If the SNP resolved to disband in the aftermath of a Yes vote, would it be more likely to win in 2014?
It’s Nick Clegg’s fault really, but what isn’t these days. The No2AV campaign successfully, if malevolently, turned the referendum on the Alternative Vote into a referendum on the Lib Dem leader rather than on the issue itself. Faced with having to personally win over more than 50% of the voting electorate, Clegg and his proposed improvements to the UK’s voting system were doomed before the debate had even gotten off the ground.
The SNP could and should learn from this. After all, it is facing the same opposition that so ruthlessly put the Deputy Prime Minister to the sword. Given the chance, they don’t take prisoners and will leave you tied in knots before you even realise that you are done for.
Take the NATO debate. The SNP is getting publicly bogged down in what its own party policy is rather than facilitating a national discussion on whether Scotland should make this decision on its own in the first place. The Scottish media, naturally, is leading everyone a merry dance in portraying this as an independent Scotland’s de facto NATO policy rather than just one party’s. It is the same, or at least similar, for policy areas such as nuclear power, tuition fees, currency and foreign relations. The SNP speaks for Scotland when, for once, it doesn’t want to.
There is, of course, every chance that it would be a Labour (or a non-SNP coalition) that makes up an independent Scotland’s first Government. What would our country’s policies be then? Well, we don’t know because every unionist party is wisely keeping schtum and letting the SNP twist in the strengthening southernly breeze.
To win the referendum, the SNP is having to jump through two hoops:
Hoop 1 – to soften up enough people to the very idea of independence
Hoop 2 – to effectively win the first independent Scotland election on domestic policy two years before it takes place. And with a clear 50% of the vote.
You simply can’t succeed with odds stacked so heavily against you. No wonder Alex Salmond has summoned all of his political nous to try getting a Devo Max option onto the ballot slip, but that is not going to happen. After all, why should the unionists give the SNP an easy way out when they can win a single question referendum at walking pace and potentially blow the SNP’s formidable machine to smithereens?
The fight that needs to be fought is the first of the two hoops above and in order to stop hoop number two even being a consideration in the public’s mind, the SNP needs to take itself out of the game entirely, and I do mean entirely. I am proposing that the SNP would cease to be after Autumn 2014 if it is a Yes victory with all SNP MSPs immediately being Independents in the Parliament and all party employees made redundant soon after, unless able to be kept on by the aforementioned MSPs.
This would, needless to say, be unfortunate for those involved but there may even be a further, subtle advantage to this. The McChattering classes openly speculating where Sturgeon, MacAskill, Russell et al would go, how many new parties may spring up in place of the mothballed SNP and what sort of policy shakeup this would mean for Scotland across all parties. It would be a fascinating discussion at an already exciting juncture in Scottish politics and the more people speculate, the more they’ll want to know the answers, answers that can only come with a Yes vote.
Let’s be honest, the SNP would be creaking at the seams if it didn’t have independence to bind it together. The party contains, from top to bottom, would-be Conservatives, Greens, Labourites and even Lib Dems. Pull away that Saltire-emblazoned big-top canvas and Nats would be tumbling out in all manner of directions.
Perhaps the very onset of independence is the time to let that free for all take place. Why delay the inevitable if it’s win-win?
Another factor to consider in all of this is that a significant slice of the establishment has a deep-seated, irrational hatred of the SNP. Examples abound from Coventry journalists labelling us racists, Tom Harris’ famous ‘hate fest’ comment, Guido Fawkes’ assistant’s “scum” insult and of course the unimaginative classic ‘xenophobe’ charge from MSPs in the Lib Dems and Labour. The SNP’s collective instinct surrounding this problem is to fight back fairly but harder, and that has reaped dividends over the past decade. However, there are times when flight is a smarter choice than fight and robbing the exhaustive list of influential persons across the UK who don’t have a good thing to say about the SNP of their bogeyman may be the smartest means to a particular end.
To take this one step further and for the SNP to actively talk up Johann Lamont as the likely first Prime Minister of an independent Scotland would be the ultimate example of flattering to deceive. How many soft but currently resolutely partisan ‘Labour’ votes could be turned with that inducement alone?
And, needless to say, to take the duplicity to the fullest extent, the SNP could simply reform under a different name and brand in the relatively long period between a Yes victory in Autumn 2014 and the Spring of 2016 when the first elections would likely take place. All is fair in love and war, after all. The Scottish Social Democrats has a nice ring to it, a title that hasn’t done too badly across most of the Nordic countries in the past few decades.
