail... but the result could be a nation that really truly is the envy of the world, separate from a fading UK institution, unable to come to terms with its imperial past or its European future, lurching to the right, preaching union and isolation at the same time and pandering to xenophobic elements just because they perceive them to be popular, unable to defeat its reliance upon class, old school tie and nepotism. Scotland has so many gifts but none greater than its people who understand their place in the world, who are welcoming and welcomed across the globe. Scotland doesn't fear Europe. It doesn't fear anyone because it is confident in its identity, even with its headache-inducing national instrument.
5. So go for it Alex. Give it your absolute best of... well, British. (We will still be British after a yes vote - please counter that idiot claim). Please don't try to be too clever, to fit yourself origami style into a tiny box of relativism and semantics. You are not a small man, Alex. You're one of only a few politicians who has believably eaten a pastie. You do not want to be dancing on the head of a pin, or a pound for that matter. Leave everything out there. Don't come away with regrets. Don't be so strategic that you forget the very energy that will drive this is passion. That's what we need to see. I realise you are probably more knackered than anyone could possibly be. I realise that large sections of the media will call the debate for Darling before it even begins. I and you must realise all of that and do it anyway. Do it for Scotland. Not for the Scotland we have now, but the one we could have ten years from now. Whatever happens, we will be proud of Scotland, proud of the campaign, and dare I say it proud of your courage for bringing this great debate to this, the last and steepest hurdle.
Good luck.
Nick (dirty ex pat) Bain
