The comments made by Nicola Sturgeon, the Scottish First Minister, on Twitter on 2 January 2023.
This has been a sad and shocking incident in Perth today. My deepest condolences are with the bereaved and my thoughts with all those involved. I am also hugely grateful to the firefighters who responded and to our other emergency services.
The new year message from Alister Jack, the Secretary of State for Scotland, issued on 30 December 2022.
This past year is one we will never forget – the year the UK came together to mourn the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
For those special, almost unreal days in September, the UK paused to remember her long reign and her remarkable life – a life devoted to service to her country.
I was honoured to play a small part in the ceremonies to mark her passing in both Edinburgh and London. And I was so proud to see the scenes that unfolded during the official period of mourning.
People from all walks of life, from all corners of the land, were united – in sadness, of course, but also in admiration, respect and gratitude for The Queen’s life.
We witnessed history and we saw the United Kingdom at its very best.
The Queen’s death followed an uplifting Platinum Jubilee programme of events celebrating her 70 years on the throne.
I know, as the year ends, people across Scotland will join me in reflecting on her life, in once again saying thank you and in wishing our new King, Charles III, a long, happy and successful reign.
I was delighted when His Majesty and The Queen Consort, in what was their first official duty, travelled to Fife to confer city status upon our ancient capital of Dunfermline.
Accompanying them that day, I could see how much it meant to the people of Dunfermline, and caught a glimpse too of a new style of monarchy, fashioned very much in their own image.
King Charles III and The Queen Consort will be crowned next May. We can look forward to a very special day that I am sure will again bring the whole country together.
Another thing which brought people together this year was fantastic sport.
Who can forget Perthshire’s Eve Muirhead leading her curling team to Olympic gold in February in Beijing? And Neil Simpson and his brother and guide Andrew topping the Paralympics podium in Alpine skiing?
Later in the year the Birmingham Commonwealth Games kept us thrilled and inspired in equal measure, and I was lucky enough to be able to cheer on Team Scotland – who came away with a grand total of 51 medals.
These shared moments feel especially important during difficult times.
Like the rest of the world, the UK continues to face real challenges.
The UK Government’s response to the Covid 19 pandemic saved lives and livelihoods, with a rapid vaccination roll-out and support for employees and businesses that helped keep hundreds of thousands of Scots in a job.
But the costs continue to be felt. Essential public services still need our support.
Putin’s illegal war in Ukraine also continues to take its terrible toll.
We should be immensely proud of the humanitarian and military support we have provided to Ukraine as that country stands up to Putin’s Russia.
That support will not cease. But we must recognise Putin’s aggression has sparked an energy crisis which has sent prices spiralling, compounding other cost-of-living pressures.
Even with the UK Government’s multi-billion pound package of help for families and businesses with energy bills, we know times are hard.
As we move into a new year, we must follow the course we set ourselves some time ago.
We must continue to invest, here in Scotland and across the whole UK, in initiatives that will make a difference to communities and help grow our economy.
With a new Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, and a new Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, at the helm, we will achieve the sustainable economic growth we need.
Here that means rolling out our £1.5 billion city and growth deals programme across the whole of the country. In the coming weeks and months we will announce two Freeports in Scotland, in an exciting joint initiative with the Scottish Government. The second round of the Levelling Up Fund will support more projects in Scotland and we will work directly with local councils to provide cash from the new UK Shared Prosperity Fund.
That’s in addition to the work we are doing to support our energy sector – making us less reliant on imports – and to help Scottish firms break into new export markets.
We will also continue to build warships on the Clyde and at Rosyth, equipping our Navy, keeping us safe, filling Scottish yards’ order books, and securing thousands of high quality jobs in Scotland.
Serious times demand serious plans.
The need for Scotland’s two governments to work together on shared challenges and real priorities has never been more pressing.
There is much to be done, but by working together we can ensure that Scotland, as part of a strong United Kingdom, has a bright future.
The parliamentary question asked by Peter Grant, the SNP MP for Glenrothes, in the House of Commons on 20 December 2022.
Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)
What recent assessment he has made of the potential impact of his policies on levels of poverty in Scotland.
The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (James Cartlidge)
The Chancellor published the “Impact on households” document alongside the autumn statement 2022, containing analysis of how policy announcements affect household incomes. The results show that the autumn statement decisions on tax, welfare and changes to the energy price guarantee in 2023-24 benefit low-income households across the UK, including Scottish households, the most. The autumn statement announced further support targeted at 8 million of the most vulnerable households across the UK, who will benefit from additional cost of living payments in 2023-24.
Peter Grant
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that, by October this year, one in five households in Scotland had already had to go without food or without heat because they could not afford both—and that was before the recent severe cold snap. The JRF also described the Scottish child payment, introduced by an SNP Government, as
“a watershed moment in tackling poverty”.
Does the Minister have any plans to speak to the Scottish Government to find out how the Scottish child payment works so it can be introduced here? Who knows—they might give him some tips on how to avoid a nurse’s strike at the same time.
James Cartlidge
I am, as ever, grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his advice. Of course, we engage closely with the Scottish Government. The latest official statistics from the Department for Work and Pensions, based on data up to 2019-20, show that, compared with 2009-10, there were 55,000 fewer people in absolute poverty after housing costs in Scotland. But I think the key point is that we are supporting everyone in every single part of the UK with their energy bills this winter. It is a challenging time, but our extraordinary help is making a real difference.
The speech made by Alistair Darling, the then Chief Secretary to the Treasury, on 24 April 1998.
The Chief Secretary is usually as welcome as the grim reaper. And we usually come with the same message.
Today I want to set out how we must build a stable economic platform to provide sound public finances in the future. And how it is essential that we take a new approach to Government. How the process of modernisation in Government and economic management has to continue.
We were elected to government just under a year ago. The night of 1 May last year saw a complete change in the political landscape – not just in Scotland but throughout the whole of the United Kingdom.
We are very conscious of the faith invested in us. People right across the country give us their trust. And we are determined to return that trust – delivering our election pledges – doing what we said we would do.
The People voted for change – not just for a new Government but for a new political approach. Not for a return to old fashioned corporatism any more than a misplaced faith in neo-Liberal individualism. They voted for a new approach which recognised the complimentary role of government and individual effort.
And they voted for a Government that would look to the long-term.
We said that rebuilding the country would take time. And it will. But in this, the first year of the new Government, we have begun to put in place the building blocks we need.
Economic Stability. Sustainable public finances to provide high quality public services. Modernising the Welfare State. Encouraging work and making work pay. Promoting enterprise. Encouraging investment. Building a fairer society. Supporting families with children. Tackling poverty.
And of course constitutional change – handing power to the people.
Constitutional change. A year ago many people said it would never happen. Now – less than a year after we were elected – the Scotland Bill has almost completed its passage through the House of Commons. And elections to Holyrood will take place next year.
The Welsh Assembly Bill will shortly be going to the House of Lords with elections in Wales next year too. And that’s not all.