Anyway, if there is a No vote in 2014, this is all largely redundant. The SNP would regroup, lick their wounds and try again in a generation, or sooner if they can engineer it. I see the Quebec Independence Party is set to return to power again, promising a new referendum, a mere 17 years since the last one. Noting that the one before that was only 15 years ago, there’s realistically really not so long for the SNP to have to wait to rebuild their strategy and have another go at this constitutional question.
Not that many in the SNP will be considering defeat. Indeed, they are presumably willing to leave it all out on the field to get the result they want at the first time of asking. Well, why not make that literally ALL out on the field? Furthermore, to invoke Clegg again, is there a hint of a suggestion that to not stick to the underlying objective of the party and to not disband the SNP after an independence victory smacks a bit too much of a love for the ministerial limousines? We wouldn’t want the SNP staggering on into the era of independence primarily because its once-radical leaders enjoy their privileged lifestyles too much.
No, the longer this moribund excuse for an independence debate continues, the longer the polls remain resolutely rigid and in order to concentrate Scottish minds into delivering its goal, the Scottish National Party might be required to make the ultimate sacrifice.
#1 by Ben Achie on September 3, 2012 - 8:17 am
Downside of this, Jeff, might be to delay the fundamental reform necessary at Holyrood. Fact is, post independence, all the parties will be in a state of flux, and forming a new party from one that is functioning Scotland-wide at both parliamentary and grassroot level would be daunting. That said, Holyrood in an independent Scotland would become a much more attractive proposition for high achievers and original thinkers than it is at present, and anything that facilitates the election of such new talent can only be a good thing.
#2 by Colin on September 3, 2012 - 8:37 am
As is mentioned above – what happens in the meantime? Does the current Scottish Government collapse? Surely after such a huge decision (a yes vote) it would be dangerous to have the government disbanding into independents. Chaos!
I do see the SNP splintering after we get independence, that is the natural end game. However it would be irresponsible and pretty pointless for this to happen immediately. The SNP would have a moral duty to guide Scotland through the early years of independence.
#3 by Jeff on September 3, 2012 - 8:48 am
I don’t see that it would be chaos. The Governent would continue as a band of Independents for 18months or so, not so different to how some Highland councils are run. I’m sure Alex Salmond wouldn’t lose a vote of confidence so it’d be business as usual. Everything would be about the transition into independence anyway.
#4 by Colin on September 3, 2012 - 8:55 am
Well chaos was tongue in cheek, but I do think it would be daft to do it so early.
Ideally I would also like to see the respective camps in the snp go their own way in time to stand in new parties for the first indy election in 2016 – but I reckon that timescale is too tight.
More likely 2020 – a whole range of new parties standing! What a breath of fresh air!
#5 by Alex on September 3, 2012 - 11:30 am
have to say, i see Jeffs point in this.
This is not about what is good for the SNP post independence, but a way of actually helping that moment come about. The unionists will tear the SNP apart for the next two years, both with fair questions and downright lies (as seen with the AV referendum). If it was known that the SNP would cease to exist post 2014, this could shut this line of attack off. I can see the “this is for Scotland to decide’ coming out of Salmonds mouth every time the question about post independent policy comes up.
If the referendum turns into an election about post independent policy of a single party (ie the SNP), i feel the ‘yes’ campaign will lose. Basically because they cannot muster 50% of the vote based on people voting in effect for the SNP, not for the ‘yes’ campaign. If this is about whether Scotland is better off with or without the rest of the UK, i think the ‘yes’ campaign can win. This campaign broadens the possible voting base and maybe gets the yes campaign over the 50% (for example myself, who having never voted snp, will vote Yes but struggle when it comes to a discussion about SNP policy, some of which i really dislike).
Jeff – maybe there could be a couple of weeks to set the program of government (almost coalition type negotiations, but within the SNP) before they split. This may avoid the ‘your leaving Scotland in chaos’ argument, while hopefully also retaining the point of splitting and becoming a government of independents.
#6 by Jeff on September 3, 2012 - 11:51 am
Yes, the timing of the disbanding is not so important, some time in 2015 or even 2016 would suffice. It was the overall strategy that interested me.
#7 by Derek Young on September 3, 2012 - 10:20 am
Am now almost torn: the disbandment of the SNP would be very tempting – though giving up the Union first would be way too high a price.
