Big push on last day before Scottish independence vote Live No campaigners proud of 'patriotic vision', says Gordon Brown in Glasgow speech Scottish independence referendum live Spain warns on EU membership Scottish referendum campaigns make final pitches IDS: 'stay in union to stop jobless doubling' Police: no campaign exaggerating aggression Datablog: a no win is likely, but not certain
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No campaigners proud of 'patriotic vision', says Gordon Brown in Glasgow speech
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“My colleague George Arnett has
summarised the referendum in nine key numbers. Click here to read it in
full, but here are the nine points in brief:…”
Scottish independence referendum live
Yes Supporters gather on Buchanan Street during the final day of campaigning for the scottish referendum in Glasgow.Photograph: Mark Runnacles/Getty Images
My colleague George Arnett has summarised the referendum in nine key numbers. Click here to read it in full, but here are the nine points in brief:
307 years - how long the union has been in existence
703 days - how long the referendum campaign has been up and running
4,285,323 - the number of registered voters
£1,033,475 - how much more money Better Together has received in major campaign donations than Yes Scotland over the past year
79% - the probability of a No vote based on gambling patterns, according to Betfair
95,600 - the number of Twitter followers of Yes Scotland
275,000 Facebook interactions a day
357767 317879 - the grid reference of the new centre of the UK if Scotland leaves
6am - the estimated time of the last result to be called in the referendum
Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, has suggested Scotland should stay in the union to help stop its unemployment rate doubling to the level of Ireland, reports Rowena Mason.
This tweet, claiming that the Scottish Telegraph’s editor Alan
Cochrane is on a £20,000 bonus should the referendum be a decisive no,
caught our eye. PO
We asked our Scotland correspondent Severin Carrell to find out
whether this was true or not and this is the reply he got when he
approached Cochrane:
I would love a bonus but I know nothing of any bonus plans which I’m
accused of in Private Eye. If there was a bonus going, I’m waiting with
open hands.
And if there are any bonuses going, all my lot would get one. I will put in a word for you too.
Updated
Nicholas Watt asks:
Did Gordon Brown intend to quote Lady Macbeth when he warned a Yes vote is irreversible: 'once it's done it's done' @UK_Together#indyref
— Nicholas Watt (@nicholaswatt) September 17, 2014
Alex Salmond kisses flower seller Katrina Paterson in the East Kilbride shopping centre.Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty ImagesEddie Izzard addresses a pro-union rally in Glasgow.Photograph: Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images
Lunchtime summary
Gordon Brown, the Labour former prime minister, has said
SNP policies could send an independent Scotland down “an economic
trapdoor ... from which we might never escape”. In a speech which galvanised supporters (see here and here and here), he said:
Let us tell those people who have still got doubts and are wavering,
who are thinking of voting yes yesterday but could be persuaded today,
let us tell them about the real risks. This is not the fear of the
unknown. This is now the risks of the known. An economic minefield where
problems could implode at any time. An economic trapdoor down which we
go, from which we might never escape.
Real risk 1: the uncertainty about the currency unaddressed by the
SNP. Real risk 2: default from debt that they threaten, unaddressed by
the SNP. Real risk 3: having to build £30bn of reserves, at the cost of
the NHS and the welfare state, unaddressed by the SNP. Real risk 4:
prices rising in the shops, unaddressed by the SNP. Real risk 5:
interest rates and mortgage rates going up, unaddressed by the SNP. Real
risk 6: a million jobs, dependent on our trade and our membership of
the UK, shipbuilding, finances, all the problems unaddressed by the SNP.
And real risk 7: a massive financial hole that cannot be made up,
even a fraction of it, even by oil revenues, a massive financial hole
that means the risk to the National Health Service does not come from
us, it comes from the policies of the Scottish National Party.
Dennis Canavan, chairman of the Yes Scotland campaign, has
told a yes rally that Scots should not be fooled by the offer of more
powers for Scotland from the unionist parties. At a rally in Glasgow he said:
A vow - it looks like something written on the back of a fag packet
at the fag end of a long campaign. But the people of Scotland will not
be fooled.
There is only one guarantee of getting more powers for the Scottish
Parliament and that is by voting Yes, so let’s take that message out,
let’s take our message out to every street, every city, every town,
every village. every community, every workplace, every home in Scotland.
He was joined by Patrick Harvie, co-convenor of the Scottish Greens, who said:
We are on the verge of victory because we have reconnected so many
people to the political process, people who have been justifiably angry
at a broken political system.
And actress and comedienne Elaine C Smith told the rally:
What it takes to change the world is a pencil and a piece of paper
on a ballot, and putting your cross on Yes can change the world ... To
quote Oscar Wilde, I would like to say at this point, I don’t want to
live in a world where Utopia isn’t on the map. Even if we never reach
it, let us lift anchor and set sail.
