If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
The Blog
No matter how many press releases you pen, how many interviews you give, or how much spin your experts can generate, sometimes there's no substitute for appearing in person, something Rupert Murdoch and David Cameron took to heart this week, flying into and out of London respectively to rouse the troops and go into battle for the things they hold dear. For one, there's a newspaper and the reputation of his staff at stake, for the other, the future of the UK as we know it.
As an Englishman and an Irishman - but a Briton first - I look upon this debate with the despondency of one who wishes the United Kingdom could have remained wider still. The sadness of division in Ireland, both within and without, is nothing to envy. We, the British people, are greater than the sum of our parts. Let us fight, wherever we are, for our shared national home.
The pro Britain campaign has not got off the ground. It needs to and quickly. And it needs to be a campaign about YES to Britain and not NO to independence... 2012 is going to be filled with cool, iconic reasons to celebrate the UK. That must be the backdrop.
In my view, the cry for Scotland's Independence is at best folly and probably one of the worse ideas I have ever heard in my entire life.
Alex Salmond's plan to hold a referendum on Scottish independence in autumn 2014 has reignited a debate which has been with us for centuries. Last week the Scottish first minister came to London to put his proposals to the English asking, "Is there a market for Scottish Independence in England?"
It was difficult to be a Scot in London yesterday, because for once it felt like the real action was elsewhere. Alex Salmond's speech to the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, in which he laid out the details of the SNP's constitutional position and plans felt like some kind of historic moment.
There I was passing a shelf of specially-ordered Burns Night haggises at Waitrose in Canary Wharf when I overheard a woman speaking to her friend. "Any Scottish people I've known have always been really arrogant and loud," she said in an East End London accent. "Yeah. Big drinkers too," her friend nodded, picking up a haggis and eyeing it suspiciously.
In 1707 the Act of Union gave England political and economic authority over Scotland and some Scots have been protesting ever since.
I should start with an apology. This blog will have a special, and possibly unhealthy, appeal for political nerds. It addresses some technical issues to do with democratic theory and the detailed arithmetic of Scottish opinion.
Hailing as I do from the still heavily divided 'British territory' of Northern Ireland or the 'occupied six counties' of Ireland, whichever way you so wish to put it, it stands that this week's big news on Scottish Independence has been of real interest to us over here across the Irish Sea.
It staggers me and most Scots that David Cameron and indeed the whole London commentariat could possibly have thought his proposed "deal" to have a speedy binding Scottish referendum - or nothing - would be greeted in Scotland as anything other than a stale bit of last week's bread fit only to be chucked straight back over the fence.
When Alex Salmond criticises David Cameron for interfering in Scottish affairs, he fails to understand the English nation and our legislative procedures. We English have a long, proud history of interfering in the affairs of countries over whom we have no mandate. That's how we've always done things.
With Alex Salmond announcing that his government has a mandate to hold a referendum on Scottish independence in 2014, the next few years look set to be the most important in 300 years of union.
No one cares more about Scotland's success than the people who live here and that, ultimately, is why independence is the best choice for our future.
What has the rest of the United Kingdom ever done to the Scots to deserve this? It's not like they didn't inflict enough hurt on us with our last prime minister and his tartan mafia.
The Scotsman is in no doubt what the big story is today - Megrahi's death bed 'confession'. It puts confession in quotes, but it's a nod and a wink - ...