We’ve incorporated the European Convention on Human Rights. A Freedom of Information Act will be introduced. Abolition of the right of the Hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords is on its way.
But people will judge those constitutional reforms not as an end in themselves but by what they do to improve the quality of our lives.
The Scottish Parliament will be judged by the calibre of its members, the quality of its decision making and above all by what it does to deliver a first class education system, an NHS we can rely on, a business environment that encourages job opportunities. It will be judged by its actions.
That’s why we are determined to ensure, for our part, that candidates for Holyrood are of the highest possible standard. People expect nothing less.
And Scotland will expect Holyrood to work in partnership with Westminster. Last September we voted for partnership not conflict. We voted for a Scottish Parliament within the United Kingdom. We voted for change – not for the sake of change but in the justifiable expectation of better Government to Scotland.
And just as Westminster will have to work closely in partnership with Holyrood, so too will Holyrood have to work in partnership with Councils across Scotland. After all it is Councils that deliver many of the services we all rely on.
And preparations are already in hand to ensure that this partnership works.
Donald Dewar and his team are already working up proposals to allow the Scottish Parliament to get into its stride as quickly as possible.
Scottish Office and Welsh Office officials are already working with Treasury officials and other departments to ensure a smooth working relationship which is essential if Holyrood and Westminster are to work together effectively and efficiently.
And arrangements are already in hand to ensure that Ministers work closely together in the interests in the people they serve.
But we will only get what we voted for if Westminster and Holyrood work together. Because if you stop anyone in the street in Aberdeen, Glasgow or Stornoway and ask them what they want they will say exactly the same thing.
Constitutional change, yes. But now let’s see what you can do.
An education system we can be proud of. That provides opportunity and a first class education for all.
A National Health Service – in this it’s 50th year – that we can rely on. A Health Service that not only cures but prevents illness. A Health Service that is efficient and effective.
Quality housing, better transport. Safer streets.
Constitutional change is being put in place. Holyrood will soon open its doors. Now is the time to prepare to deliver what the people want.
And it’s to that new agenda that I now want to turn.
Delivering that agenda will depend upon Westminster, Holyrood and councils working together. There can be great changes in the next few years but it depends on us all being engaged in the same common endeavour in the interests of the new Scotland.
The setting up of a Scottish Parliament represents a radical vision. But delivering that vision depends on the determination to work towards the same goal. A dynamic vibrant economic environment. Improving our quality of life. A country of optimism and ambition. Building a new Scotland. Where Government and business work together in partnership.
But that ambition must be built on a secure and lasting foundation.
Delivering that agenda depends on a secure and sound economic platform.
Planning for the long-term
A year ago, this Government came to power because of the failure of the last Government.
We said we would inherit a mess. And we did. Years of underachievement and underperformance.
We said that it would take time to sort it out. And it will. There are no quick fixes.
We said that we would rebuild and modernise this country. And we are.
But rebuilding will take time. This is a Government that is planning for the long-term. For that we need stability.
An end to the boom and bust that destroyed so many business in the past and undermined public services.
A commitment to low inflation – an essential pre-condition of long-term sustainable economic growth.
Without that stability, that long-term sustainable growth, we cannot provide the public services we need. Good quality schools and hospitals need stable public finances.
We are determined to avoid the mistakes of the past. Where the economic miracle of the 1980s became the economic disaster of the 1990s. Where unsustainable booms ended in damaging bust.
There are some who are telling us today that our troubles are behind us. Just like Nigel Lawson in the 1980s. Then he set off on a spending spree where in two years inflation doubled and interest rates soared to double figures.
We will not heed those siren voices. We will not repeat those mistakes for which so many people paid with their jobs and homes.
We will not repeat the mistakes of the late 1980s. Or the mistakes of 1964 and 1974 where the incoming government tried to deliver its promises before sorting out the problems they inherited. That path leads to both political and economic failure.
There are no short-term fixes. That’s why we unashamedly take a long term view. We are determined to be put in place a stable economic platform on which to build for the future. Anything less would be to betray the trust of those who voted for a new approach: a Government that would act in our best long term interests.
Our objective is to raise the rate of sustainable economic growth in this country so that everyone can share in rising levels of prosperity.
After 18 years the people voted for a new start. Not just the same as before. And deliver our commitments we will. And built on a secure foundation.
That’s why we said at the election we would take the tough decisions necessary. That’s why we said would to stick to existing spending limits for the first two years while we sorted out the mess we inherited.
We can only deliver the economic growth, job opportunities and stable public finances if we keep our attention firmly fixed on the prize of long term sustainable growth and stability. Because that is the only way to provide the schools and hospitals and other services we all want and need.
So I make no apology for the need to repair and rebuild our economy. We are determined to provide stability for the future. It’s in all our interest that we succeed. That is why Gordon Brown in his two Budgets has set about the job of rebuilding and modernising the British economy.
We inherited a situation where the national debt doubled in just 6 years. We spend over 25 billion Pounds a year servicing that debt – more than we spend on schools in the whole country. We inherited a situation where the last Government planned to spend some 19 billion Pounds more than it was going to get in.
The deficit reduction plan will mean that public finances will come into balance over the next two years.
We have introduced radical reforms which will build long term sustainable growth.
Firstly, a commitment to economic stability. Our reforms to the Bank of England – giving it operational independence – creates one of the most open and transparent central banks in the world. It has already begun has already begun to deliver. We now have the lowest long term interest rates for 33 years.
The last time they were this low was when Willie Ross was Secretary of State for Scotland – the first time around!
Secondly, we have introduced new measures to help business. To encourage investment and innovation.
Corporation tax is at its lowest level ever. And we have introduced measures to help small businesses and to encourage innovation and research and development. A new fund to convert good University research into good business prospects – helping business and education work together for the benefit of all.
We are modernising the Welfare State. We have introduced one of the most radical reforms to the tax and benefits system. To make work pay. And to provide opportunities for all, to a whole generation excluded for too long.
We inherited a situation where one child in three grows up in poverty. Where poor families bring up children who themselves become poor when they grow up. A second generation of people without experience of work – denied opportunity, denied hope.
And the tax and benefit reforms will provide for those who need it most.
The new Working Families Tax Credit is the most radical reform of the tax and benefits system for a generation. It will make work pay.
For families where someone works full-time, there is now a guaranteed income of at least 180 Pounds per week.
And to that same working family a second guarantee, that no income tax at all will be paid on earnings below 220 Pounds a week.
We inherited a system whereby a family with two children paid tax even when they earned only 25% of average earnings.
Now they will pay no income tax until they earn over 50 % of average earnings.
And we have taken other steps to remove barriers from work for parents.
That is radical reform. A radical transformation that makes work pay.
And as part of that reform we have introduced the new childcare tax credit as part of the Working Families Tax Credit. It will pay up to 70% of the cost of childcare, up to a limit of eligible costs of 100 Pounds per week for one child or 150 Pounds for two children ormore.