Sir Tom Hunter, one of Scotland’s leading entrepreneurs,
has told the Guardian that Scotland would not have financial
independence under a currency union. He would not reveal how he
would vote, but he was strongly critical of a currency union, the SNP’s
preferred option. He told my colleague Severin Carrell:
[Under a currency union] our interest rate policy will be set by a
foreign country’s bank and indeed our spending in global terms will be
dictated by a foreign bank.
Now, I don’t think that is the independence that the yes side have
been striving for, and I don’t think that has really been spelt out to
people who say we want to be independent, we want to be separate. That
is me is less flexible that the fiscal autonomy that we have today.
It just seems to me to be less flexible in what we can do just now
using sterling. And we do have quite a lot of autonomy, and now promised
more autonomy.
While Gordon Brown was giving his well-received speech at the Better
Together rally in Glasgow, yes campaigners were in buoyant mood as
famous names gathered with grassroots activists outside the same city’s
concert hall to mark the final push before the country goes to the polls
tomorrow, reports Libby Brooks.
Actors Martin Compston and Elaine C Smith were joined by the Yes
Scotland executive and members of groups including Women for
Independence, English Scots for Yes and Firefighters for Yes.
The area around Donald Dewar’s statue at the top of Buchanan Street,
as well as nearby George Square, has become an unofficial gathering
point for yes activists over the past week, with flashmobs singing
Caledonia and even an impromptu early evening ceilidh. It’s the
indyref’s Tahrir Square, if that comparison isn’t too loaded.
With balloons, chants of “yes we can” and “hope not fear” the
atmosphere was cheerful but not quite as overwhelmingly optimistic as
recent yes gatherings I’ve been to, perhaps as the knowledge sinks in
that the polls are still showing an agonisingly close win for no.
Smith explained what the yes campaign had to do to get over the line
tomorrow, echoing Barack Obama’s mould-breaking presidential campaign of
2008.
I think it is about people, particularly women, weighing up the
arguments. We’re really good at that ... In essence it is about hope ...
Yes offers hope and change, and people want to have something in life
to vote for.
Compston talked about the George Square gatherings; he organised one
for yes activists via social media himself yesterday evening.
Jeane Freeman of Women for Independence told Libby:
We need to get every single vote out, in particular all those folk
who have registered for the first time. Our slogan is ‘take another
woman with you’ and keep on talking about the benefits of a yes vote for
women, including equality enshrined in a written constitution, free
child are, equal pay legislation with teeth.
I think most people have made up their minds, but for those who
haven’t it’s really about keeping a strong presence on the streets and
being there to answer any last minute questions.
Stephen Paton.Photograph: Libby Brooks/Guardian
Below is Big Sandy, a regular at yes events - real name John Ainslie of Scottish CND. He said:
The costume get a good reaction. Everybody smiles. It’s a way of
starting the conversation. A yes vote is a chance to get nuclear weapons
out of Scotland and possibly the UK.
Former Italian prime minister says yes vote could lead to decline of EU
The ‘yes’ in Scotland will help those who want, in the referendum of 2017, to take the UK out.
The UK is one of the pillars of the single market, of big
international trade agreements and is so important in Europe that the
consequence will be maybe the start of the true decline of the European
Union.
The sequence, the consequences of tomorrow’s referendum, could be very, very dangerous.
Here’s my colleague Nicholas Watt’s view on the Gordon Brown speech:
Gordon Brown gave a vintage performance at the last Better Together
rally of the referendum campaign that will bring back memories of the
days when he dominated the UK political stage as one of the main
architects of New Labour.
Speaking without notes, the former prime minister combined a
passionate appeal to Scottish voters, as he said he would vote no for
the sake of his children, with a classic Brown economic demolition job
of his opponents.
The rally, held in the Maryhill area of Glasgow, was designed to
provide positive images for television after the Better Together
campaign was criticised for being relentlessly negative. A piper led the
main pro-UK party leaders onto the stage at a community hall where the
comedian Eddie Izzard compered proceedings. Members of the audience
waved banners saying: “Love Scotland Vote No.”
The former prime minister warned that Alex Salmond had laid an
“economic trapdoor” from which the people of Scotland would never escape
if they voted yes. He then listed seven “real risks” which included
uncertainty over the currency, the need for an independent Scotland to
build up £30bn in reserves, if it uses sterling outside a formal
currency union, and the danger to one million jobs linked to Scotland’s
membership of the UK.
The speech highlighted the main theme Brown has been campaigning on
for months and which formed the basis of his recent book - to set the
referendum debate in terms of what is best for Scotland rather than
debating the future of the UK. But the former prime minister has, until
recent weeks, campaigned just at Labour party events.
Brown has finally become the start turn for the cross-party Better
Together. It is quite late in the day, though the no side are confident
they will nudge victory.
