One Year to Go. It looks like No.

It's not exactly been a happy pre-anniversary for the Yes Scotland campaign. Looking at the deluge of one-year-to-go opinion polls, the only sensible conclusion is that very little has changed and independence is set to be rejected by a substantial majority. Yes, the number of don't knows has gone up and there is a degree of fluidity about the supporters of devolution max. But there is no sign of an early breakthrough. Even Alex Salmond's Aberdeenshire school students blew him a raspberry by voting against independence in mock elections by a margin of three to one.

The economic argument rages on to no particular purpose. All sides accept that Scotland could be a viable economy on its own, but the £500 question remains unanswered. An opinion poll by ICM last week suggested that 47% of Scots would vote Yes if they could be assured that independence would make them richer by this amount, while only 18% would vote for independence if they were made poorer. Nicola Sturgeon welcomed this poll and insisted that “on the basis of the current Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland report Scotland’s finances are stronger than the UK’s as a whole to the tune of £4.4 billion – which equates to £824 per person”. Whether this fiscal arithmetic is right or not, I find it rather demeaning for the question of Scotland's national renewal to be reduced to the cost of a minibreak in Benidorm.

Anyway, the Nationalists are always going to be on the defensive with these arguments because of the uncertainty factor. It is impossible to say whether Scotland would be better off after independence, and the hard fiscal reality is that a short period of post independence austerity is likely, even with the benefit of oil revenues. The Institute for Fiscal Studies claimed last week that Scottish public spending, which it says is 17% higher per head than in England, would be squeezed in a transition period as Scotland tried to grapple with the debts inherited from the UK.

Now, the Nationalists rightly say that this is hardly their fault, and that is true. They are also right to argue that with oil and renewable resources, Scotland could be a viable and very effective economy. But it is hard to argue with the IFS calculation that there would be significant spending constraints in the short term. The IFS is the gold standard of financial accounting and its assessments have to be taken seriously, unlike the UK Treasury, which has been frankly producing propaganda in the guise of economic analysis.

Now, in any normal independence situation, such transitional costs would be seen as a price worth paying for national freedom. You didn't find the Slovakia, the Lativa, or any of the other countries which won independence in 1990s worrying over such trivial sums. In Barcelona today, Catalonian nationalists don't march in their millions demanding 500 more euros – they demand an end to domination from Madrid, cultural liberation, control of their own affairs. Scottish independence is in danger of turning into a bean-counter convention, where people are arguing over the small change in the national accounts instead of creating a vision of a better society.

RBS/Libor. If Iceland can prosecute bankers why can't we?

If you're shopped by your ex-wife for point switching on a speeding ticket you face prison; if you are in charge of a department responsible for one of the biggest financial scandals in history, you get a £700,000 pay off. Well, that's what has happened to the Royal Bank of Scotland executive, John Hourican, who has agreed to step down over the Libor fixing scandal. Step down, mind you, not accept responsibility, let alone admit to any wrong-doing. RBS insists that Mr Houlican had no involvement in, or knowledge of any manipulation of Libor interest rates.

So, er, why is he stepping down? What kind of justice allows companies to nominate someone to shoulder the blame who is blameless in order to divert blame from those who are guilty? Why couldn't Chris Huhne just nominate his driver to take taking the rap for his speeding ticket, while of course making clear he had no knowledge of any wrong-doing and therefor isn't responsible.

The RBS scandal is another nail in the coffin of British - and Scottish - banking. This omni-scandal is giving us all indignation fatigue. It's hard to remain apoplectic with rage month after month, year after year, as bank criminals are allowed to hide behind presentational resignations and get fines that are paid out of tax payer's money.

Oh, sorry, I forgot. Vince Cable, the business secretary said yesterday that RBS bankers will pay the £390m Libor-fixing fine from their bonus pool. But where exactly did this bonus pool come from? Yes, the profits of the STATE OWNED Royal Bank of Scotland. This fine isn't being paid by the bankers but by us. It is an insult to tax payers that these executives are earning bonuses at all when they owe us for the £65bn for the recapitalisation -  plus interest on two hundred billions of public money used to underpin the value of Royal's dodgy loan book in 2008/9.

Let us remind ourselves of what banks like RBS, UBS and Barclays have been up to.

Is the independence referendum already lost?

SCENES from the independence debate: I took my son, Jamie, to the very excellent Stand comedy club shortly after New Year.

It was a packed and raucous show, with a mostly young audience. The compere – a tubby guy from Edinburgh whose name escapes me – launched into an obscene rant about Alex Salmond and Scottish Nationalists who, apparently, are people of a sordid sexual disposition who need to be put down in various brutal ways. And anyway, he said, the Scots "could never govern themselves 'cos they are totally and completely f***ing useless". As a punchline, he bawled out: "Does anyone here support independence?" Not a soul spoke.

You can't judge the politics of a country by its comedy, but if this had been Barcelona, that comic would have been lucky to escape unharmed. Catalans, who are also having an independence referendum in 2014, are fiercely proud of their abilities, whether they support independence or not, and would have taken exception to this affront to their national dignity. Now, don't get me wrong: it's good that we laugh at ourselves (though if the compere had been funny it might have helped). I only offer this as a random insight into Scotland's frame of mind as we enter 2013: the insecurity and awkwardness many Scots feel about the whole idea of independence; the lack of confidence in their ability to govern themselves; uncertainty about whether they even want to bother with it. It's Yes Scotland's biggest nightmare: the credibility gap.

Opinion polls confirm that Scots still just don't get independence. At least, not yet. The most striking thing about the referendum debate thus far is how little change there has been in Scottish attitudes to independence since the SNP's landslide victory in 2011. Scots still oppose independence by around two to one – a ratio that has remained constant for the last 20 years, give or take the occasional poll giving independence a marginal and transitory lead. It's hard to look at the evidence and not conclude that the Yes campaign has lost even before the campaign has started. Labour and the Better Together campaign are already awarding themselves battle honours and talking of getting three million No votes.

The Yes campaign team insists it is relaxed about the polls and points out that the SNP's landslide victory in the Scottish elections in 2011 was incubated largely during the campaign itself. In the year running up to the Holyrood elections, Labour had a comfortable lead in the polls and it was only after the campaign started that Scottish voters decided that Iain Gray was toast.