We are introducing a National Childcare Strategy thoughout the country. An extra 25m Pounds of money for Scotland will help set-up new out-of-school provision.
This is major and radical reform of the system. Modernising the Welfare State. Putting the emphasis on work. Helping people into work. Making work pay.
This is essential to increasing the capacity in our economy. You all know that people are better off in work than they will ever be on the dole.
Child Benefit will increase next year by the largest single amount ever. We are determined to channel resources to where they are needed most – to children.
And the Government’s Welfare to Work initiative – the Pathfinder Project for 18-24 year olds – was piloted in Tayside. And it has been successful in Tayside. Over 1000 people have entered the New Deal in the first 14 weeks and over 420 employers have signed up to the programme.
The New Deal is a flagship programme which shows how Government, public and private sectors can and work together. There is a common cause in getting people into work. Its good for them and its good for the country. The New Deal has already seen thousands of people sign up. Employers and employees coming together.
For years now we’ve campaigned against unemployment. Now we are delivering real jobs. Good training. New opportunities..
We have set up a new Employment Zone in Glasgow. This will pilot a range of initiatives to get people off benefit and into work. It will put us on the road towards the creation of Personal Job Accounts.
These Accounts will allow unemployed people to move resources between benefits, training and part-time employment to help them get back into work. Glasgow will be at the forefront of new developments – it will be an example of our new approach. It will strike at the heart of the problem. It will link these without work, with the work that needs to be done.
A Government that helps provide opportunity where there was none.
And we recognise that the local government settlement in Scotland, England and Wales was tough this year. But it was tough for everyone. However, it was better than it would have been under the Tories. And it was necessary if we are to build for the future.
So these reforms underpin our approach. Economic stability. Reform of the Labour Market. Modernising the Welfare State. Helping families with children. A fairer and therefore a more efficient society. And there are more reforms to come. The modernisation will continue.
All these measures will build the economy and with it long-term sustainable growth. And that growth is necessary to generate the wealth we can depend on.
So we are building a platform for the future. And as we promised we are conducting a root and branch examination of all Government spending. Started last year, immediately following the election, the Comprehensive Spending Review, will be completed this Summer.
We said that we would conduct a root and ranch examination of every penny spent by central Government – all 350 billion Pounds of it. And not just the amount spent, but the policies that underpin that spending. A radical Government must be prepared to reject failed policies of the past and embrace the changes needed for the future. A radical Government – like local government – has to make choices and set priorities.
The conclusions of the Review will be published in the summer. It will set out the priorities of this Government for the rest of this Parliament and beyond.
The Government will deliver its promises. But we will do so on a prudent sustainable basis. Hard choices do have to be made to meet our priorities. We will maintain rigorous control of public spending because that is necessary to achieve sustainable long- term growth.
And we’ve already shown how choices can be made. How our priorities are different from the last Government. In the last year we have made significant changes to spending priorities because we maintained rigorous control over spending. We have redirected existing resources to meet our objectives.
We have invested an extra 2.5 billion Pounds to improving schools, including 1.3 billion from the windfall tax to improve school buildings and equipment. That would not have been done but for the change in Government.
We introduced the Bill to abolish the assisted places scheme. A scheme under which the last Government unashamedly backed the few at the expense of the many. This money has instead been ploughed into public education. We abolished the nursery voucher scheme. Our priority is for the many and not for the few.
We have invested an extra 2 billion Pounds in the National Health Service. We have scrapped the wasteful and inefficient Tory internal market. Sam Galbraith’s White Paper on the future of the Health Service has been widely welcomed.
And all pensioners are getting cash payments to cope with winter fuel bills on top of the cut in VAT to just 5 per cent. The poorest pensioner households in income support are receiving 50 Pounds.
And there’s more.
We’ve introduced extra targeted funding to improve literacy for young children. A total of 24 million Pounds for the early intervention programme over the next three years.
We’ve introduced 3 million Pounds alternative to exclusion grants scheme to develop additional alternatives to children being excluded from school.
We’ve tackled the crisis in higher education funding with new plans for the funding of student maintenance and tuition. In the long term these will release funds to widen access to agreed standards at the universities and colleges.
We have ensured that there will be an addition 8 million Pounds for further education institutions next year.
And next year we’ll make an additional 17 million Pounds available to higher education institutions.
And housing – we provided an extra 15 million Pounds this year and an extra 51 million Pounds next year to be spent on new housing partnerships – covering energy efficiency and other housing initiatives.
The empty homes initiative gets 2 million Pounds this year and 7 million Pounds next year.
The rough sleepers initiative will get 16 million Pounds in total across Scotland.
And we have delivered many other measures in that short time. This is just the start. The CSR will set out our priorities for the rest of this Parliament and beyond.
But we will only be able to deliver the high quality public services that we need if we have a stable foundation on which to build them.
Scotland and the Global Economy
And that stability is essential for the whole country.
Westminster, Holyrood, local authorities have the same long-term interest. We are all part of the same economy. And increasingly not just the British and European economy but the global economy. It isn’t possible to go it alone – create an economic island in isolation from the problems that everyone has to deal with.
There is no room for opting out. Pretending that fundamental problems are for others.
We recognise that the global economy has changed everything. We are interdependent. As we know, what happens on the other side of the world affects us here. And in the global economy what will mark us out are the skills, adaptability and employability of the workforce.
We now have economic objectives which are open and clear – which look to the long term. And we have a new approach where Government – at levels – needs to work with business and individuals in partnership – recognising each others strengths. Finding new ways of working together.
As we prepare for the new Parliament at Holyrood, we realise that modernisation, not just of institutions, but of approach must continue.
We must examine our approach right across the board.
This Government is committed to increasing investment. But investment accompanied by reform – whether its in education, welfare to work, childcare or health. The successful economies are those which can adapt at every level. Where change is embraced.
Scotland is rightly proud of its education system. But we cannot rely on reputation alone. We must examine our schools and universities and ask ourselves how standards can be improved.
We cannot shy away from change and innovation. It was our ability to innovate that made Scotland in the past. And the same spirit of innovation will make Scotland in the future. But we can only do that if we embrace change – look at new ways of doing things.
People don’t want the new Scottish Parliament to cling to the past. To seek refuge in the old ways. They voted for change.
I want people to come to Scotland not just to see our heritage, but to praise our innovation. In business. In education. That’s what made us in the past and that’s what will make us in the future.
We’ve put in place a new system for funding higher education with student tuition. Because aspirations for improvement are not enough. Aspirations have to be accompanied by reform if we are to ensure stable funding in the future.
In the Health Service – there are far too many hospitals in desperate need of replacement and renewal.
The public sector alone cannot meet all the problems we inherited in an acceptable timescale. And new forms of management -getting the best of both public and private sector – can deliver a better service. What matters is the quality of service that the patient receives.