Another Tory MP has expressed his opposition to the Barnett formula -
the arrangement guaranteeing the Scottish government a certain amount
of money that the leaders of all three main UK parties promised to
maintain yesterday. This is from Philip Davies, MP for Shipley.
For the record, I will
not be voting to maintain an unfair funding settlement for Scotland
whatever Messrs Cameron, Miliband and Clegg say
— Philip Davies (@PhilipDaviesMP) September 16, 2014
In the event of a No
vote, I will be doing all I can to stop MPs from Scotland voting on
issues in Parliament which don't relate to Scotland
— Philip Davies (@PhilipDaviesMP) September 16, 2014
Crowds shout during a pro Scottish independence campaign rally in central Glasgow.Photograph: David Cheskin/AP
Gordon Brown's speech - Verdict from Twitter
Anyone who covered British politics in the late 1980s and the 1990s
knows that Gordon Brown can deliver a great speech. It was a skill less
apparent during his premiership, but in some ways the Scottish
independence campaign has revived his career and this speech was vintage
Brown, combining passion, certainty, Biblical rhetoric and a
hammer-blow assault on his opponents.
Actually, it was much the same speech he has been giving on the stump
for a week or more. But only in the 24 hours has he been getting a wide
television audience for it and, as you can see from some of the Twitter
reaction, it is going down very well.
Interestingly, even some Tories and Liberal Democrats are acknowledging the power of Brown’s oratory.
Here are some of the most interesting tweets I’ve seen from
commentators and political figures. I’m sure there is some negative
comment on Twitter, but I have not seen any yet from journalists or
prominent Yes Scotland campaigners. AS
From Mehdi Hasan, quoting Sky’s Adam Boulton
"That was a fine piece of political rhetoric and one of the best speeches I've heard [Brown] deliver" - @adamboultonSKY
— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) September 17, 2014
From Jackson Carlaw, a Scottish Tory MP
For the first time in my life Gordon Brown spoke for me in a powerful, passionate and compelling testament for the Union #nothanks#indyref
— Jackson Carlaw MSP (@JacksonMSP) September 17, 2014
From the Daily Mirror’s Kevin Maguire
Gordon Brown making Alex Salmond look B League. On fire at Love Scotland Vote No rally in Glasgow
— Kevin Maguire (@Kevin_Maguire) September 17, 2014
Brown might still be PM if he showed this passion when PM. Gordie goes to Holyrood as First Minister?
— Kevin Maguire (@Kevin_Maguire) September 17, 2014
From Piers Morgan
The new Braveheart > Gordon Brown.
— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) September 17, 2014
From the Independent on Sunday’s Jane Merrick
Gordon Brown re-writing his political (and actual) obituary with the speech of his life right now
— Jane Merrick (@janemerrick23) September 17, 2014
That felt a bit like @Mo_Farah overtaking everyone down the final straight. Let's see
— Jane Merrick (@janemerrick23) September 17, 2014
From Eddie Barnes, a Scottish Tory
Watch Gordon Brown now. An extraordinary speech in the making #indyref
— Eddie Barnes (@EddieBarnes23) September 17, 2014
From the Mail’s Matt Chorley
Quite astonishingly good speech from Gordon Brown. "If you don't know, vote no." Totally different man to when PM #indyref
— Matt Chorley (@MattChorley) September 17, 2014
From the Telegraph’s Stephen Bush
Reminded of Brown's Citizens UK barnstormer. Something funny happens to that guy at the eleventh hour.
— Stephen Bush (@stephenkb) September 17, 2014
From the Sunday Mirror’s Vincent Moss
Mildly bemused at number
of right wing hacks & commentators who have suddenly realised
Gordon Brown can deliver a decent speech #indyref
— Vincent Moss (@vincentmoss) September 17, 2014
From Wes Streeting, a Labour councillor in London
Gordon Brown currently
exemplifying everything that's been missing from politics: principle,
conviction, authenticity and gravitas.
— Wes Streeting (@wesstreeting) September 17, 2014
From the New Statesman’s Helen Lewis
Intrigued to see what
this Gordon Brown revival means for GE2015. Surely now harder for Tories
to land their "he ruined everything" line?
— Helen Lewis (@helenlewis) September 17, 2014
From Caron Lindsay, co-editor of Lib Dem Voice
Really good rally. Am
certain that power & passion of Gordon Brown's speech will come over
well on tv. Clare Lally was brilliant. #indyref
— Caron Lindsay (@caronmlindsay) September 17, 2014
From the Scottish Daily Mail’s Alan Roden
Gordon Brown in the best speech of the entire #indyref campaign: "Have confidence. Stand up and be counted tomorrow."
— Alan Roden (@AlanRoden) September 17, 2014
Updated
Here’s an extract from Gordon Brown’s speech - on the risks
independence would pose, and the “massive financial hole” he says their
policies could leave in Scotland’s accounts.