Leveson Press Law. Don't worry, it'll never happen.

    The debate over Lord Justice Leveson's call for statutory regulation of the press has unfortunately turned into a political bun-fight. Labour are so eager to court popularity by hammering the gutter press that they've embraced the Leveson Laws with hardly a moment's pause. Meanwhile, from the opposing camp comes the din of grinding axes as special interests led by the Murdoch press line up behind David Cameron against Leveson's “statutory underpinning”. Many believe the PM is only opposing regulation because he wants to keep the press barons on side for the next election.

But while politicians are always guilty of courting the press – even our own First Minister , Alex Salmond, couldn't resist offering to bat for Rupert as Leveson pointed out acidly – we should give the Prime Minister some credit for having genuine reservations about the rush to reintroduce regulation after three hundred years. And yes, I know regulation doesn't mean “political control” - but you have to look at how this new “independent” regulator would work.

Let's imagine that the Leveson proposals are adopted into law. What happens then? Well, the new Press Standards Commission is appointed by a panel overseen by the regulator, Ofcom. Since Ofcom is appointed by government, a line of influence is already open. The PSC drafts a code of conduct requiring journalists to behave properly, not hack phones, not harass famous novelists, not tell lies about people who've lost children, not blag medical records of politicians' children from the NHS -  In other words: obey the law. But since it is the courts that enforce the law, what else would the commission do? How would the Commission enforce good behaviour? Well, it would license the press – decide who is a legitimate accredited journalistic operation.

Lord Leveson doesn't use the word, “license” but he does propose a “kite-mark” for reputable organs. In exchange for being licensed, the newspaper would have certain legal protections in defamation and other cases. Lord Leveson says that those who don't play along would have to pay full court costs in defamation actions even if they WIN the case. So, if Lord X sues for defamation, and the Sunday Herald win on the grounds that what they have said about him is true, it might still have to pay the costs of the litigation, which could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

  Licensing raises the whole issue of compliance. Editors would have to show, even before they embark on a story, that they have fully discussed the implications, not just all the possible legal consequences, but whether they are within the Commission's code. If they are not, and the story leads to court action, they could effectively lose the protection even if story is true. So we can already begin to see some of the difficulties this might cause in a fast-moving news environment. 

Who will be first to be locked up by the Leveson Laws?

 Form an orderly queue there, please. Editors are jostling to be the first in the clink if the government moves to introduce press regulation. Already, the editor of the Spectator, Fraser Nelson, has said he will not comply with any such statutory body, and is prepared to suffer the consequences – which could mean spending a few months at Her Majesty's Pleasure. Other hacks are promising to desert print for the internet where it is thought the Leveson Laws will not apply.

They're all assuming that Lord Justice Leveson will today end Britain's tradition of press freedom, which dates from 1695 when state licensing of newspapers was abolished. And they are almost certainly right. Lord Leveson is not bonkers. His report, published today, will be cogent and reasonable and will almost certainly call for a new independent system of press regulation, backed up by new laws, which the Prime Minister will find very difficult to reject.

During his lengthy inquiry, the Law Lord made it clear that the present system of self-regulation through the industry body, the Press Complaints Commission, is broken and that public confidence can only be restored by independent regulation of the press. All of the press. Opinion polls show overwhelming public support for regulation. This time it really is closing time in the last chance saloon – and PC plod is about come and chuck out the barflies.

Now as working hack, I find talk of statutory controls deeply troubling. Not least because it seems to be Labour and Liberal spokespeople who are mustard-keen on press regulation, while it is the Tory ministers like Michael Gove and press barons like Rupert Murdoch who are standing for the principle of a free press. With friends like these... It is disturbing to see the Guardian newspaper, which broke the Milly Dowling story, and the National Union of Journalists arguing for a form of state regulation of newspapers.

Regulation can only mean, surely, that a new body - admittedly at arms length - will be empowered, effectively, to license publications, and possibly even license journalists. Certainly the new regulatory body would be in a position to levy fines and enforce the right of reply, and it will be a court of final appeal for people who feel they have been hard done by in the press. Perhaps, indeed, the regulator will have to be consulted when a newspaper proposes to break the law, or bend the law, in the public interest. I'm thinking about use of covert recordings or phone hacking to expose fraud, wrong doing and illegality. To catch a thief you set a thief.

Salmond gets the numbers wrong. But it's all Mike Russell's fault.

  “Facts are chiels that winna ding” is one of Alex Salmond's favourite Burns quotes, so it was with particular relish that Labour's education spokesman, Hugh Henry, flung the words in the FMs face on Thursday when it became clear that Salmond had got his facts wrong on college funding. At First Minister's Questions Salmond had said repeatedly that further education spending had increased when it had actually fallen. A humbled First Minister returned to the debating chamber later that afternoon to apologise for misleading parliament. “Ding, dong!” said Henry.Now, the education secretary, Mike Russell, has agreed to come to parliament today to set the record straight. 

It seems the Scottish government's omnibourach moment is not over. This is the third time in a month that leading figures in the government have found it necessary to make an emergency statement before the close of play in parliament. In October Alex Salmond was forced to answer accusations from opposition leaders that he'd been “lying” over claimed legal advice on European Union membership. He apologised last week for inadvertently misleading parliament on college spending.  This could be habit forming.

   What with "Plan McB" wilting under the impact of recession, unemployment rising and support for independence waning,  things seem to have stopped going Salmond's way recently. Following the climb-down on the second referendum question, and the unexpected resignation of senior nationalists after the conference debate on Nato, Labour sense that Salmond may finally be outstaying his welcome, both in the SNP and in the country. Mind you, they've said that often enough before and the FM's popularity has remained stubbornly high.

Same sex marriage. We've been here before.

 The First Minister is in a dither about it; the cabinet is split over it; church figures call for a referendum as gay rights activists take to the streets. No, not Tuesday's aborted cabinet decision on same-sex marriage, but the Labour-Liberal Democrat cabinet in 2000 during the row over the abolition of Section 2A on the teaching of homosexuality in schools. It is remarkable that the first real split faced by the SNP First Minister, Alex Salmond, is over homosexual equality, just as it was for the late Donald Dewar.