That’s why we are working in partnership with the private sector – to bring forward investment that would never otherwise have taken place. And why we have set up the new Business Forum – so that business and Government works closely together.
And in local authorities too – where a substantial amount of innovation has taken place over the years.
At its best the public service provides excellent service. But we all know that that service can and does fall below standards we deserve. Second best isn’t good enough.
The people deserve better. Councils should be the champion of the people who elect them and not the defenders of institutions where they know they could do better. It is the quality of service that matters.
For us – as it should be for you – what counts is what works. Public and private sectors in partnership.
And that must be the approach for the Scottish Parliament.
We must change – not just the procedures – how members address each other – where they sit. But fundamentally we need to look at the way in which services are delivered. If we don’t reform and modernise, we will not build a new Britain or a new Scotland. Not a doctrinaire approach – but a practical one. What counts is what works.
The people voted for change, not just in structures and procedures but for a better quality of life.
This Government has a different economic approach. We are a radical reforming Government.
So too must the Scottish Parliament embrace change. It starts with a clean slate.
Partnership between Westminster and Holyrood. Between public and private sector. Setting the old conflicts behind us. Pursuing new objectives shared in common. All of us – Government – Business – Education – Councils – working together.
In May last year the people of Scotland voted, in large numbers, for change.
And they voted in large numbers for constitutional change last September.
It is now up to all of us – wherever we sit – Westminster, Holyrood or in Council chambers – to show what we can deliver that new modern confident Scotland.
It is on that that we shall be judged.
The speech made by Kirsty Blackman, the SNP MP for Aberdeen North, in the House of Commons on 14 December 2022.
I am sorry, Mr Deputy Speaker; I was slightly distracted. I was clearly listening to everything that was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Gavin Newlands), but unfortunately I missed the last few sentences.
We are here talking about Scotland’s future, because we are stuck in a constitutional conundrum. We are in a situation that we cannot get out of, because there is no way out of it. That was proven by the Supreme Court judgment, which effectively said, “There is no current democratic way for the people of Scotland to get out of this Union, even if they want to.” Even if the people of Scotland vote for parties that support an independence referendum, as they continually do, there is no way out of the situation without the UK Government’s granting a section 30 order. There is no way out of this voluntary union of nations. We are stuck in this voluntary union whether we like it or not.
The opposition—that is, both Labour and the Conservatives—seem to think that it is some sort of oddity—an unusual situation—when people in this place are keen to talk about constitutional reform. In some odd way, apparently, SNP Members are the only ones in this House who have any interest in constitutional reform. We have a party in this place that passed the recent Elections Act 2022, which changed the way in which people vote, and is changing the parliamentary constituencies, reducing their number. We have a party that is desperate to abolish the House of Lords—we have heard that before—and a party that previously said that it would abolish the House of Lords. These parties have spent decades tinkering with the constitution, making changes to it, and they are still doing so; they are still talking about the Bill to repeal EU law, and about Brexit and what a wonderful bonus it has been. Those are all constitutional changes.
The only difference between our party talking about constitutional change and their parties talking about constitutional change is that we are doing so consistently, pointing in the same direction, with all of us standing up and fighting for independence for the people of Scotland. That is the constitutional change we are speaking for with one voice. The fact that we can consistently do so is very different from the warfare that is happening within Better Together about the best way forward for the constitutional future. That is why it riles them so much that we are able to come here and speak with one voice, because we on the SNP Benches act together in supporting Scotland’s right to choose.
The reality is that, under the UK constitution, Parliament is sovereign—that is the way that it works. That has never worked for us, as colleagues have said; that has never been Scotland’s constitutional set-up. Our set-up is that the people of Scotland are sovereign. The people of Scotland are the ones who have the right to choose our form of government; the people of Scotland are the ones who should be making this decision, and we should not continue to be stymied by Westminster.
I want to talk about ducks. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) for mentioning the duck test. He has said that there is a duck test in relation to the referendum, which is apparently the position of the Conservative Front-Bench team: if it looks like it is time for a referendum and it sounds like it is time for a referendum, it is time for a referendum. I hope Mr Deputy Speaker will not mind my saying that the Conservative party does not have a very good track record on determining whether or not something is a duck, because if it looks like a party and it sounds like a party, it is in fact a work event. If it looks like a drive to Barnard castle and it sounds like a drive breaking covid rules, it is in fact completely legitimate and perfectly normal for people to do that—[Interruption.] An eyesight test, indeed, and definitely not against covid rules.
I have some questions for the Minister about his plan for how Scotland could choose to determine its constitutional future, and exactly what he has said about this issue. To move away slightly from the duck test, he has said that we need all of the parties and civic society in Scotland to come forward in order to have a referendum. Thinking back to the Brexit referendum, is it possible that not all of the parties supported having such a referendum? Is it possible that that dramatic constitutional change was not supported by every single party in this House? I think it is possible that that was the case—that every party in this House did not come together and support constitutional change. I assume that prior to the Scottish Parliament election in 2011, the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party did not put in its manifesto that it would support an independence referendum. It is incredibly odd for the Minister to suggest that there should be support from every party. Does he mean the Labour party, the Conservatives and the SNP? Does he mean the Labour party, the Conservatives, the SNP and the Lib Dems? Does he include Plaid, the SDLP and the DUP? Would every party across the UK need to have a referendum on Scottish independence in their manifesto in order for that referendum to happen? What does he mean by “every party”? Does he really mean it? It would be great if he could provide some answers. Does he mean every party that gets over a certain percentage of the vote? If so, what is the threshold? Would they have to have it in their manifestos or simply have to make the agreement afterwards?
Douglas Ross
Will the hon. Lady give way?
Kirsty Blackman
I am not going to give way.
On the Scottish Parliament, the Scottish Government and the decisions made by them, I was confused to hear Front-Bench Government Members talking about devolved matters, given that they have chosen to be elected to Westminster. They put themselves forward as Westminster parliamentarians when they knew that such issues were devolved. It got even more bizarre when the hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) stood up. Does he realise that he is in the wrong Parliament? Does he realise that he could ask those questions in his other job?
Douglas Ross
Will the hon. Lady give way?
Kirsty Blackman
Absolutely.
Douglas Ross
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way; I have been trying to intervene for some time. I want to take her back to her point about what things look like and what they are in reality. Can she tell us what it looks like when the chief executive of her party gives a personal donation of £107,000? What is that in reality?
Kirsty Blackman
The Conservative party talking about donations! We have seen £29 million go to somebody who took the VIP covid lane—people in that lane have private jets. The Conservative party agrees that the taxpayer can pay the bills for the former Prime Minister’s defence against allegations of having a party during covid, so I do not think it has any ground to stand on.
There has been talk about the powers of the Scottish Parliament and how it is managing. The reality is that we do not have all the flexibility over our finances that we should have. Even the Labour party is not suggesting devolving workers’ rights, which seems most bizarre given the continued attack on workers’ rights and trade unions by the Conservatives. If we devolve those rights to Scotland, we will not be doing that to trade unions.