Gordon Brown speaks at a ‘No’ campaign rally in Glasgow.Photograph: Dylan Martinez/Reuters
Gordon Brown's speech at the Better Together rally
Gordon Brown is speaking at the Better Together rally.
The silent majority will be silent no more, he says.
He says his “patriotic vision” is up against a nationalist vision
with only one aim in mind: to break every link with our friends and
neighbours in England.
Scotland is a nation, he says. And it has a parliament. And everyone is agreed it should have more powers.
He says soldiers from the UK fought together. They build the peace
together, the NHS together, the welfare state together, and they will
build the future together.
Let no narrow nationalism split us asunder, he says.
(Brown’s father was a Church of Scotland minister. At times, like now, his rhetoric has a Biblical flavour.)
Scotland does not belong to the SNP, to any politicians, to him, to Alex Salmond or to John Swinney. It belongs to all of use.
The risks of independence are not unknown, he says. They are known.
They are: the future of the currency; the risk of a default; the need to
build up reserves; the risk of prices rising; the risk of interest
rates rising; the risk of jobs being lost; and the risk of a “massive
financial hole” in Scotland’s accounts, caused by oil revenues running
short.
That is what would put the NHS at risk, he says.
What is our demand? Not a separate state, but social justice, he says.
What message would Scotland send out to the world if we, who have
build a partnership, said tomorrow we are going to give up on sharing?
This is not the Scotland I recognise, he says.
Brown says tomorrow he will cast a vote, not for himself, but for his
children. The SNP say the decision is irreversible. But this is a
decision for all-time.
So you have to vote and take account of the needs of children, he says.
And, if you have any doubts, then the answer has to be no.
If you have doubts about the case for separation, hold your head
high, have confidence and say, for reasons of solidarity, sharing,
justice and pride in Scotland, the only answer is vote no. AS
Cameron reaffirms his intention not to resign in event of yes vote
David Cameron, the prime minister, has reaffirmed
his intention not to resign if there is a yes vote. This is what he said
this morning at an event in Hampshire.
My name is not on the ballot paper. What’s on the ballot paper is
‘does Scotland want to stay in the United Kingdom, or does Scotland want
to separate itself from the United Kingdom?’. That’s the only question
that will be decided on Thursday night. The question about my future
will be decided at the British general election coming soon.
Cameron has to say this. If he were to confirm that a yes vote would
lead to his resignation, that would probably give the Scots an added
incentive to vote for independence (given the relative unpopularity of
the Conservatives in Scotland).
But is he right? It is hard to tell, really, because the matter could
be out of his hands. Cameron has already said that, if there is a yes
vote, he would do his best to make independence work. But some Tory MPs
believe that his position as party leader would be untenable, and there
is a strong chance that some of them would seek to replace him with a
leader a) untainted by responsibility for the referendum defeat and b)
determined to fight more aggressively for England’s interests. AS
Alistair Darling speaks at a ‘No’ campaign rally in Glasgow.Photograph: Dylan Martinez/Reuters
Terry Macalister, the Guardian’s energy editor,
sends this report on some statistics just out from from Wood Mackenzie, a
globally respected Edinburgh-based energy consultant. The report
predicts that the longterm decline in North Sea oil and gas production
will be temporarily arrested in the run up to 2018 but will then fall
again.
By 2023, it will be down below 1m barrels of oil equivalents a day - from 1.17m now and 1.3m in 2018.
1m barrels would be less than a quarter of output in the North Sea peak days of 1999.
Also Wood Mackenzie believes there are 15.3bn barrels of reserves yet to be exploited.
This compares with industry body, Oil&GasUK, and the SNP who believe the figure is 24bn.
The Wood Mackenzie figure is close to the one highlighted by Scottish offshore industrialist Sir Ian Wood (no connection).
Wood Mackenzie says Scotland can lay claim to 84% of commercial
reserves and warns the tax concessions needed to dismantle old platforms
could cost the UK - or Scotland - £9bn by 2030.
A yes vote in Scotland would be very demoralising for the unionist
community in Northern Ireland, an academic has warned. This is from my
colleague Henry Macdonald.
Dr Graham Walker, an expert on Ulster-Scotland
relations, said a yes vote would have major implications for the region
and lead to further political de-stabilisation.
The Queen’s University Belfast political scientist said: “Scotland
is the most emotional link in the British chain for unionists. It might
be questioned whether unionists can adapt to a new UK that doesn’t have
Scotland in it. Would unionists feel their identity could be expressed
in that new UK?
“It would be demoralising politically for unionism, and as such it
could have repercussions in terms of the political situation here.”
Dr Walker even suggested it might convince some unionists to prefer
an “Independent Ulster” option - something that would be an anathema to
Irish nationalists living in Northern Ireland - to a truncated UK.