I recall that episode very well, not least because I was close, perhaps too close, to the ministers, led by the former Communities Minister, Wendy Alexander, who were leading the campaign to abolish Section 2A. The ferocity of the response took them by surprise. They thought Scotland was a tolerant nation and that abolishing the clause would be a foregone conclusion. Then came Brian Souter, Cardinal Winning and Keep the Clause. Donald Dewar, a conservative liberal, if that isn't a contradiction in terms, found it an almost impossible conundrum.

And so, it appears, does Alex Salmond. Roll on 12 years and the SNP First Minister is caught between liberals in the cabinet led by the Health Secretary, Nicola Sturgeon who believe that homosexuals should have equal rights, and Catholic ministers like Roseanna Cunningham, who think that gay marriage might be an equality too far. Salmond clearly hasn't made up his mind and since nothing happens without his say so, the government seems paralysed.

The status quo isn't what it used to be.

 The status quo isn't what it used to be. In the old days, you knew where you stood when you voted No to constitutional change. You would be voting for things as they are - whatever arrangement happens to apply at the time of voting. Not any more. This weekend it is impossible to say what the current state of play is on the constitution because all the unionist parties are proposing radical changes to it.

The status quo is now a process not an event, to paraphrase Donald Dewar. There was David Cameron last month, after his meeting with Alex Salmond, announcing that there could be “more powers” for the Scottish parliament. A week later, Alistair Darling – no enthusiast for fiscal autonomy - caught the bug and announced that to be responsible a parliament “should raise the money it spends”. Last week, leading figures in all three unionist parties got together to promote “devoluton plus” under which Scotland would acquire powers to raise income tax, corporation tax and oil revenue, while leaving VAT and National Insurance with Westminster.

Now, this weekend, the new leader of the Scottish Labour Party, Johann Lamont, has announced that she will lead a new commission on devolution, a kind of Calman plus, to look at new fiscal powers. This parallels the commission already set up by the Scottish Liberal Democrats under their former leader, Sir Menzies Campbell, to look at a federal option. And there is the Future of Scotland initiative – an umbrella of various “civic Scotland” groupings like churches, charities and trades unions, who met last week looking at form devolution max .

Suddenly you can't move for commissions on fiscal devolution. It makes the unionist demands for an early referendum on independence look oddly premature. If there were an early ballot, what on earth would Scots be voting for? Independence is clear – sort of. Alex Salmond at least seems to know what he is talking about. But on the other side there is now a shifting kaleidoscope of constitutional formulas occupying the unionist space.

The unionists' priority of course is come up with a something, anything, to block the march of the SNP, following its election landslide victory in  May. Figures like Douglas Alexander, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, have been urging the Scottish Labour party up to understand the extent and significance of its defeat and start thinking constructively about more powers for Holyrood. But Lamont, who says she will be leading the No campaign with Alistair Darling and Gordon Brown in support, is still grudging about what she calls the “virility” test of more powers. She is even hinting about powers being taken away from the Scottish parliament – not so much devolution plus as devolution minus. Right now, bizarrely, the UK Labour party seems more radical on the constitution than its Scottish counterpart.

So, where does all this leave the state of the union? Do we have any clear idea where the status quo is going? Well, they haven't said it explicitly, but the parties are clearly heading very rapidly towards a consensus on devolution plus, if only because there really is nowhere else to go. The Scottish parliament, to satisfy voter opinion, simply has to have a new funding arrangement more radical than that offered in the current Scotland Bill. The idea of splitting income tax between Holyrood and Westminster, proposed by Calman in 2009, was always a difficult sell and it is now well past it. Devolution max is a bit too like independence, since it involves Scotland raising all taxes and sending a contribution south for common services like defence.

Devolution plus is the only credible unionist destination short of independence. It is the unionist Maginot Line – the line beyond which Alex Salmond shall not past. It is also almost certainly what the Scottish voters would vote for – if the unionist parties would only let them. Perversely, all three unionist leaders are still insisting that there should be no opportunity for Scots to have a say. But how else are the voters to have any confidence that this better devolution will actually happen? Unionists can't simply offer promises of what might be if the Scots are good boys and girls and reject nasty Mr Salmond. Everyone knows that if the referendum returns a No to independence in 2014, then the unionist parties' enthusiasm for more devolution would rapidly evaporate. If they refuse a second question or a second ballot, then the only alternative would be to move a new Scotland bill, replacing the one limping through the House of Lords. But come the referendum, if all the unionists offer is jam tomorrow, I wouldn't put it past the Scottish voters to back independence in order to be sure that they get a better devolution.

Pandagate. Those independence scare stories in full.

But they will never take...our pandas! I don't know where the Mirror got the story that, because they were gifts to the UK not Scotland, we would lose Sunshine and Sweetie if Scotland voted for independence. The paper cited government sources.   But apart from being straight wrong - the pandas were lent to Edinburgh Zoo, not the UK - it only drew attention to the First Minister's quip that there are more giant pandas in Scotland than there are Tory MPs.

Pandagate provided an element of light relief among the increasingly bizarre scare stories that radiated across the media since January. The defence secretary, Philip Hammond, warned that, after independence, Scotland would have to pay “billions” for the cost of relocating Trident. This wasn't quite in the same league as losing the pandas, but was equally daft. I don't recall the Ukraine being required to build bases in Russia for the nuclear weapons it returned in 1994. Scotland never asked for weapons of mass destruction in the first place. Anyway, there's a simple enough solution: Trident nuclear warheads are moved by road convoy every year from Coulport to Aldermaston near Reading. Maybe they could just make a one way trip in 2015. Scotland could pay for the diesel.

The UK government also turned its big guns onto Alex Salmond's proposals for an independent Scottish defence force of one naval base, one aircraft base and a mobile brigade. “You can't just break off bits of the army like a bar of chocolate” said Mr Hammond. Which is curious because that is exactly what the UK government has done under its defence review, which reduces Scotland's bases to, er, one naval base, one aircraft base and a mobile brigade. This is a childish dispute because, Trident aside, it would be senseless for England and Scotland not to co-operate on defence, since we occupy one small island.