The Scottish Parliament has to subsist on the fixed budget given to us, over which we have no flexibility. As my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Dave Doogan) said earlier, it is like trying to set a table when all we have is spoons. We cannot make all the decisions we would like to make if we continually have to mitigate Tory policies and exist on whatever budget the UK Parliament decides is relevant for Scotland when it is unwilling to give fair pay deals to public sector workers.
We are stepping up and making the change—mitigating the bedroom tax and the rape clause and doing all we can in Scotland with our second anti child poverty strategy, which is making a massive difference. We have increased the Scottish child payment and widened the eligibility massively. All those things are making a difference to the lives of people in Scotland, but we do not have full control over them. The issue is about the democratic right of the people of Scotland to choose their own future. Westminster is doing everything it can to sink this ship and go harder and harder in support of policies that make Scottish independence all the more likely. We need that route out of this Union. This is a democratic trap that we are shackled in and we cannot get out of it. The UK Government have failed to give us that route. That is why we are here today arguing for the future for our constituents.
The speech made by Gavin Newlands, the SNP MP for Paisley and Renfrewshire North, in the House of Commons on 14 December 2022.
I start by saying that I envy my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman)—in fact, I am right jealous—because she gets to sum up today’s debate following the speeches from the Government and Labour Front Benches. Holy moly, talk about fantasy stuff. It is quite incredible. They would have been hilarious, were the matter not so serious, getting to the heart of democracy in this precious Union of ours.
I have recently been rereading Ian Hamilton’s books on his mission to liberate the Stone of Destiny, and on his incredible life before and after the event that was to make him a household name across Scotland and, for a time, the Met police’s most wanted person. Ian was many things—an incredible intellect, a top-tier advocate and a political one-off—but what comes through again and again in his writing and character is his unshakeable belief in the people of Scotland. It was not about whether they should choose self-government, although he continually argued that they should, but about his absolute conviction, rooted in his very soul, that no one had the right to stand in the way of their choice if it was arrived at fairly and democratically.
That should be a completely apolitical and unremarked upon state of affairs, and it reflects appallingly on the two major UK parties that they have turned a matter of basic democracy and decency into a constitutional bunfight. Indeed, prior to the 2014 independence referendum, the SNP and the main Unionist parties all agreed the following joint statement:
“Power lies with the Scottish people and we believe it is for the Scottish people to decide how we are governed.”
That is not a new concept. Many, or at least some, Conservative Members may have grown up with a poster of Maggie Thatcher on their bedroom walls. She said, as my hon. Friend the Member for Glenrothes (Peter Grant) recalled, of the Scots:
“As a nation, they have an undoubted right to national self-determination… Should they determine on independence no English party or politician would stand in their way.”
Brendan O’Hara
My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech, and I thank him for bringing up my late constituent Ian Hamilton, a wonderful man. He is talking about the change of heart from 2011 to now. Would he care to speculate as to why that change of heart has taken place? What possibly could have occurred in those intervening 10 years to make that change of heart so dramatic?
Gavin Newlands
I appreciate my hon. Friend’s intervention, but I have to say he has got me stumped. I have no clue—no clue whatsoever. I could hazard a guess. It might be because they are feart: the Conservatives are now feart that they would lose the referendum. It is now five polls in a row that show support for Scottish independence.
Mrs Thatcher’ successor, John Major, said of Scotland that
“no nation could be held irrevocably in a Union against its will”.
David Cameron said:
“I felt, as the prime minister of the UK, I had a choice. I could either say to them”—
“them” being Scotland—
“‘well you can’t have your referendum, it is for us to decide whether you should have one.’”
He went on to say:
“So I did what I thought was the right thing, which was to say ‘you voted for a party that wants independence, you should have a referendum that is legal, that is decisive and that is fair.’”
The former Secretary of State for Scotland, the right hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale said:
“If the people of Scotland ultimately determine they want to have another independence referendum, then there will be one…Could there be another referendum? The answer to that question is yes.”
The UK has had literally hundreds of referendums over decades. Many like to pretend that they still live in the age of Bagehot and Dicey, when this place could legislate to turn the sky pink and theoretically change the laws of physics, but the simple fact is that popular democracy is not a novelty; nor has it unleashed anarchy in the land. We have had referendums in the UK to solve internal disputes in the Labour party—in the days when Harold Wilson knew some things about heading a broad church that should be studied by the current Leader of the Opposition.
We are still picking up the pieces of the last referendum, which many say was designed as a manifesto commitment by a Prime Minister to silence his Back-Bench awkward squad of arch-Brexiteers and hopefully to trade off in a coalition negotiation with the Lib Dems. That entirely self-created time bomb went off, as did that Prime Minister, in the entirely accurate words of Danny Dyer, “with his trotters up” while the rest of us count the cost. We even had a referendum to keep the Lib Dems happy, which—surprisingly for the Lib Dems—did not.
Back in 2017, the current Prime Minister said:
“It seems hard to block a”—
second—
“referendum but we should push the timing until after Brexit so the choice is clearer for people.”
He also described the Union as being “there by consent” and said that it exists democratically and voluntarily. When asked many times in recent weeks, however, he has been signally unable to tell us how that is the case. How can it be democratic or voluntary when Scots continually give the SNP and our partners an electoral mandate to seek an independence referendum, only to have that denied time after time?
Peter Grant
We have heard a lot about mandates recently. Clearly, as my hon. Friend mentioned, in 2021, the pro-independence parties got more than 50% of the vote on the list vote, which is when people vote for a party rather than candidates. Does he recall that the party that told us that voting for it in the list vote was the only way to stop an independence referendum managed to get 23.5% of the vote on that occasion? Does he think that there is a lesson there about respecting mandates that the Conservative party perhaps should be listening to?
Gavin Newlands
I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. He will probably recall, as I do, that not just in that election, but in every election, whether it was for the Scottish Parliament, councils or Westminster, every single leaflet that the Scottish Conservatives put out was about saying “no” to indyref2. That was essentially their only policy in every election, whether it was relevant to that election or not, and they have been soundly defeated every time. Given that the Prime Minister could not tell us, perhaps the Minister or indeed the shadow Secretary of State can explain to us how Scotland or Wales can leave this voluntary Union. What is the route map to democracy? How can we get it?
John Lamont
I do not know where the hon. Member has been, but if he had cared to listen to my opening speech, he would have heard that I made clear the mechanism by which there could be a second referendum. We experienced it in 2011 when there was consensus between both Parliaments, civic Scotland and all the political parties. That consensus is not currently here.
Gavin Newlands
To be clear then—the Minister can intervene again if I am wrong—everything else is in place, essentially. If we look at the situation in Scotland, the votes in the last 2021 Parliament are in place, as is the role of civic Scotland. The only bit that is missing is the consensus of this Government and this Parliament. Is that correct? Perhaps he will confirm that that is the case when he sums up. You are vetoing Scotland’s right to democracy.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I am not vetoing anything and this is not a chat, so can the hon. Gentleman please continue with his speech?