But Walker’s warning should be tempered by consistent data from
opinion polling in Northern Ireland since the IRA and loyalist
ceasefires over the last two decades. Successive public surveys show an
often stronger pro-union majority in Northern Ireland compared to
Scotland in the years building up to tomorrow’s independence referendum
vote.
Johann Lamont, the Scottish Labour leader, Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservative leader and Willie Rennie, the Scottish Lib Dem leader, are now on stage at the Better Together rally in Glasgow.
This is from Blair McDougall, the Better Together campaign director.
Alistair Darling, the leader of Better Together, is speaking. AS
He says at the end of a campaign like this, you need certainty.
But the nationalists are not offering certainty.
If anyone is in any doubt, they should say no, he says.
Everyone in Scotland if fiercely patriotic, he says. But his view is that Scots should say no with head and heart.
Imagine a yes vote on Friday. There would be years of uncertainty, he says.
This will be one of the biggest decisions people will make. If you buy a house, you need to be sure of the foundations.
A vote to say no is for a secure, stronger Scotland.
Yes we love Scotland. That’s why we’re voting no.
Eddie Izzard, the comedian, has opened the Better
Together rally in Scotland. He said saying no could be a positive act,
if it involved rejecting a bad thing. Alistair Darling has just come on stage. He was escorted in by people playing the bagpipes.
Here’s more detail on what Mariano Rajoy, the Spanish prime
minister, told the Spanish parliament this morning about how long it
would take Scotland to rejoin the EU. (See here.) My colleague Ashifa Kassam has filed this from Madrid:
Rajoy has warned that it could take “years” for an independent
Scotland to be integrated into the European Union, as all 28 countries
would need to agree unanimously.
“It’s clear, as is explained in the treaties and has been
demonstrated more than once by EU leaders, that if one part of a state
separates, it converts itself into a third territory with respect to the
European Community,” said Rajoy.
He noted that “they can ask to be integrated”, but warned that it
would “open a process that could take years. In the case of Spain it
took eight years.”
His remarks came in response to a question put to him by MP Aitor
Esteban, from the Basque Nationalist Party: “If the yes campaign wins
tomorrow’s Scottish referendum, will your government facilitate the
integration of Scotland in the European Union?”
Rajoy said that he had spoken with representatives from the 28
countries in the EU. “Everyone in Europe thinks that these processes are
tremendously negative because they generate economic recessions and
more poverty for everyone.”
He added they act like a “torpedo to the vulnerabilities of the EU,
which was created to integrate states, not to separate them. Strong
states are what’s needed today.”
Already Tory MPs are rebelling against the promises made. The
leaders’ vow, they say, is “not a guarantee” that Westminster will
accept the changes. Some have already said they will block them. Even
the person who introduced the Barnett formula has spoken out to say that
its continuation would be a “terrible mistake” - and scrapping it would
slash Scotland’s budget by some £4 billion, which would do huge damage
to our National Health Service.
Today, the most powerful political force in the land is the people of Scotland.
If we vote No we would be at the mercy of whatever promises David
Cameron makes to the supporters of Nigel Farage. The Labour politicians
who are providing cover for the Tories won’t be able to help.
If, however, we wake up on Friday to a Yes vote, then the full range
of powers we need to create more jobs and fully protect the NHS are
coming. We get the vital new job-creating powers we need and the ability
to secure our NHS for the future.
Libby Brooks has been at today’s yes rally outside the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall.
.@patrickharvie tells Glasgow crowd: whichever way it goes, nothing is ever going to be the same again #indyref
— Libby Brooks (@libby_brooks) September 17, 2014
Elaine C Smith: people finally have something to vote for & something to hope for #indyref
— Libby Brooks (@libby_brooks) September 17, 2014
A group of digital artists have used state-of-the-art digital technology to turn Leyden Farm in West Lothian tartan.Photograph: Craig Robertson/RexCup cakes are
displayed in the window of Cuckoo’s bakery in Edinburgh. The bakery has
been running the ‘Cuckoo’s cup cake opinion poll’, for 200 days,
displaying the percentage of cakes sold in each of three categories.Photograph: Russell Cheyne/Reuters
John Harris has been travelling across Scotland and
has met people on both sides of the independence debate. Above all what
he observed from both the yes and the no camps was an engagement with
politics he had thought was dying out.
“I can really feel that something incredible’s happening here,” he
says in the video below. “In British terms, no question, this is the
most significant political moment of my lifetime.” PO
The Scottish Police Federation seems to be accusing
journalists and no campaigners of exaggerating the extent of aggression
deployed during the election campaign. It has released this statement
from Brian Docherty, its chairman. AS
The referendum debate has been robust but overwhelmingly good natured.
It was inevitable that the closer we came to the 18th of September
passions would increase but that does not justify the exaggerated
rhetoric that is being deployed with increased frequency. Any neutral
observer could be led to believe Scotland is on the verge of societal
disintegration yet nothing could be further from the truth.