But divorce is a costly business. “An independent Scotland would be saddled with a crippling national debt of at least £140bn!” cried the Daily Mail, again citing “government sources” Shock! Horror! But, wait: this figure is arrived at by giving Scotland a 10% share of the UK national debt which is estimated to rise to £1.4 trillion by 2014. So, if Scotland is in the red, England would be even redder – and Scotland at least has the oil. I'm not sure who I'd put my money on in this particular race to the poorhouse. The truth is, as far as debt is concerned we really are in it together.

Riding for a fall with the Murdoch hunt.

Why do they do it? Why do political leaders, even in Scotland, worship at the tawdry court of the Sun king Rupert Murdoch? What to they think they'll gain? Murdoch is the most toxic brand in British public life, his crude right wing publications a byword for bent news and illegal practices like phone hacking. Yet there he was, the “Dirty Digger” as Private Eye calls the boss of News International,  sneaking into Bute House by the back door on Wednesday for tete a tete with Alex Salmond. Even as the claims of a “network of police corruption” by the Sun,were still reverberating across the Leveson inquiry. And on the very day that James Murdoch resigned in disgrace from his post as chairman of NI. How many votes does Alex Salmond want to lose?

Of course the First Minister insists Murdoch was just there to talk about jobs over "tea and Tunnocks caramel wafers" as one of Scotland's leading employers. But if he thinks Scottish voters will believe that then he is out to lunch. Salmond also says that he made his views clear about Leveson and newspaper ethics. But this came rather hollow from a politician who had just leaked the date of the Scottish independence referendum - 18^th October – to give the super soaraway Sunday Sun a front page splash for its first edition. Is that really the kind of behaviour we expect from our First Minister?  That he sells his referendum for a sycophantic tweet from Rupert Murdoch? It's not even as if the Sunday Sun actually supported independence. It won't unless and until Murdoch becomes convinced that the referendum is a certainty. The Sun doesn't lead opinion - it follows it. Why don't politicians understand that.

The new Scottish Labour leader, Johann Lamont, made a spirited attempt to embarrass Salmond at First Minister's Question time. But it rebounded badly, not least because of Labour's own record of cosying up to Rupert. Salmond read out the guest list for Murdoch's summer champagne party, which included Ed Miliband and Ed Balls. He might also have reminded Lamont about that summer sleepover party that Gordon Brown's wife Sarah organised for Rebecca Brooks when she was editor of the Sun - at the Labour Prime Minister's official residence at Chequers. Wonder if she brought her gift horse from the Met?

Salmond launches "illegal" referendum campaign.

 As we waited in the Great Hall of Edinburgh Castle for the arrival of Moses, sorry, Robert Mugabe, sorry Alex Salmond, there was much chatter about Tuesday's now infamous Newsnight interview in which Jeremy Paxman compared Alex Salmond to Zimbabwean dictator and suggest that he wanted to set up a one party state in Scotland. The FM wisely refused invitations to criticise Paxo - since the interview has probably added a couple percent to the SNP's poll ratings. Instead he ticked off BBC Scotland for axing a lot of its political output, including the respected Newsweek Scotland programme.

This was as sure-footed a performance as we have come to expect from the First Minister on these occasions. I've lost count of the number of times I've heard Alex Salmond launch constitutional consultations, but this was Eck's Biggest Day Out ever. With the hall packed with international television hardware, and press from over forty countries, the political theatre couldn't have been more dramatic. As the winds howled around the Castle, Salmond confidently forecast victory in the 2014 independence referendum. Surrounded by massed weaponry of warfare in the frankly militaristic Great Hall, Salmond was right to assure the assembled international media, that Scottish nationalism - unlike say Quebec, Basque or Corsican separatism - has  always been a peaceful pursuit. There has “not been so much as a nosebleed” in the last hundred years of home rule agitation. Though I notice the FM didn't mention injury to letterboxes.

The biggest gag was The Question itself. “Do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country?” Is that it? No dodgy phrases, no weasel words, no devious circumlocutions. And no second or third questions either, unless civic Scotland gets its act together to formulate one. Here was Salmond doing precisely what he had been urged to do by the UK government and the opposition parties:  seek a straight answer to a straight question. No need to invoke the Canadian Clarity Act.    The UK Electoral Commission will have its say on the question, Salmlond confirmed, and would oversee the referendum, reporting to the Scottish parliament.

If David Cameron can support gay marriage - so can Alex Salmond.

      The campaign against the Scottish government's proposals to legislate for gay marriage reached critical mass last week - if you'll excuse the pun - with two senior members of the Scottish Roman Catholic hierarchy backing the former SNP leader, Gordon Wilson's call for a referendum on the issue.  Archbishop Mario Conti of Glasgow and Bishop Joseph Devine of Motherwell have condemned same sex marriage as an abomination. "Those in government need to be respectfully reminded", said Archbishop Conti, that a mandate to govern does not include a mandate to reconstruct society on ideological grounds, nor to undermine the very institution which, from the beginning, has been universally acknowledged as the natural order and bedrock of society, namely marriage and the family".  In other words: Alex, get your pink tanks off our lawn.  

    Archbishop Devine went even further: "We now have a straight fight between faith and atheism, morality and amorality, a culture of life and a culture of death,” he said last week. “The institution of marriage should not be corrupted by the transient fashions of society or by malevolent forces seeking to undermine the place of religious faith in society.”  This is turning into a Holyrood epic, with pointed hats firmly pointed at the SNP government. Alex is ducking for cover. 

   Now as an atheist, or rather a humanist, I have to object here that the gay marriage issue is not about undermining religious faith and undermining he natural order of society, whatever that is, still less an attack on religion.  Actually, if truth be told, the concept of same sex marriage is a triumph for the traditionalists and for people of faith.  It is an admission that there is something more to love than living together and that relationships need 

to be put on a firmer moral foundation. That moral foundation for - most people - still seems to be the essentially the Christian, to the extent that marriage is a Christian institution. 

 The fact that even gay people - the ultimate sexual outsiders- are now are seeking the sanction of marriage is surly the most obvious confirmation of that.  If there really is a straight fight going on, the Christians appear to have won.   That so many senior figures seem not 

to realise this is strange.