Gavin Newlands
To be clear, Mr Deputy Speaker, you are not vetoing anything, but this Government certainly are.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
My hon. Friend has exposed what we already knew, which is that the Government will not tell us what the route is because there is no route. In effect, they are vetoing it because we have had our democracy. Before he became the Prime Minister, the current Prime Minister said of the First Minister of Scotland that,
“I want to take her on and win the argument on the union because I passionately believe in it”.
Does my hon. Friend share my view that the Prime Minister has changed his mind on that, because he knows that it is an argument that he cannot win?
Gavin Newlands
Well, if he started the argument, he is doing a pretty good job, given that the independence polls have been so good for Yes. However, it would appear that he has now walked away from that, because he is feart: he is feart of the voice of the people of Scotland. The Minister shakes his head. Perhaps he will now allow an independence referendum, and allow that debate. If he is so sure and the Prime Minister is so sure, let us have that debate—but I see that he is unmoved.
We expect nothing else from Conservative Members, but those in the Labour party—a party that owes its lineage to R.B. Cunninghame Graham and the home-rulers who founded it alongside Keir Hardie—who are still, at least publicly, keen to get the Better Together band back together are setting themselves up for a very graceless fall.
The UK has seen referendums on congestion charging, licensed premises, water authorities, council tax rises, creating directly elected mayors, abolishing directly elected mayors, English regional devolution and neighbourhood plans, as well as a referendum on whether to hold another referendum. Yet we are told that the future of Scotland—the potential self-government of a country that dates back 1,000 years, and the restoration of our relationships with our international friends and allies—is a no-go area. The smallest parish council in England can hold a vote any time it pleases, but a national Government and Parliament elected yet again on a mandate to ask the people what they think are told that now is not the time.
This has not been true of previous referendums and the parties who have called them, but there is no internal dispute in the SNP about independence. It is what we have stood for throughout our 88 years of existence. It is what we have stood for through good times and bad, from the days when saving our deposit in a single constituency was considered a triumph to more recent times. I was there, Mr Deputy Speaker. I may have been young, but I was there. It is the parties who have used referendums to solve their own self-created intramural conflicts who now stand in the way of the democratically expressed will of the Scottish electorate and the will of our democratically elected Parliament.
Alan Brown
Is it not strange that the right hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), who is vehemently opposed to Scotland having a referendum, was advocating referendums to allow fracking?
Gavin Newlands
I could not agree more. The double standards on the Conservative Benches are unbelievable.
As has been already mentioned a few times by my hon. Friends and me, we have seen the polls shift quite strongly over recent weeks following the Supreme Court ruling, and, more pertinently in my view, the UK Government’s stubborn and shameful refusal to accept the democratic mandate of the Scottish Government. There have been five polls—I wrote “four” in my speech, but now it is five—with a significant lead for Yes, with utterly disastrous polling for the Conservatives in Scotland thrown in for good measure. I say this to the UK Government: change course now, so that when the inevitable happens and Scotland has its say, they have a sporting chance of making it a contest rather than being faced with the prospect of being the side that has nothing other than no to say to a country that wants to say yes.
The speech made by Ronnie Cowan, the SNP MP for Inverclyde, in the House of Commons on 14 December 2022.
Mr Deputy Speaker:
“That this House believes it should be for the Scottish people to determine the future constitutional status of Scotland; and accordingly makes provision as set out in this Order”.
It is hard to believe that we even have to make that request. It is galling to think that my nation is expected to ask permission from another country to have control over its own constitutional status. It is frustrating, too, to witness the damage being done to individuals, families and communities in Scotland by the austerity policies of the current Conservative and Unionist UK Government. The SNP Scottish Government have mitigated the damage to the tune of billions of pounds; all that could have been spent elsewhere if this place had truly, as it claims, been compassionate when legislating. But it has not, and time and again the Scottish Government take the strain.
As has already been pointed out, there is of course a range of topics that we could have debated today: the damage forced on Scotland by Brexit; the austerity policies forced on Scotland by this Government; the dreadful immigration policies that they continue to ramp up; the fact that in the 21st century our constituents have to decide whether to heat or eat; and so on. We know that the outcomes of each and every one of those things is determined by the actions taken by the Conservative and Unionist UK Government here at Westminster. There is no point in us continually addressing the symptoms when the cause is staring us in the face.
We would love to debate all those issues in a Holyrood with the powers to address them. Westminster will deny us this request—we know that—and that is indicative of their fear: “Why do the SNP keep asking? It knows we won’t allow it.” They just do not get it. That is partially because some MPs who represent Scottish seats will back up the UK Government when they pronounce their intention to rule over Scotland. That servile attitude only empowers Westminster.
I noticed yesterday that the front page of the Scottish edition of The Times newspaper had a quarter-page story with the headline “Scots back independence for fourth poll in row”, but the edition that I saw in the Tea Room had a different story in that space: ironically, it was “Last-minute talks to halt nurse strike break down”—not a story The Times could have run in Scotland as the SNP Government have successfully come to an agreement on that issue in Scotland. The lack of the independence poll result on that front page reminded me how little engagement Members here have with Scotland and Scottish issues—as can be seen today by the empty spaces on their Benches. Unless we bring it to the table, it is not on the menu. So rather than retreating to a bunker and repeating the line, “You had your referendum, and it was once in a generation,” the UK Government would do well to engage with the devolved powers in an equal and respectful manner. Share the platform with us and respect our right to ask the people of Scotland.
The pressure is building up behind the UK Government’s dam of denial, and when the dam bursts, they do not want to be standing under it. It will wash them away and they will be replaced with an independent Scottish Government working for all of the people in our free, sovereign nation. The UK Government’s choice is not, “What is the direction of travel?” but whether they want to be part of that democratic process, or whether they still live in fear of democracy?
The speech made by Pete Wishart, the SNP MP for Perth and North Perthshire, in the House of Commons on 14 December 2022.
I rise from the unfamiliar terrain of the Back Benches for the first time in 21 years. I hope you will be gentle with me, Mr Deputy Speaker, as you always are, as I get used to this new environment.
It is only three weeks since the Supreme Court made that important ruling on whether the Scottish Parliament had the necessary powers to bring in a Bill to have a referendum on an independent Scotland. We have seen what has happened since then. There have been several responses, but, most notably, what Unionists thought was going to happen did not happen. They thought that, when this judgment was made, somehow the call for Scottish independence would be diminished and support for the Union would go up. That did not happen. If they did have that view, I am pretty sure that they are quickly disabused of that notion now. It was four opinion polls, but I have just checked, and a fifth opinion poll has come through as we have started to debate this issue today. Narrowly though it may be, that is five opinion polls showing majority support for independence.