I once had a chat with a prominent Nat about what would happen to the SNP as a political force post-independence; since they are part-party and part-movement. Her view was there was still a role for an anti-Trident pro-enterprise party which Scottish Labour on its own would/could not be. Maybe, but the odds have to be that there would be realignment of all political forces post-independence. For example, the Tories could no longer rely on an English majority for their significance; and would have to broaden their appeal to the centre to have influence. On the plus side any lingering feeling of them being anti-Scottish would dissipate reasonably quickly. Two late great former elected politicians (one a Nationalist, the other a Liberal Democrat) both agreed in my presence that they would be most happily comfortable as Scottish Liberal Democrats in an independent Scotland – this was a point about the strange dynamics of party tribalism, but it lends support to the notion that there would be a place for a centre/centre-left liberalism in the political sphere with some former nationalist support (as there was under Charles Kennedy and during the 1999-2007 coalitions in Holyrood). The Nats would perceive a need for themselves as they remain united by a desire to prove that their grand claims were right and the critics wrong (as they challenge the European Commission before the European Court of Justice on having to (re)apply for entry to the EU, for example, and then wait for the (Rest of the) UK’s veto, for example). But this isn’t enough to sustain a political movement in the medium term; unless it got so bad that there was a strong and immediate campaign to reunite and reform the UK, in which event they would coalesce as the opposition.
But apart from all this future-gazing, the analogy with No to AV can be taken too far – there will be plenty of Yes to AV Labourites and Lib Dems who will be on the Better Together side of the debate and who retain a lingering disgust for the tactics of the Tom Harris, Sayeedi Warsi brigade who did little more than condemn us to the pendulum back-and-forth, mud sticks, childish adversarial yah-boo-sucks politics for a generation or more.
#8 by BaffieBox on September 3, 2012 - 10:43 am
Sounds nice in principle but easily countered by the NO campaign who will accuse the SNP as a party of being unwilling to accept the consequences of independence and shoulder the responsibility of what they campaigned for, at least in the short term. They’d have a point – it’s a cop out. They are a political party and as such, should be expected to nail their manifesto to the mast and be expected to honour it. It’s far too easy to say they’ll disband and withdraw from the party political landscape come independence – it will not be difficult at all for the opposition parties to make currency of this on the doorstep.
No… the problem is, and has been, that the Yes campaign is still an SNP campaign. And the solution is still to ensure that the Yes campaign is far bigger and wider than the SNP.
#9 by KBW on September 3, 2012 - 10:46 am
By that argument the Scottish Tory’s should have gone long ago!
#10 by Thomas Widmann on September 3, 2012 - 10:48 am
I think disbanding straight after a Yes vote would be irresponsible, but promising not to contest the 2016 election would make sense.
In the immediate aftermaths of a Yes vote, somebody needs to stand up for Scotland until Labour, the Libdems and the Tories have regrouped and worked out what they want to achieve in an independent Scotland, so if the SNP had already disappeared, it would be bad for Scotland.
#11 by Elaine on September 3, 2012 - 10:50 am
The SNP has I feel transcended the “party of independence” label and has become the breath of fresh air that was needed in Scottish politics.
To suggest it disband to leave a load of old Labourites running Scotland, would turn me and a lot of voters off completely.
Scotland will need steered on its course as an independent nation and that I see as the continuing purpose of the SNP.
Yes, there will eventually be a parting of the ways post independence, but to leave it immediately to old Labour to pick up the gauntlet, is a very worrying proposition.
#12 by Alasdair Stirling on September 3, 2012 - 10:56 am
Granted the NO campaign has had a good summer, but they have given up much ground in the strategic manoeuvring around the process of the referendum. More importantly, they have painted themselves into the ‘status quo’ corner, and are now condemned to fight the referendum without offer a vision for a new or better future. This looks good during the Olympic summer, but remember 88% of the proposed austerity measures have not yet taken effect. The Coalition’s script, was that the UK would by now be enjoying dynamic growth and that because of the increasing prosperity that accompanies such growth we would not notice the cuts as they really started to bite. Of course, this growth might yet materialize, but if it doesn’t the slogan ‘Better Together’ might turn out to be something of a difficult sell. More importantly, the NO campaign have already shut off and closed down their options and opportunity to define a Unionist better future for Scotland, and last minute changes rarely rescue a political campaign that voters dislike.
In regard, to post independence politics. The assumption that the SNP will fall apart after securing independence runs contrary to almost all historical experience. Generally, independence movements or parties have a window of 10-15 years unchallenged dominance after independence. Objectively this makes sense in a Scottish context. The Unionist parties will suddenly find themselves cut off from their southern lifeline. No more more funds coming north to subsidize their activities and no more experts and activists arriving from London to provide the intellectual heft for their campaigns. Perhaps, more importantly, history also shows us that the politicians that made their names as cheerleaders of the previous political regime have no place in the country’s independent future. No money and no activists from London and their ‘big beasts’ past and present discredited – independence would likely be the death and destruction of Scottish Labour. That’s not to say that there will be no left-centre party in Scotland after independence, simply that it is more likely that it will be the Scottish Labour that implodes after independence.