   Only twenty years ago, atheists, feminists and marxists condemned the "nuclear family" and marriage as a bourgeois institution that served to oppress women and block social progress.  Marriage was seen as inherently conservative, as a transmission belt for reactionary attitudes of nationalism and patriarchy.  Radical pyschiatrists like R.D. Laing - who has heard of him recently - railed against marriage as the  cause of mental illness and even extreme political movements.  In the sixties and seventies, people tried all sorts of alternatives to marriage - communes, 'open' relationships, serial adultery.   Marriage appears to have emerged from arguably the greatest challenge it has faced in its two thousand year history. 


    Gay marriage is now supported by the Quakers, the Episcopalian Church and unitarians.  The Church of Scotland has opened the door for gay marriage by accepting in principle the presence of openly gay and lesbian ministers.  It would surely be inconceivable for the Kirk to allow homosexuals to speak God's word from the pulpit and yet not allow them to marry each other.  Why is it that the Roman Catholic hierarchy seem to want to make this a political issue rather than a moral one?  

   I am treading into deep waters here and I don't have my arm bands on, so I'll leave it there.   The Church hierarchy is seeking to hijack the Scottish government's current consultation on the subject. And it has done pretty well so far, especially now that the former leader of the Scottish National Party, Gordon Wilson has come out in favour of a referendum on gay marriage.  He hopes it will be rejected.   I'm really not so sure: the only opinion poll I have seen on the issue suggests that 60% of Scots favour legalising gay marriage.   But judging from column inches, the Bishops are ahead on points. 

Independence - Is that it?

As Alex Salmond’s flagship referendum bill sank beneath the waves last week, there were precious few mourners at the quayside, even amongst the SNP. There were even fewer criers of ‘betrayal’ - though the godfather of fundamentalism, the former SNP deputy leader, Jim Fairlie, remarked that: "at the mention of the word 'independence', a shiver ran through the ranks of the SNP, frantically searching for a spine to run up."

    The opposition parties snorted about broken promises and nails in the coffin of  Alex Salmond’s credibility, but it was pretty routine stuff - as if the abandonment of the independence referendum bill was just another item on the list of lost manifesto commitments along with local income tax, the Scottish Futures Trust and abolishing student debt. But it is much more than that.  Only two years ago, at the height of the SNP honeymoon, people were seriously talking about the momentum towards Scottish independence becoming unstoppable.  August bodies like the Constitution Unit at UCL in London were holding conferences on the mechanics of separation -  one referendum or two? how to split the national debt? It was more or less assumed that an independence referendum would happen, somehow. Not any more  

There will be a referendum on independence - in 2012.

 The decision by the Scottish Liberal Democrat conference to boycott the Scottish Government’s forthcoming referendum bill might seem about as momentous as Stephen Fry abandoning Twitter because someone said he was boring.  (Oscar Wilde never had to put up with such indignity!)   So why are people saying that it has made a referendum almost inevitable?  And even that the campaign for the 2012 referendum on independence has already begun..  Let me explain. 

  The closed-door debate in Dunfermline last weekend was designed to get the LibDems out of the hole they dug themselves into after the Scottish elections in 2007, when Tavish Scott, the SLD leader refused even to discuss a coalition with Alex Salmond unless the SNP leader dropped his party’s policy of a referendum on the constitution - which of course he could not do.   This was an act of unpardonable folly by the Libdems since there was never going to be a referendum anyway. It was a matter of simple arithmetic.  The SNP had only 47 out of 129 MSPs, so as long as the unionist parties held firm, the referendum bill was never going to get to the statute book.

  Salmond couldn’t dump the formal commitment to a referendum without being accused of betrayal, but a referndum was the last thing the leadership actually wanted at that moment anyway.   The Nationalist game plan has always been to show that they could run a competent government at Holyrood before popping the question about leaving the UK.  However, they did initially want a coalition and they wanted to talk.   The SNP were even minded to make a raft of key concessions to the Liberal Democrats including a new Constitutional Convention and a promise that the referendum-that-wasn’t-going-to-happen would include the Liberal Democrat option of federalism.  But it was not to be.

   The Liberal Democrat opposition to the principle of an independence referendum never made much intellectual sense.  The UK party has been calling for a referendum on Europe,  a referendum on constitutional change in England and a referendum on electoral reform.   But under a veto thought to have come from the UK party leader Sir Menzies Campbell, Tavish and his troops were not allowed even to go into the negotiating chamber unless the SNP ruled out its defining policy.    So, the Scottish Liberal Democrats were left out of office and out of power after eight years. They had turned down the opportunity to introduce their local income tax,  and to put their stamp on a whole range of issues of policies in their 2007 election manifesto from the climate change bill to the abolition of bridge tolls.  

  Meanwhile, Alex Salmond, with opportunistic genius, realised that he could make a virtue out of necessity and run a minority government. The rest is history.  The SNP minority administration was spectacularly successful, while the Scottish Liberal Democrats have been left wandering in the wilderness with the other lost tribe of Scottish politics, the Conservatives.  Losing office is like bereavement for some politicians, and the Scottish Liberal Democrats have been in mourning ever since.  The conference at the weekend was an attempt to lay the past to rest and find away back to the land of the living.  The leadership has signalled that, while they rule out a referendum before the 2011 Scottish elections, all bets are off after that. They will not require the SNP to drop its flagship policy before they sit down and talk after the  next Scottish election in 2011 - that’s if the SNP win, of course. 

    However, the Nationalists have done very well under minority, and might be a lot less keen on coalition-making than they were in 2007.   Which means that the terms for any 2011 coalition might be stiff.  The Liberal Democrats will have to agree actively to support a bill for a referendum, which means Alex Salmond will almost certainly get his ballot.  But does he really want one?  The great mystery of Scottish politics is why the SNP are so determined to hold a referendum on independence that they will almost certainly lose.  