I have an opinion about why that is the case, and I will share it with the House: it is because the Scottish people just will not be telt. There is something about the Scottish character that just takes badly to being told they cannot do something or to feeling they do not have the necessary ability to do something they feel they have a legitimate right to do. That comes down to the Scottish character and the Scottish personality. [Interruption.] It is thrawn, as an hon. Friend says from the Front Bench. We just do not take well to being telt.
We have been telt by the Supreme Court, which says that with the powers that have come to reside in Scotland, there is no particular legal way to have an independence referendum, and we all accept that. I think everybody has said that their lordships had the opportunity to have a look at that, and they did so fairly and came to their own conclusion, decision and judgment, but the Scottish people are not prepared to accept this UK Government telling them that there is now no legitimate means to secure an independence referendum and that our road to it has now closed. That is something that the Scottish people refuse to accept or go along with.
The Scottish people returned a Government with the biggest vote ever secured for a party in the Scottish Parliament. They secured more independence supporting MSPs than we have ever secured in any Parliament since 1999. That is why we now have increased support for independence. It reminds me of the day during the independence referendum—I am sure my colleagues will remember this—when the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, together with all the other Unionist shadow Chancellors, got together to tell the Scottish people that they could not use the pound, which they believed they had the right to and shared with the rest of the people of the United Kingdom. Those politicians thought that that would kill the calls for independence stone dead in the independence referendum campaign.
In fact, the exact opposite happened, because support for independence rose from something in the mid-20s to something approaching 40% as a result. It was probably the most important point in the last independence referendum, and from that point onwards, it was always going to be close as to who would win the subsequent independence referendum. This is why we are going to see such a rise in the opinion polls as we go forward. It is five in a row, as we have just said, but we are where we are.
We are trying to find a way forward with all these issues and trying to design a way to deal with the situation in which we find ourselves. My colleagues have repeatedly asked Government Ministers from the Prime Minister downwards, “How do we now get that independence referendum, when we supposedly and notionally are in a voluntary Union?” We have not had any real answer or response to that, save for one thing: a duck. That was the response I got when I asked the Secretary of State for Scotland in the Scottish Affairs Committee, “How do we do this now?” His response was the duck test. I think what he was trying to present was that we would just know when we had got to the position where a referendum on independence would be reasonable and legitimate. Of course, he now has that fabled duck test, where if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck—Members know how the rest of that goes.
What the Secretary of State for Scotland was saying was that if it looks like it is time for an independence referendum, and it sounds like it is time for an independence referendum, it will be time for that independence referendum. The only thing is he did not tell us how that democratic test would be met. I presented a few options to him, which were all rejected. It is now incumbent on the Government to tell us how we get there. They have conceded that there is a way to an independence referendum, albeit under the guise of our aquatic feathered friends. What they now have to do is to sit down reasonably and constructively and tell us exactly what the test will be, but it has to be a democratic test that satisfies the democratic aspirations and ambitions of the Scottish people. It has to be based on actual results in ballot boxes as we go forward.
There is this idea that somehow, in 2011, civic Scotland and all the political parties in Scotland got together and agreed a way forward for an independence referendum, and that is right. I was here, and I remember exactly how that deal was concocted, and my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) put his finger on it. The Government agreed to all this because they profoundly believed that they would win it and kill any notion or idea of Scottish independence for a generation, as we keep on hearing about in the context of these debates. They are not prepared to do that now, because they know they will lose. They are looking at the opinion polls and seeing the trends in Scottish public opinion. The reason why they are failing to engage in a process towards a second independence reference just now is that they know they start from a position that assumes we would win, they would lose and Scotland would become an independent country. There is no doubt whatsoever that if an independence referendum was held tomorrow, Scotland would vote to become an independent nation. Every shred of evidence is telling us that. It is the trend we are moving towards just now. The Scottish people will not be telt about how they will engage in democratic affairs, particularly when they voted for a Scottish Government committed and obliged to deliver an independence referendum.
I really do hope that the Government get round the table and discuss this issue positively and constructively with the Scottish Government. We have presented today a proposal and an option to devolve the powers to the Scottish Parliament to allow it to democratically decide how this issue is taken forward. If the UK Government are not happy with the idea, which I sense they are not—they are failing to engage with this as a constructive way forward—it is now up to them to tell us and design a way forward.
We cannot go on like this. Year after year we come back to the issue of how we decide and settle Scotland’s constitutional future. We have been doing this for nearly 30 years. We have had one referendum already that has proven to be non-conclusive. Everybody knows that and I think we all agree that somehow this has to be settled. Let us settle it, for goodness’ sake. Let us put this issue to bed. Let the people of Scotland come together to hear the arguments for and against the Union. We are looking forward to making the passionate arguments for why Scotland should be an independent nation; the Government should be looking forward to putting the case for their Union. Let us put those two competing visions together and let the Scottish people decide. Let the Scottish people on their own determine their future.
Now is the time to constructively debate and design a way forward. It is now up to this Government. I hope they get the message that this issue is having to come to a head. We have to deal with it constructively, so let us all agree today that we will go forward and let the Scottish people decide.
The speech made by Brendan O’Hara, the SNP MP for Argyll and Bute, in the House of Commons on 14 December 2022.
Today’s motion, if agreed, would allow the people of Scotland, and they alone, to determine the future constitutional status of Scotland. If the people of Scotland decide that our future should be as an independent country, and as an equal member of the European Union, that is what it should be. It is not for this place or anyone else to say otherwise.
As much as the Unionist parties have tried to make this a debate about the merits of independence, or even the record of the Scottish Government, this debate is not about that. Do not get me wrong, I am more than happy to argue the merits or otherwise of independence, but this is not the forum for that debate. Although the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont), is not in his place, I congratulate him, because his speech was far more powerfully in favour of Scottish independence than anything I could say.
After Brexit, the worst cost of living crisis in decades, spiralling energy prices and the threat of power cuts for the first time since the 1970s, and with millions of working people relying on food banks and the Government engulfed by yet another scandal after allowing their wealthy mates to become even wealthier by plundering the public purse to the tune of billions during the pandemic, believe me that making the case for Scottish independence has never been easier, but this debate is not about Scottish independence; it is about democracy. It is about self-determination and who has the right to decide what our constitutional future will be. Is it the people who live and work in Scotland, and who call Scotland home, or does that right belong to this Parliament and a governing party that has not won an election in Scotland since 1955 but has the power to hold a referendum because that power is constitutionally reserved to this place, thereby denying the democratic will of the Scottish people?
We have heard this afternoon that the Supreme Court confirmed the position that only this place has the power to hold a referendum, which remains by far the SNP’s preferred option for settling this constitutional logjam. Given how both the Government and the official Opposition behaved in the aftermath of that Supreme Court ruling, however, it is fair to say that it would require a road to Damascus-like change of heart. I recognise that is unlikely to happen.