#13 by Thomas Widmann on September 3, 2012 - 11:16 am
I agree that the SNP would probably ride on a wave of success in the first decade of an independent Scotland. Eventually, the SNP would just become one of several pro-independence parties in Scotland, because soon after independence all parties will be pro-independence (how many Irish or Norwegian political parties are against their country’s independence?), and the SNP would start to be defined by its economic and value-based policies.
However, I do think Jeff’s point is valid. Although disbanding the SNP might be too radical, how can the Yes side communicate that voting Yes does not mean that you sign up to living in an SNP one-party state for eternity? Perhaps the SNP should announce a series of referendums to be held in 2015 to decide on NATO membership, the currency of Scotland, the future of the monarchy, etc.?
#14 by Commenter on September 3, 2012 - 5:31 pm
how can the Yes side communicate that voting Yes does not mean that you sign up to living in an SNP one-party state for eternity?
Wild-eyed nonsense like that should be easily enough countered by simply reasoning with people. If that doesn’t work, I’d recommend throwing our hands up in despair.
#15 by Iain Menzies on September 3, 2012 - 11:00 am
But disband when? dont get me wrong i wouldnt miss the SNP 😉 but if they disband on the announcement of a yes vote can they really lead the negotiations between scotland and HMG between yes and day one of independence?
Or if they disband after negotiations, where is the oppertunity for scots to express a view on the out come of those negotiations.
As it happens i think your getting to a point (on the issue of post indy policy) but i dont think disbanding is the right answer. What we should have is a second question….to affirm or reject the final terms of independence.
#16 by Cath on September 3, 2012 - 11:15 am
I don’t see any good reason for the SNP to disband now, or promise to disband, as we have no idea what the post independence political landscape will look like. Also, between 2014 and 2016, following a yes vote, we’ll need people to negotiate with Westminster and currently the SNP are best placed to do that. Who’d trust any of the Better Together Westminster ones?
What would be useful, and aleady appears to be happening, is for the political landscape to start shifting between now and 2014. Labour for independence is gaining ground, and could become far more organised and more of a geunuine party; we may have Lib Dems out for independence and possibly even Tories/business people forming around their own ideas.
If this happens, that will allow anyone in the SNP who feels better suited to an alternative, new, pro-indy party to go somewhere else – currently there isn’t anywhere if you’re pro indy other than the SNP, greens or SSP. Until genuinely independent, Scottish alternatives are available, why resolve to disband? I suspect post independence, people will drift away from the SNP to other new parties, but this should be allowed to happen naturally, as and when the time is right, not tied to a date.
As for the “hate-fest” of people like Tom Harris and the English based press, that was what pushed me to join the SNP eventually. I think most people in Scotland see through that and really don’t like it.
#17 by Doug Daniel on September 3, 2012 - 12:18 pm
It’s a nice idea in theory, and the SNP probably will cease to be after indy at some point anyway (or at least it will shrink considerably), but in practice I think it would be handing a gift to the “NO” campaign to have a formal declaration of some sort of arbitrary end date for the SNP.
Remember that the day after a “YES” vote, Scotland will not have changed one jot. Between then and the first post-indy election, the Scottish Government’s role (won’t it be nice to be able to just say “Government” without having to clarify if you mean Scottish or Westminster?) will be to dot the Is and cross the Ts, putting the wheels in motion to making Scotland actually independent. You can just imagine all the unionist spin about instability if the SNP ceases to be in 2014 and using that as an argument against independence. Even if we have a fully-prepared constitution with every detail nailed down, there’ll still be a need for a government to make that transition from union to indy.
Also, if Scotland votes “NO”, the independence movement will still need the SNP to exist to get us to the same point again. But if people already have their mind set on creating new parties after the referendum, I suspect whatever groupings they would split up into in the event of a “YES” vote would happen anyway in the event of a “NO” vote.
Between 2014 and 2016 the SNP will arguably be playing their most important role yet. I think it would be far better for them to continue as they are and let things happen naturally, with people from the left and right wings of the SNP leaving of their own accord to create new parties with the former members of the unionist parties.
They can’t disband before the first post-indy election. Not purposefully, anyway. However, trying to imagine which parties will form post-indy and who will be in them from the various parties is one of my favourite indy-related games, and I would love to think that opposing parties being led by former colleagues who achieved their life goal together and then split amicably will help us towards a better style of politics post-indy…
#18 by steven luby on September 3, 2012 - 12:27 pm
Giving the lack of vision by the Scots unionists,I fear their minds,nevermind their hearts,will not belong in an Independent Scotland.