Scotland’s citizens are overwhelmingly law abiding and tolerant and
it is preposterous to imply that by placing a cross in a box, our
citizens will suddenly abandon the personal virtues and values held dear
to them all.
At this time it is more important than ever that individuals be they
politicians, journalists or whoever should carefully consider their
words, maintain level heads and act with respect. Respect is not
demonstrated by suggesting a minority of mindless idiots are
representative of anything. One of the many joys of this campaign has
been how it has awakened political awareness across almost every single
section of society. The success enjoyed by the many should not be
sullied by the actions of the few.
He also said said that people who were talking up the prospects of disorder following the result were not being helpful.
Police officers must be kept free from the distractions of rhetoric
better suited to the playground that the political stump. If crime has
been committed it will be investigated and dealt with appropriately but
quite simply police officers have better things to do that officiate in
spats on social media and respond to baseless speculation of the
potential for disorder on and following polling day.
Cameron admits he can't explain why the polls are so close
David Cameron, the prime minister, has given an interview to the Times (paywall). Magnus
Linklater, who interviewed him, said he only got seven minutes with the
PM, before Cameron’s speech in Aberdeen on Monday, but he managed to
get a splash out of it. AS
Here are the main points.
Cameron admitted he could not explain why the polls were so close.
[Cameron] was at a loss to explain a series of polls showing the
referendum on a knife edge. “I’m not a pollster, so I can’t really
explain polls. My job is to help move them rather than explain them,” he
said. Asked whether the prospect of defeat wakes him in the night, he
answered: “Of course.”
He said that the yes campaign would be doing even better if
he had let the Scottish government hold its own referendum, without
instead negotiating an agreement with Westminster (the Edinburgh
agreement) that gave the referendum a firm legal base. He said:
I lead a democratic country, and when one of the nations of the UK
voted for a government whose policy was to have a referendum, I had a
choice. You either say ‘Yes, you can have that referendum, and here’s a
way of making it legal, decisive and fair’, or I could have taken the
approach of just putting my head in the sand, and saying, ‘No, you can’t
have a referendum’. I think that actually Scottish independence would
be closer today if I had taken that approach than it is by having a
proper referendum.
This is slightly disingenuous because Cameron effectively bounced the
Scottish government into having a referendum. Although Alex Salmond’s
government was committed to having one, it had not done much about it
until Cameron started putting pressure on Salmond for a date.
He claimed that worrying about the result was keeping him awake at night.
Does he, then, wake in the middle of the night sweating over the possibility of defeat?
“Of course,” he says immediately.
He defended his decision not to have a third question, on further devolution, on the ballot paper. He said:
For Scotland to have further devolution, you need to answer the
prior question: ‘Do you want to stay in the United Kingdom, or separate
off from the United Kingdom?’
He said businesses had been threatened with the loss of
contracts from the Scottish government if they spoke out against
referendum. He said:
The intimidation of businesses, and the fear people have for
speaking out — that I found disturbing. Because I’ve got direct
experience of having business people sitting round a table, and asking
them, well, if you’re so worried about separation, why don’t you say
something? And then it all comes out, immediately [they speak out]
there’s someone on the phone saying ‘You’ll struggle getting work from
us.’
There has been quite a lot of that going on, and that does worry me.
David Cameron speaking in Aberdeen on MondayPhotograph: Dylan Martinez/REUTERS
After much speculation over which side the Scottish Sun would endorse in the independence debate, today’s paper refuses to pick sides, Frances Perraudin reports.
“Britain’s Got Talent vs the Ecks Factor”, the headline reads. “We
believe in the people of Scotland to make the right decision,” the paper
concludes. “Whichever you choose, the Scottish Sun will continue to
fight for you and our Scottish principles”.
The Scottish Sun’s front page ignores the story next to the
masthead on its English edition: “Salmond army plan shot down”,
criticism of the SNP leader by “top British warriors”.
Meanwhile, today’s Daily Mail
pleads with Scots to stay in the union. “To our Scottish cousins we say
sorry for England’s inept political class and beg you to stay in our
great British family,” an editorial reads. “Our peoples are so
intermingled by blood and history that there’s hardly a family on either
side of the border that doesn’t have friends or relations on the other
... This is why today, the Mail makes a heartfelt appeal to the decent,
sensible, cautious Scots who represent the overwhelming majority of a
great nation.”
The Herald leads with
“Yes hails poll momentum”, quoting chief executive of Yes Scotland
Blair Jenkins saying that recent surveys, which show a relatively small
52-48 gap in favour of the union, were “hugely encouraging”.
In an exclusive from the Daily Telegraph,
Scottish first minister Alex Salmond is accused of bullying the
principal of St Andrews University, Prof Louise Richardson. The
Telegraph has seen emails it says show that Salmond’s office attempted
to persuade Richardson to release a statement criticising the UK
government’s higher education policy.