  One of the constants of Scottish political opinion over the last quarter century is that, in opinion polls, only around a quarter to a third of Scots actually want to leave the United Kingdom.  The vast majority want ‘devolution max’ - a Scottish parliament, with more powers, within the UK.   In a three question referendum, there seems almost inconceivable that independence would prevail.  Just think: if you are offered, the status quo, a leap in the dark, or a better Holyrood, which would you choose?  

   So, why does Alex Salmond want a referendum that would rule out independence for a generation (he has said there would no recurrent ‘neverendum’). Some cynics say that the SNP doesn’t want independence any more and is quite happy getting rave reviews for running the devolved Scottish parliament.  This is plausible. But  in my many discussions over the years with SNP leaders I have never once had any of them nudge me in the ribs and say: “forget independence, we like this fine”.  Alex Salmond genuinely seems to want a referendum, even if it means that independence is off the agenda as a result. 

   I suppose the way to look at this is that a referendum is a game the SNP cannot lose.  If they win, fine - negotiations begin with Whitehall about leaving the UK.  But if they don’t win, the chances are that they will still be in a parliament which  acquires tax raising powers.  So long as the SNP keep winning elections to the Scottish parliament, and it looks as if they will win next time, the nationalist project is being fulfilled.  Scots are being given confidence in their ability to run their own affairs, and the UK is getting used to thinking of Scotland as a separate country.  Independence is a long game- they’ve waited three hundred years, so what’s another generation or two.  

   The task for Labour will be to prevent them remaining in charge of the Scottish parliament, which is why, Labour will become very much more nationalistic after the next general election - assuming they lose office in Westminster - and might themselves decide to opt for a referendum on their own terms to pre-empt the Nats.    With the SLD moving in that direction also, you can begin to see why this weekend’s non-event in Dunfermline may have altered the course of Scottish history. 

SNP 'turkeys voting for an early bath' in TV debate storm.

   It's the great unmentionable that everyone’s talking about.  The Scottish National Party’s desperate bid to get a platform on the English premier league. The Scottish squad has made repeated attempts to get equal treatment with the English teams during the BBC coverage of next year’s finals. They’re hoping that their midfield miracle worker, Alex Salmond, will show that he really can play hard ball with the big boys.  

 But the reaction from the English premier league has been negative. “They’re just turkeys voting for an early bath, quite frankly", said one top English TV supremo: “We don’t want any jumped up Jocks coming on our TV and alternately boring the pants off the viewers and then frightening the life out of them with their sectarian chants and parochial obsessions. ”  There is concern that English viewers might not understand what Salmond says and could switch off in droves.  Said one English fan: “It’s a diabolical liberty.  We thought we’d got shot of the Scots, and here they are demanding to be back on our television screens”. 

  The other Scottish teams are similarly contemptuous of the move.  “The SNP have just shot themselves in both left feet” said the Labour United supremo Iain Gray.  “Salmond’s obsession with playing in England is undermining the rest of the Scottish division and will put off potential sponsors. They should be supporting the Scottish game, not trying to get their faces on English TV sets.  They’re falling between two stools with their tails between their legs. ”.

    Blues boss Annabel  Goldie predicted that Scottish fans would desert them.   “It’s time they got the ball in the net in Scotland instead of crying foul every ten minutes. Alex Salmond will be sick as a parrot when he sees how this plays with the home support. The SNP would be playing in a different league all right: it’s relegation time for the nationalist club. ”

  But the old firm is adamant that its future lies in getting a piece of the UK action.   The club is contemplating taking legal action against the BBC if it tries to lock the SNP out of future live action coverage. “At the end of the day, we’re itching to get our kit on and show what we’re made of against the top English firms”, said an SNP insider. “We need to get access to the UK media where the real money is.  That’s the carrot at the end of the tunnel .    Top commentator Lonnie Donnegan said: “It may seem a no brainer for the nationalists.   But if they can’t stand the heat they really should stay out of the ring” ”.  

Alex Salmond will "hang Westminster from a Scottish rope"

SORRY, FOR SOME REASON THE SEVEN COMMENTS ON THIS PAGE GOT LOST IN EDITING. DIDN'T DELETE THEM.


  When it comes to attention-seeking, no one does it better than Alex Salmond.  The SNP leader’s pre-conference interview with the Tory-leaning Daily Telegraph at the weekend was a classic of its kind .  “There’s a vast overwhelming majority of people in Scotland”, said the First Minister,  “who rather like the idea of a Westminster parliament hung by a Scottish rope.”  Leave aside whether this “vast majority” of Scots has given a second’s thought to what might happen if the Conservatives fail to win an outright majority at the next general election, I’m really not sure that Scots actually want to dangle Westminster on a rope.

  But the intention is to provoke and provoke it does. Talk like that gets many English Tory MPs puce with rage - believe me, I’ve seen it and had to dodge the foam-flecked rebuttals. Given half a chance they’d be swinging the rope over the nearest Westminster lamppost and hanging Alex Salmond from it.  Conservative backbenchers talk about Salmond as if he were a wily, streetwise leader of a post colonial national liberation movement - a devilish cunning demagogue who is not to be trusted as far as he can be thrown, and given Alex’s fondness for pies, that’s not far. 

   This presumably is what Salmond wants.   It’s not the first time the SNP leader has tweaked English noses.  Earlier this year, he promised that he would make Westminster “dance to a Scottish jig” after the general election by holding the balance of power in the House of Commons.  In fact, it would be the Liberal Democrats who would almost certainly be doing the jigging, since they’ll be the likely king makers.  But Alex isn’t bothered about the arithmetic - just  the reaction.  Similarly, the threat of legal action if the BBC televises a UK party leader’s debate without Alex’s participation is another way of reminding an anglo-centric media that there is another party in Scotland.  

  Now, you might ask whether it is fitting for a national leader, the First Minister of Scotland, to be thumbing his nose quite so rudely at the mother of parliaments.  Isn’t the SNP line supposed to be that,  as their answer to the West Lothian Questions, they withdraw from Commons votes on legislation that affects only England?  If so, shouldn’t they be standing aside from any coalition king-making that determines the government of England?  And, anyway, is it wise to appear so cocksure confident of winning 25 seats, when most commentators think the SNP will be lucky to win half that?  Is Alex heading for a fall? 