I have no faith in them now and as can be seen week in week out within Holyrood,its of poor quality.As for a higher string of minds entering in the scheme of things I fear those hopes are premature.Westminster holds very few as it stands at the moment and even less so are of Scottish stock.
I have the feeling if a yes vote is cast then a small few and only a few will leave the SNP shortly after.The left-center will remain and continue with their policies as they stand now.It will be up to the ex unionist parties to prove themselves once again in 2016 and I for one don’t believe thay can shed the last 15 to 30 years to make that challange.
We all appear to be forgetting that the media within Scotland will all have to make a shift and stand on their own legs too! But they do say that sh..e sticks so perhaps the cons&labs will still be blindly followed,but only perhaps.
#19 by Peter A Bell on September 3, 2012 - 12:28 pm
“You simply can’t succeed with odds stacked so heavily against you. No wonder Alex Salmond has summoned all of his political nous to try getting a Devo Max option onto the ballot slip, but that is not going to happen. After all, why should the unionists give the SNP an easy way out when they can win a single question referendum at walking pace and potentially blow the SNP’s formidable machine to smithereens?”
A fallacy and a false assumption all neatly wrapped up in one paragraph. Let’s take the fallacy first.
Unionists and their allies in the media have been strenuously peddling the notion that Salmond is actively seeking a second question on the referendum ballot. Even absent all the bluntly contradictory statements from the SNP, the very fact that British nationalists are putting so much effort into selling this line should make any thinking person suspicious. The reality, of course, is that Salmond and his team are not seeking to get a second question on the ballot. The SNP, as they have said repeatedly, does not favour “devo-whatever”; will not propose a second question on “devo-whatever”; and would actively campaign against any “devo-whatever” proposal that did make it onto the ballot.
But Salmond also realises that the idea of a second question has a considerable amount of public support. And a “devo-whatever” option may even be favoured by a majority of the electorate. The Scottish Government – as opposed to the SNP – cannot therefore be seen to arbitrarily reject these things. It must be made abundantly clear that it is the unionists who are denying the Scottish people the choices that they want. Just as it was the unionists who sought to prevent the referendum ever taking place. (See Bella Caledonia for more on this – http://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2012/09/03/question-time-2/#comment-14389)
The false assumption is that the unionists are a shoo-in to win a single question referendum. This view relies on the tragically simplistic notion that all polling responses not specifically supportive of independence must ultimately default to a NO vote. It takes no account of the fact that a NO vote would be a vote for the least favoured option – the status quo. An option explicitly rejected by the overwhelming majority of respondents.
We have to ask ourselves which way the supporters of more powers would be most likely to go should their preferred option be denied to them. Would they be more likely to go for a no change option that they have already rejected? Or would they be more likely to go for the option that they are already tending towards?
Personally, I’m perfectly happy that the anti-independence campaign has effectively closed off its options on offering a viable alternative to independence. And I’m quite delighted to have them believe that they’ve already won the referendum. But I’m not about to participate in their delusions.
#20 by Allan on September 3, 2012 - 8:12 pm
Peter, the Unionist’s are far from a shoo-in to win a single question referendum. However, Salmond’s poor spin operation has once again struck, many ordinary people believe that Salmond wants Devo-Max as some sort of insurance issue.
#21 by Martin B on September 3, 2012 - 12:34 pm
While there are a number of options on timing (my preferred: the SNP would not fight any post-independence elections but as the incumbent Scottish govt, would negotiate & manage the transition), I think the strategy is right.
Not only is it tactically very powerful in winning the referendum, it sets the context correctly for the post-independence era: that existing party positions are no longer relevant, and a realignment is necessary.
The post independence party landscape must reflect the spectrum of political opinion in Scotland, distinctly from the current reflection of the spectrum across the UK, where the mainstream of Scottish opinion is a relative outlier in the coalitions that are UK parties.
The worst possible outcome would be that in a hundred years, our politics and the nation’s parties are still primarily defined by the positions taken on the 2014 referendum, and are otherwise indistinguishable. Otherwise known as the Fianna Fail/Fine Gael duopoly.
By disbanding and setting free a large body of talented people to form new or existing groupings, the SNP will kickstart this process.
#22 by Angus McLellan on September 3, 2012 - 2:05 pm
Perhaps my paranoia is getting the better of me, but might that approach not encourage delay in negotiations? After all, referendums are never binding and nothing would be irreversible until the paperwork was signed and sealed. If that wasn’t the case by May 2016, there’s no reason at all why the subsequent Not-SNP government in Edinburgh has to close the deal. “Vote Yes, get No”.