Further afield, the New York Times’s Stanley Reed argues
that North Sea oil revenue would not be sufficient to justify “such a
big bet on the country’s economic future”, even if the bulk of it went
to an independent Scotland, as is expected. “The approximately £5bn, or
$8bn, that the British government received in tax revenue from North Sea
energy last year would have been the equivalent of only about 3% of the
Scottish economy,” he writes.
Spain’s El Mundo reports
on this morning’s statement to the Spanish parliament by Spain’s prime
minister Mariano Rajoy. The prime minister made it clear that Scotland
would have to reapply to join the EU, just like any other state. The
Spanish media has paid extra attention to the Scottish independence
debate because of similarities it has to its own Catalan independence
movement.
Danny Alexander, the chief secretary to the
Treasury in the UK government and a Scottish MP, has also put out a
statement about the job figures. He says the overall numbers
show that “the United Kingdom is becoming the employment powerhouse of
the major economies” and the the Scottish figures are “a powerful
demonstration of how we are better together”. AS
Scottish government says job figures show it is outperforming UK
The Scottish government has welcomed job figures out this morning showing employment in Scotland at an all-time high.
This is from the SNP news release.
The strength of Scotland’s economy throughout the referendum
campaign was revealed today with new figures showing employment levels
are now at an all-time high.
The figures, published by the Office for National Statistics, cover
May to July 2014 and show that total employment increased in Scotland by
87,000 over the year to reach 2,623,000– the highest on record.
The employment rate in Scotland is now 73.9 per cent compared to 73.0 per cent in the UK as a whole.
And here’s a comment from John Swinney, Scotland’s finance minister.
On every headline figure we are outperforming the UK. That is the
reality of Scotland’s economy and that clearly demonstrates how wrong
the scaremongering of the UK government and the No campaign has been.
Two years ago the chancellor claimed that the referendum process
would be bad for Scotland’s economy. Instead employment is at a record
high and our economy has recovered from the westminster recession.
The no campaign were wrong then, and they are wrong to talk down our economy now.
Tomorrow we have a unique opportunity to build on this success and
to bring job creating powers for Scotland into Scotland’s hands – but
only a Yes vote gives us that opportunity.
Nicola Sturgeon
and John Swinney, look on as 19 year old apprentice fabricator Craig
McKee angle grinds a yes sign during their visit to Steel Engineering
yesterdayPhotograph: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images
Ahead of a frenetic final day of campaigning today by both sides in
tomorrow’s referendum, many activists on both sides tried to catch up on
some sleep last night.
But not everywhere. The Guardian’s Ben Quinnwas at the final session held in Aberdeen by the pro-independence artists’ group National Collective.
Here’s the sound of them singing along and stamping their feet to the
leftwing Scottish anthem Freedom Come All Ye, which was written in 1960
by the Scottish poet, songwriter and activist Hamish Henderson.
And here’s a video of them listening to the Skye Boat Song.
Those enjoying the night included members of the Radical
Independence Group (RIC), Women for Independence and others who are
canvassing and reaching out to voters from behind stalls today.
The Guardian now has 14 reporters, writers and editors joining our regular correspondents Severin Carrell and Libby Brooks across Scotland – from Esther Addley in the Shetlands to Helen Pidd in the Borders, with comment and analysis from Martin Kettle, among others. Steven Morris,
more usually found reporting in the south west of England, is in
Dundee, where he’s been talking to voters about how they feel about
tomorrow’s referendum. He’s found a taxi driver who will be ferrying
people to the polls for free (and perhaps giving them the arguments for a
yes vote along the way).
He has also spoken to a voter who was swung on to the yes side by
“what they [the UK government] were wanting to do to our NHS ... They
want to cut, cut, cut all the time.”
Alex Salmond and Alistair Darling interviews - Summary
Alex Salmond, Scotland’s first minister, has led the yes campaign,
and Alistair Darling, the Labour former chancellor who heads the Better
Together campaign, has led the no side.
They were both on the Today programme this morning. Much of what they
said repeated what they have been saying for days, but here are the
new, or new-ish, points. AS
Salmond said the enthusiasm shown by voters during the
campaign could turn Scotland into the envy of democratic participation
across the rest of the world.
If we can encapsulate some of that enthusiasm, some of that
positivity, that is going to turn this nation into a better place and we
will be the envy of democratic participation across the rest of the
world.
He said that he viewed clause 30 as the most important part of the Edinburgh agreement (the one between Edinburgh and London agreeing the referendum - pdf.) Clause
30 says, whatever the result, “the two governments are committed to
continue to work together constructively in the light of the outcome,
whatever it is, in the best interests of the people of Scotland and of
the rest of the United Kingdom”. Salmond said he would “honour that by
the letter, spirit and word”, perhaps implying that, even if there is a
no vote, he will press for more powers for Scotland.