   Well, you accuse Salmond of over-ambition at your peril - look what happened in 2007.  Moreover, his cheek  has a  purpose. The SNP leader’s calculation is that if and when there is a Conservative government in Westminster, the Scottish political game changes over night.  Scottish politics will become a contest between Labour and the SNP over who can best defend Scotland against Tory cuts.  Labour will have a couple of hundred MPs;, the SNP will have say 20 at the  most, but numbers aren't everything.  The SNP won power in the Scottish parliament, not because the Scottish voters want independence - though some do - but because they saw the SNP as best bet for fighting Scotland’s corner against London.  Scotland’s traditional party, Labour, seemed to have lost its voice. With a Cameron government, Scottish Labour will regain it very rapidly, and will be leading the public sector unions in their campaign against job losses.  You can already see the posters : that picture of Cameron and the Bullingdon Berties, with the caption “All in it together? Vote Labour”.  

   With a Tory government pushing through radical spending cuts, it is imperative that the SNP first of all presents these as Tory cuts imposed on Scotland from London - otherwise, as the Scottish government, they’ll get the blame for all those care homes closing and teachers not getting jobs.  Secondly, that they show they're best able to promoting Scotland’s interests, and won’t just be innocent bystanders as George Osborne wields the axe. 

  Labour will say that this is their historic mission, and that you can’t trust the nationalists. Yesterday, the Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy,  launched Labour’s “Vote SNP, Get Tory” campaign, claiming that the SNP can do nothing other than make life easier for the Tories in office. Just look at what they’ve been doing in Scotland, Labour will say.  The SNP have been the “Tories little helpers” pushing through cuts because, like the Tories, they like it.   The Scottish Tories, says Murphy, are “Thatcher’s grandchildren” and the nats are their tartan Tory playmates.  

   So, after the election we will have not one but two anti-Tory parties vying to take on London. Not surprisingly, this is making some UK Tories begin to wonder if a constitutional confrontation might not be the wild card in the first term of a Cameron government.  Alex Salmond is itching for a fight, and there are a lot of English Conservatives who would dearly like to give him one.  Cameron has already conceded that he might have a “shortage of mandate” in Scotland, and that it might be difficult to push through an austerity budget.   For this reason, Tories grouped around the website ConservativeHome want Cameron to call an early referendum to marginalise the SNP, and demonstrate that most Scots want to stay in the union.  (I note that Tories like Annabel Goldie now say they oppose “Alex Salmond’s referendum” and haven’t actually ruled out a Cameron one}. The Liberal Democrats are coming round to a referendum, and the intriguing question is whether Labour might also decide that the way to shoot the nationalist fox is to hold the referendum Alex so desperately wants.  After all, Wendy wanted one. 

   Now, Cameron and Brown insist they’ll “do nothing that damages the Union” but I can’t help thinking that there is a lot in it for all the unionist parties now to call Salmond’s bluff, turn the tables and show that Scotland isn’t dancing to the nationalist jig, if you’ll excuse the mixed metaphor.  Show him that in politics as in life, the only thing that’s worse than not getting what you want, is getting it. That’s if the unionist parties have the bottle. 

    

Will Scotland rise up against 'English' Tory rule?

On the night of the 1992 general election a prominent journalist I know laid in nine bottles of champagne - one for each of the nine Scottish Conservative MPs - to be opened in celebration as each lost their seat.  As the night wore on, the bottles remained unopened and the party went decidedly flat.  To everyone’s shock and dismay, the Tories not only won the 1992 general election, they actually gained two seats in Scotland.  It was the last time the Tories won an election - until now. 

  The 1992 result led to a largely spontaneous out pouring of anti-Conservative feeling on the streets of Scotland.  The return of Tory rule, following Margaret Thathcer, two devastating recessions and the poll tax, was a profound shock to social democratic Scotland. The celebrated trades union leader, Bill Spiers, who died recently at the early age of 57, led the formation of the Scottish anti-Conservative front “Scotland United” along with Labour MPs like George Galloway and John McAllion prominent cultural Scots like Pat Kane of Hue and Cry and Ricky Ross of Deacon Blue.  Even SNP politicians, like Mike Russell, who had boycotted the cross party Scottish Constitutional Convention only four years previously, joined Scotland United demonstrations which culminated in a 25,000 strong rally in Edinburgh at the European summit in December 1992. 

  So, could history repeat itself?  In a matter of months, Scotland could, if the opinion polls are accurate, wake up to find itself back under Conservative rule from Westminster for the first time in thirteen years, and with an increased number of Scottish Conservative MPs.  Will it be 1992 all over again?  Could the shock of Tory rule be the spark that re-ignites the constitutional debate in Scotland and prepares the ground for another referendum, this time on independence?  Will Pat Kane come out of semi-retirement and form “Scotland Re-United “on a bill with a Deacon Blue tribute band? 

   Probably not.  Things are very different today, and popular music has moved on. We also have a Scottish parliament with wide ranging powers over domestic affairs, which the Conservatives no longer oppose.   But what we are likely to witness if David Cameron wins in May 2010 is the original “nightmare scenario” envisaged thirty years ago by critics of devolution like the Labour MP Tam Dalyell, author of the West Lothian Question, who argued that  devolution was “ a motorway to independence with no U turns and no exits”.  It was precisely this combination  of a Nationalist government in Edinburgh and a Conservative one in London which opponents  of home rule believed would ultimately tear the union apart.  More recently, the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, Vince Cable, has echoed this warning telling the Libdem conference last month that that he expects “conflict and possible secession” after a Tory victory.  Could David Cameron become the last prime minister of the United Kingdom as we know it?

   Certainly, a Tory government in Westminster is an important element in Alex Salmond’s game plan for winning independence.  David Cameron isn’t Margaret Thatcher, and  he has effectively apologised  for the impact of her economic policies on Scotland. He has promised to rule Scotland “with respect”.  But he is also committed to very deep cuts in public spending.  Since a disproportionate number of Scots are employed by the public sector, the proposed cuts of 10% in departmental budgets - on top of the SNP government’s own 2% efficiency savings - could  lead to tens of thousands of lost Scottish jobs.  The SNP will present this as another London-inspired economic holocaust equivalent to the Thatcherite industrial recessions of the 1980s.  Only this time The Proclaimers will be singing: “Schools no more, nurses no more, care homes no more...”  