(A vaguely similar sequence of events came to pass elsewhere, so this isn’t tinfoil hat stuff.)
#23 by Chris on September 3, 2012 - 2:04 pm
I think the SNP would be better engaged in how to prevent the referendum becoming a complete drubbing. Offering to disband is not the answer. Serious answers on currency, border controls and defence should be answered before offering bizarre flights of fancy.
Talking about post-independence contexts is serious waffle. This is not very likely to happen and the SNP post-referendum should turn their attention to what they can can do for the next 20 years of Devolution.
Don’t we already have FF/FG? One centre-left party racing to the bottom on crime and the other centre-left party racing to the bottom on tax?
#24 by Peter A Bell on September 3, 2012 - 2:48 pm
Dear oh dear! Not the tired old “unanswered questions” nonsense again! If the SNP hasn’t made its position on the matter of post-independence currency then what exactly have unionists been attacking? Tilting at their own caricature of SNP policy as usual?
And if you’re not keen on the vision offered by the SNP, then what about the other options which have been set out by George Kerevan among others – http://bit.ly/MuClTH? Or are you as blind and deaf to that as to what the SNP says?
Pretty much the same goes for all the other supposedly “unanswered questions”. It’s not answers we’re lacking. It’s listening.
#25 by David Smillie on September 3, 2012 - 2:48 pm
All the stuff about ‘freeing a large body of talented people’ by disbanding the SNP is nonsense. Anyone who feels that way can leave the SNP any time they like. The SNP will not disband because their opposition is so overwhelmingly unionist. It can be confidently guaranteed that these unionist parties will continue to contain large numbers of people who will continue to plot and scheme for the Union even after independence. I for one will never, ever trust them and will continue to promote what I see as best for Scotland through the SNP. I’ll bet there’s plenty more like me.
#26 by Commenter on September 3, 2012 - 5:34 pm
It makes no sense for the only party that was in favour of independence to auto-destruct immediately after independence is achieved. The result would be that voters would only be able to vote for anti-independence parties.
Absolutely hatstand, Jeff. Loopy.
#27 by Jeff on September 3, 2012 - 5:56 pm
I’m not saying Nicola Sturgeon and John Swinney would go off and work as lawyers thinking their jobs are done. I’m removing the speculation over what the SNP’s policies in 2016 would be to ensure focus is on what 2014 is all about. Of course the majority of the SNP would reform between 2014 and 2016 under a different party name, and the SNP wouldn’t “destruct”, it’d still have a majority and form the Government, just as ‘Independents’. And they would still stand in 2016 and ensure voters had a pro-Indy party to vote for.
I like “hatstand” though, not heard that one before.
#28 by Peter A Bell on September 3, 2012 - 7:00 pm
The focus will shift from the SNP anyway as the @YesScotland campaign gains momentum. That’s one of the main reasons for setting up the umbrella group. It allows the campaign for independence to be taken forward while the SNP concentrates on shaping itself for its post-independence role.
Don’t forget that the SNP’s quiet competence in government is one of the main reasons we’ve got a referendum at all. If they left the scene then this would create a lot of uncertainty about what kind of government we’d have after independence. Not everybody will want the SNP in power. But you may safely assume that all those who voted for the party in 2011 would prefer to have the option.
#29 by Allan on September 3, 2012 - 7:05 pm
One point, the campaign to date has been anything but polite (“Newsnat” anyone?), unless you mean things are going to get a whole lot nastier and viceous (which is what I think will happen).
#30 by Allan on September 3, 2012 - 7:17 pm
Two points
Firstly, i’m sure that Mini-Guido (or Harry Coles to give him his full name) was pro Scottish Independence. Unless of course you mean one of Guido’s other minions…
Secondly, The SNP are going to dispand anyway in the event of a “Yes” vote, just not straight after the vote. I would have though that the SNP in it’s current guise would contest the first post Independence General Election, but maybe not the second. However, I don’t think that offering to dispand will sway one single voter towards a yes vote.
#31 by Jeff on September 3, 2012 - 10:03 pm
Well, first of all it’s “Harry Cole”, not “Harry Coles”, and I find it very, very hard to believe that he’s pro-independence.