Bizarrely, it appears that the Government and the official Opposition thought that the Supreme Court ruling would somehow settle the matter—that the demand for a referendum on independence would miraculously disappear—and that they could double down on their dogged refusal to accept the mandate given to the SNP at the Holyrood election to hold that referendum. That was never going to happen, and opinion poll after opinion poll since the ruling has shown that the demand for a referendum has intensified and that support for Scottish independence has hit an all-time high.
The Government’s position, which is enthusiastically shared by the Labour party, is completely untenable and simply cannot hold. The more they deny Scotland’s right to choose its own constitutional future and the more they say, “No, you can’t,” the more Scotland will say, “Yes, we will and, yes, we can.” Both the Government and Opposition Front Benchers would do well to heed the words of Professor Sir John Curtice of Strathclyde University, who warned the Unionists just the other day that simply saying no to a referendum does not necessarily constitute an effective strategy for maintaining support for the Union.
Of course, it does not have to be this way. All we are asking is for this place to recognise that Scotland has a democratic right to decide its own future. If this Parliament will not allow it, the least it should do is allow our Parliament to do so. This motion simply seeks to amend the Scotland Act 1998 to give the Scottish Parliament the power to hold the referendum that the people elected their Government to deliver.
The people of Scotland have continually backed the SNP at the ballot box, the democratically elected Scottish Government have voted for a referendum and the opinion polls show that it is the will of the people. There is a clear mandate for an independence referendum and that case is getting stronger by the day.
If this is a voluntary Union, as we have always been told that it is, then there must be a mechanism for one or more of its member nations to decide that it no longer wants to be part of it. We have always been led to believe that the Union of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was a voluntary Union, and that should at any point a majority of one of those constituent parts seek to become independent, the least we could expect was that the UK Government would not seek to frustrate that desire. People having the ability to amend the constitutional position of their country is a fundamental of democracy. It really does ill behove the so-called, self-styled mother of Parliaments to now stand in the way of the democratic demands of one or more of its constituent parts should they decide to take a different path.
I believe that the leader of the Labour party was genuine last week when he said that he opposed independence because he believed in our “Union of nations”. I have to ask him: what happens when one of those nations no longer believes in that Union? Whose wish trumps whose? Does he believe that his desire to lead a United Kingdom is more important than the wishes of the Scottish people should they decide no longer to remain in that United Kingdom? When I was listening to him last week, I was reminded of an interview that he gave to the BBC last month in which he spoke about Labour’s electoral failures in recent years and how he believed that the Labour party had lost elections because the party had listened to itself and had put its political priorities above the priorities of the voters. He said that, in his opinion, Labour lost because it did not listen to the people and what they wanted. Is that not exactly what he is doing to the voters of Scotland right now? He is putting his priority, and his party’s priority, ahead of those of the Scottish people as expressed in the ballot box just last year.
At a time when the demand for a referendum is rising, when support for independence is reaching an all-time high, and when the latest polls show that support for the Union at an all-time low of just 42%, the truth is that, whether Unionists like it or not and whether they want it or not, the people of Scotland have decided that this is their priority and that now is the time for the people of Scotland to choose their own future.
Finally, I believe that Scotland’s future will be as an independent nation and as a full and enthusiastic member of the European Union. That process has been accelerated by Brexit—an act so reckless and so ill-conceived that history will record it as being the day that the United Kingdom effectively signed its own death warrant. With that decision, as never before, those opposed to Scottish independence are now having to explain why we should stay in the Union—a Union in which our democratically expressed wishes are routinely ignored and our economic best interests thrown to the wind. I repeat: the position of both the Government and the official Opposition is simply untenable. Hiding behind the Scotland Act 1998, and relying on the provisions contained in it to deny the democratic wishes of the people, can be seen only as an act of sheer desperation, and one that betrays a fundamental lack of confidence in the ability to hold this Union together in any other way.
The speech made by Patrick Grady, the Independent MP for Glasgow North, in the House of Commons on 14 December 2022.
I echo the welcomes given to the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Stephen Flynn) and the tributes paid to the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford).
It was, interestingly enough, on 4 July 2018 that this House endorsed, without a Division, the principles of the claim of right for Scotland, acknowledging the sovereign right of the people of Scotland to determine the form of government best suited to their own needs. The Supreme Court decision about the limits of the Scottish Parliament’s power with regard to legislating on reserved matters does not change the validity of the claim of right or the reality that it expresses.
It is a simple matter of fact that when a majority of people in Scotland are prepared to vote for independence, Scotland will become an independent country. The best way to demonstrate that majority would be through a referendum on a simple question, along the lines of the referendum held in 2014. Incidentally, the way to prove the opposite would also be through a referendum; if the Unionists are so convinced of their cause, why are they not allowing a referendum to happen and so settle the question? The reality is that they are running scared.
Today’s motion would allow the Scottish Parliament to legislate for a referendum at a time of its choosing—any time of its choosing. That arrangement is far more in keeping with the claim of right than Scotland’s Parliament having to go cap in hand to this place whenever a majority of MSPs are returned with a mandate for a referendum. If the UK Government, backed up by their Better Together allies, continue to veto or ignore the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government, it stands to reason that a different kind of electoral test will be needed.
The 2019 general election, three years ago this week, was an effective—we might even say a de facto—referendum on Brexit. The Conservatives sought a mandate to implement the hardest possible Brexit short of a no deal. If memory serves, the Liberal Democrats, none of whom appear to be here today, sought a mandate in that general election to completely overturn the Brexit referendum result. The SNP manifesto supported a UK-wide second EU referendum with remain on the ballot paper, while making it clear that the best option for Scotland is and always has been independence in Europe.
Political parties are absolutely entitled to put their proposition to the voters, and the voters make up their minds. Labour, apparently, intends to stand at the next election on a platform for sweeping constitutional reform: abolition of the House of Lords and a new devolution settlement, even though Labour established the current devolution settlement through a series of referendums. The position now seems to be that a Labour Government, elected on maybe 40% or 45% of a UK-wide vote, would have a mandate to completely reform both the United Kingdom constitution and the current devolution settlement. However, an overall majority of votes for pro-independence candidates in Scotland would not constitute a mandate for anything. I am not sure how they make that add up.
During this debate, we have heard from the Better Together parties that it is a waste of parliamentary time and that constituents want us to talk about the cost of living crisis, supporting public services and the challenges facing the economy. But as the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) laid out right at the start, the responses needed to really tackle all those issues in Scotland require the full powers of independence. It is Westminster that still holds the purse strings, embarking on yet another round of austerity, continuing with the absolute folly of Brexit, and increasingly oblivious to the climate emergency and its own commitments to emissions reductions.
It is independence that will truly liberate Scotland’s Parliament to invest in Scotland’s people and places and to have the chance to build the fairer, greener, healthier society that we all know is possible—a society that welcomes people, wherever they have come from around the world, and seeks to build peace and justice across the globe. Those are the opportunities that inspired me to join the campaign for independence 25 years ago, and those are the opportunities that an increasing—and eventually unstoppable—majority of people in Scotland are now starting to reach for.