    The nationalists hope that a Scottish reaction against the Cameron Tories in Westminster will secure them victory in the 2011 Scottish elections, and make the case for a referendum unanswerable.  Has not Lord Forsyth, the former Tory Scottish Secretary,  himself called for a referendum on independence?  Have the Cameron Conservatives not promised a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty on the EU constitution.  How then, say the SNP, can could an incoming Tory government refuse a referendum on independence  after two SNP election victories in Scotland?   Journalists north and south of the border are already honing their superlatives in anticipation.  It could be a great story: the final unravelling of the United Kingdom constitution after three hundred years, destroyed by a collision between the unstoppable force of English conservatism and with the immovable object of Scottish Nationalism.  

   It’s a plausible enough scenario, but it is all perhaps just a little too neat. History doesn’t repeat itself as literally as that. Indeed, the danger for the nationalists, and for Scottish Labour as they brace themselves for the new Tory age,  is that they end up fighting the battles of the past, and fail to appreciate that Scotland has changed in the last twenty years.  For many Scots, Thatcher and her poll tax are now ancient history.  Scotland is a different country, and in many ways a small-c conservative one - at least in that it is now predominantly middle class, home owning and apparently rather conventional in its attitudes to things like multiculturalism and gay right. Curiously, the Scottish Tories have singularly failed to capitalise on this to any significant extent, and have actually been losing ground in recent polls on Scottish voting intentions. There has been no Cameron bounce - which is why the Scottish Sun did not join it’s UK parent last week in throwing its support behind the Tories. 

    Yet, the Tories remain the only party in Scotland to have won a majority of votes and a majority of seats in a general election - that was in 1955, when people still talked of Glasgow as the Second City of the British Empire.  Protestant Unionism was a powerful force in post-war Scotland, and even as late as 1979, when Margaret Thatcher was elected, the Conservatives had 22 Scottish MPs and dominated politics in both Glasgow and Labour councils.   It was of course “That Bloody Woman”, as she was called on the doorsteps in the 1987 general election, and her poll tax, which drove the final nails into the coffin of Scottish Conservatism.  The two great industrial recessions in the 1980s, from which communities in West Central Scotland have yet to recover, plus the hugely unpopular community charge, have been seared onto Scottish political folk memory.  “Tory” became a four letter word and many dismissed them as

“the English Party”, for their opposition to devolution.   The Conservatives gained two seats in 1992, against the trend, but  they were wiped out in the 1997 general election - as the “Scotland United” generation wreaked its vengeance.  There remains only one Tory MP in Scotland, and if it hadn’t been for the Scottish Parliament and PR, they might have disappeared altogether. . 

    The Conservatives still live under the shadow of the 1980s, which remains an obstacle to their electoral recovery. .   But while middle Scotland remains largely immune to the appeal of Conservatism, that doesn’t mean that Scots are going to take instantly to the streets in outrage at David Cameron entering Number Ten, though they may look to the Scottish parliament to define Scottish values more accurately and defend Scottish public services. The passion isn’t there any more.  The great achievement of the Scottish parliament over the last decade has been to defuse the Scottish grievance culture. We no longer automatically blame London for everything that goes wrong, and recent polls suggest many Scots actually support cuts in public spending. 

   The “Scotland Reunited scenario also assumes that David Cameron will follow the neo-thatcherite script, which is not certain by any means. The Tory leader does not want to go down in history as prime minister who presided over the break up of Britain.  He will do everything in his power to avoid an early confrontation with the Scottish government, and it is not inconceivable that Cameron might even accept a referendum on independence - though only if he is reasonably confident of winning it. He has been careful not to rule it out.  Tory commentators, like Fraser Nelson of the Spectator, say  a referendum would be a way of rebutting the claim that the Tories have “no mandate to rule” in Scotland by reaffirming support for the Union. 

    But with or without a referendum on independence, Cameron’s best bet for saving the union would be to adapt it to changed circumstances.  Had there been any sign of an imminent Tory revival in Scotland, he might have been able to tough out the inevitable confrontation with the nationalists.  But the signal failure of the Scottish Conservatives to thrive electorally  - their best hope for the general election is five or six seats - rules this out.   It would look too much like an ‘English’ party imposing a diktat over Scotland.  A better option would be to seek a deal with Alex Salmond - a historic compromise between Nationalism and Unionism.  That may seem outlandish, but remember, Alex Salmond is only in Bute House because the Scottish Tories were prepared to back him as First Minister after the 2007.

  After the 2007 Scottish election, the Tories struck a ‘devil’s bargain’ with the SNP, supporting Salmond in power in exchange for influence.  Annabel Goldie, the Scottish Tory leader, claimed a series of policy concessions, including more police on the beat and a cut in business rates.  On the whole it has worked; it gave the them something to talk about, and the Scottish Tories no longer face electoral oblivion.   A new deal on the UK might similarly give the Conservative government in Westminster a ‘stake’ in Scottish politics and lay the basis for recovery. All David Cameron needs to do is adopt some of the recommendations of the Calman Commission, which the Scottish Conservatives endorsed, and give the Scottish parliament greater tax raising powers. This could kill two birds with one stone:  diverting attention from the ongoing spending cuts while scrapping the Barnett Formula, which many English Tory MPs believe gives Scotland an unfair advantage in public spending.  

   There is nothing that says the Union would end just because Scotland raised its own taxes. For their part, the SNP might well be in the mood for a compromise, especially since support for independence shows little sign of increasing following the recession which showed the Scottish economy to be dangerously exposed to banking crises. The SNP has recently been talking increasingly in terms of a new “Social Union”,  new relationship in which Scotland retains the Queen as head of state, shares the network of UK embassies abroad, retains the pound as the Scottish currency, and upholds the values of common UK institutions like the integrated National Health Service.

     It could be argued that the SNP has given up on independence, in the old secessionist sense.  Perhaps one day we might even see Alex Salmond and David Cameron meeting at Buckingham Palace to unveil to the Queen their blueprint for a new improved federal United Kingdom.  Now that really would be a culture shock.