As for your second point, I agree that if you said to any voter ‘Will you change from a No vote to a Yes vote if the SNP disbands?’ then you won’t get a single taker, but that’s not my point. The SNP is failing to get its arguments across because it’s getting bogged down in what it, as a party, has as a policy on currency, on the Queen, on NATO and so on and so on. They unfairly have to convince the electorate on everything to win this thing and it’s not going to happen unless something gives. Denying the papers speculation on SNP policy post-independence (even though the SNP would still compete in the first elections, albeit as a different party) would help force people into thinking about what this referendum is actually about.
#32 by Allan on September 4, 2012 - 9:06 pm
Ah, but there are other things that the SNP can be doing to simplify their message. I agree that the “Yes Scotland” campaign has become bogged down in the minutiae of the exact wording of the question (“Yes” have also let “Better Together” away with painting Devo Max as Salmond’s saftey option). In reallity though, the key battleground of this referendum, as I have been saying for some time and Prof. John Curtis said this morning on GMS, will be the economy. Win the argument there, and I think that the SNP will go a long way to convincing people.
As for Mister Harry Cole, yes… He did a piece at “The Commentator” in January explaining why he now supported, ah… how did he put it… freedom for Scotland. Interesting piece. The fourth paragraph is something that the SNP could (and maybe should) be running with.
“Scotland is not well. This is the nation that gave us the telephone, the television, reason, logic, economics and whisky. Yet since the business interests of some three hundred Edinburgh merchants over-ruled the desires of the rest of a nation in 1707, Scotland has been in decline. The brain drain that saw enlightened Scots give America its magnificent constitution has never stopped.”
http://www.thecommentator.com/article/838/leaving_the_politics_aside_scotland_deserves_freedom
#33 by Iain McGowan on September 3, 2012 - 8:25 pm
There was always the prospect that the SNP would split
into different perhaps several parties after Indepen-dence, but it is not a serious proposition to suggest it
be disbanded after the referendum vote. Independence
has to be delivered post referendum. Alex Salmond
would be advised to draw together a Provisional Govt.
after the vote 1/ to conduct negotiations, 2/ to shadow
the currently reserved areas, and 3/ to oversee the handover of powers and responsibilties to the Scottish
Parliament. Not a Coalition with any one party, it just
wouldn’t be credible to invite any of the unionist party
leaders on board. You just can’t keep rubbishing a course of action or a constitutional option like Indep-
endence and expect to be trusted to deliver it. The
first directly elected Govt. of an Independent Scotland
in (2016) should inherit an going concern and not be
expected to start from scratch.
It would be essential to get an early date for Independence, before the 2015 election even if some
negotiations are ongoing. All primary legislation could be handed over relatively easily, with he more involved
negotiations being about finance and future relations.
Remember if the UK ? wants binding agreements they
could only be signed by representatives of an Independent Govt. The biggest danger post referendum is the Labour party winning an election in
2015, whic would necessitate winning in Scotland, does anybody doubt that they would then claim to have overturned the result of the referendum?
They are more likely to do hat in the political vacuum
that would exist in Jeff’s government of Independents.
#34 by Alex Grant on September 3, 2012 - 8:28 pm
As many have already said there is no need or indeed benefit in the SNP announcing post independence dissolution. In fact given the incompetents in the other parties God help us if we had to rely on them for leadership.
On the other hand Alex Salmonds would do well to emphasise the fact that a vote for independence is not a vote for the SNP or him. Post independence they might eventually have a decent choice of party to lead Scotland?
#35 by Angus McLellan on September 3, 2012 - 10:47 pm
On the competence question, Alex Massie’s comment about heid-in-hands politicians is worth considering. Would the prospect of Johann Lamont as the first First Minister of an independent Scotland really encourage (Massie again) “Murrayfield” voters into the Yes camp? Seems unlikely.
#36 by Jeff on September 3, 2012 - 11:09 pm
Good point.
#37 by Indy on September 3, 2012 - 9:25 pm
It is an attractive idea on the face of it but I don’t think it would go down too well with all the people who vote SNP. Kind of a slap in the face.
I agree with Peter that once the Yes campaign gets its own identity out there the SNP, as a party, will kind of slip into the background a bit.
#38 by Elaine on September 3, 2012 - 10:54 pm
Is there perhaps more wishful thinking going on here than reality, by those who are anti-SNP?
Is this actually another Unionist ploy to try and shift the goalposts, introduce some paranoia and attempt to shoogle the SNP off its firm pedestal in Govt.?
Is this just another scare-mongering question being asked by anti-SNP folk, to try and garner some Labour resurgence, to give ex-WM MPs and the like some hope for power, post independence?
If we can foresee at least a decade of SNP rule post independence, then what will those poor, unemployed WM MPs do with themselves?
The SNP would be mad to disband now it has real power and Independence in its grasp. So after fighting for Independence for decades, it just rolls over and lets the Unionist parties take over???
The SNP is not called the Scottish “Hope for Independence” Party.
It is the “Scottish National Party” and in a new Scottish Nation then that seems rather an apt name for a political party IMO.
#39 by Chris on September 4, 2012 - 9:56 am
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I think even Johann would acknowledge that she was the last man (wumin) standing and was put into an invidious position. She is doing okay, and much better than expected, but Labour needs to get a few more good people back into Holyrood. But I reckon it’s a ten year process.
#40 by Chris on September 4, 2012 - 10:06 am
It’s a nice idea to split the YES campaign away from the SNP so that the SNP can get on with post-independence policy development. Something they have had 60 years to do, but never too late huh.
But the vote will rest on answering practical questions. How much will it cost to run 2 DVLAs? What will happen to the BBC? Will my pension get paid? What currency will we use? What happens to my mortgage with the Nationwide? Will my employer keep our office open? Will we lose our customers?
If the YES campaign fails to answer these questions satisfactorily then or decides that this is the job for a post-independence SNP then the referendum promises to be a fiasco.
If they can answer them satisfactorily I might even be tempted to vote yes… (no holding my breathe)
#41 by Bill Fraser on September 4, 2012 - 10:09 am
Why would the Scottish people want the only party who are delivering sensible economic policies and defending NHS and welfare (not to mention ensuring our children have the best chance of delivering a decent future for themselves and the country by maintaining free higher education) want the NP to disband? Lamont is of the opinion that it is unfair that our children have free education and not those in England, I agree, but the answer is not to impose fees on our children, but to give it to all children in the UK. That of course is not going to happen with UK politics dominated by the parties of Westminster and the South East. It is not the SNP that is in danger of self destructing in Scotland, it is the unionist parties that are failing to understand that the Scottish electorate recognise that the only way to improve our situation is to take control of our own destiny.
#42 by Chris on September 4, 2012 - 10:10 am
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It will get vicious and nastier if the result looks close. At the moment it is quite cool although with Ian Davidson and Joan McAlpine around anything might happen.
Think back to the disgsting anti-s28 campaign. When a modest proposal to allow teachers to even talk about homosexuality was opposed by a vicious Daily Record/Brian Soutar camp to Stop Gay Sex Lessons.
#43 by Alasdair Frew-Bell on September 4, 2012 - 10:26 am
Although no SNP fan, the idea that the only large pro-sovereignty organization should indicate now a willingness to “disband” at the moment of success is truly flakey. The SNP is currently the locomotive of the cause and will still need to be around when, inshallah, the independence negotiations begin. By that time all the other political parties will most likely have formed pro-indie groups. While the rest will be packing their bags [in the delusion that England will welcome them with open arms] knowing full well they are politically redundant here. And that is the issue. Those that oppose independence, particularly in media, administration and public sector roles, are effectively gambling with their future. If they misjudge they are finished. However, as even with a nationalist government, the affirmatives are still the outsiders nothing much would change were the negatives to win. The sovereignty issue would not go away. The Parti Québecois shows how a good idea can survive a setback; and internal wrangling.
The emergence of a non-party political sovereignty colloquium in this country is a sign of maturity. The SNP by freely aligning itself with this will do more for the national cause than going for the self-destruct option proposed.
#44 by Cath on September 4, 2012 - 11:12 am
To be honest, I think the Unionist focus on the SNP and Salmond will come back to haunt them. The idea that independence is about being able to choose a government and being like any other, normal independent country is a very simple one that won’t be lost on most voters who give it any thought. The Yes campaign has barely started yet and there are two years to go. A huge amount can happen in that time. The SNP are a competent government pushing through fairly major reforms yet staying, amazingly, fairly popular even among those being reformed. Independence is one policy among many for them, as they also govern the country.
It’s hard to see where the constant SNP and Salmond bashing will succeed over the next 2 years when it’s so patently failed up until now. But with devo-max effectively out the picture and the Westminster parties all crowded onto the “no change; we’ll tell you what you can and can’t have and when” piece of ground, there is really no positive ground for them to take. I expect it will be a very, very nasty campaign from the no camp. But that in itself gives the SNP quite a few options. And ultimately, if Westminster – with a coalition of Labour-Tory-Lib Dem – win after a campaign like that, what will they have won, really? Certainly not a Scotland that will be happily ruled by them for long, and quite possibly a Scotland that will no longer vote Labour even for Westminster.
#45 by Peter A Bell on September 4, 2012 - 5:08 pm
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Why would Scotland require 2 DVLAs?