He predicted that Westminster would abandon its opposition to a currency union in the event of a yes vote.
You know it and I know it and on Friday when the yes side have won
this campaign, and I hope have won it with a decent margin, then you’ll
find Westminster politicians singing an entirely different tune.
He played down the significance of the Spanish prime minister saying Scotland would have to reapply to join the EU. Spain had not said it would block Scotland joining, he said.
Alex Salmond, the Scottish first minister. Photograph: Andrew Milligan/PA
Darling said some people would find the anti-BBC protest organised by yes supporters on Sunday “quite frightening”.
Unfortunately there are some who have stepped over the mark.
Frankly, to have people demonstrating outside the BBC, some thousands of
people holding up placards of journalists they disapprove of - you
don’t expect to see that in this country.
What sort of Scotland would that be if that sort of behaviour -
which the first minister of Scotland has condoned, he said it was joyous
- some people find that quite frightening.
Darling said the differences between the three UK parties on what powers they offered Scotland were “relatively small”.
Alistair Darling, the leader of the no campaign.Photograph: Dylan Martinez/Reuters
Updated
Are the Scots independent yet? Need a website to tell you? Here you go ...
We’ll be returning to that website again over the next few days. PO
Updated
Scottish independence campaign - How it is viewed abroad
Spanish prime minister says independence votes are bad for Europe
In the Today interview James Naughtie said the Spanish prime
minister (not the Scottish prime minister, as I mis-typed) said an
independent Scotland would have to reapply to join the EU.
Here are more details of the intervention from Mariano Rajoy.
Spanish PM Rajoy speaking
in parliament a few minutes ago: Scotland would have to reapply for EU
membership like any other state. #indyref
— Piers Scholfield (@inglesi) September 17, 2014
This is significant because applying for EU membership from outside,
as a new member, could take five years, according to some estimates.
Alex Salmond argues that Scotland’s application could be processed
within 18 months, and that effectively it would never have to leave
(because, by the time the UK split, Scotland would be a member.) AS
Rajoy said independence votes are bad for people of Europe .. spirit of the age is integration, not separation. #indyref
— Piers Scholfield (@inglesi) September 17, 2014
Rajoy also said Scotland has fewer devolved powers than Spanish regions such as #Catalonia & Basque country. #indyref
— Piers Scholfield (@inglesi) September 17, 2014
Updated
Q: This morning the Spanish prime minister said an independent Scotland would have to reapply to join the EU as a new member.
Salmond says it has been Spain’s position that it does not interfere.
A Spanish minister on Newsnight on Monday refused to say that Spain
would try to block Scotland joining.
A population with the assets of Scotland, including 60% of Europe’s oil reserves, would be welcome in the EU, he says.
Salmond is asked to comment on the intervention from military figures today. He cites the veterans backing yes. Q: If you go into negotiations, you would have to accept that you would not get everything you wanted.
Salmond says the Scottish government has already taken that view. For
example, it would allow five and a half year for Faslane to be closed.
And that’s it.
I’ll post the key points from the interview shortly.
Updated
Q: How do you bring the country together if you do not win?
Salmond says his red line issue in negotiating the Edinburgh
agreement (the one setting up the referendum) was the one committing
both governments to accepting the result, and making it work.
If there is a yes vote, he will invite people from across the political spectrum to join Team Scotland to implement it.
Salmond says he never thought he would see people queuing up to vote, as he saw in Dundee.
And these were not young people, he said. They were people who cared
about their country. It was humbling. If that spirit can be captured, it
will turn Scotland into the envy of the democractic world.
James Naughtie is now interviewing the Scottish first minister and leader of the independence campaign Alex Salmond. Q: You said these new powers offered by the unionist parties are uncertain. But the currency uncertainty is even bigger.
Salmond says Scotland will use the pound.
He says Alistair Darling, the leader of the no campaign, said in the
second debate that Scotland could, of course, use the pound. And a
senior minister told the Guardian earlier this year Scotland would keep the pound. After a yes vote, Westminster will take a different tune, he says. Q: Darling said Scotland could use the pound, but it would need a central bank.
Salmond says this was a significant moment. Previously the no side said Scotland could not keep the pound. Q: Do you think the rest of the UK should have a say in the currency union?
Salmond says he is not asking for a change to the currency arrangements.
He says Naughtie should ask about why the campaign has been so invigorating. AS
Updated
Lord Barnett says Barnett formula should go
The three main UK party leaders said yesterday that they wanted to
continue the Barnett formula, a funding arrangement that guarantees
Scotland a certain amount of money.
But Lord Barnett, who was Labour chief secretary to
the Treasury in the late 1970s when the arrangement was set up, told the
World Tonight last night that it should go.
Listen: As the three main party leaders pledge to keep funding Scotland with the Barnett formula, the architec... http://t.co/6FayhlsGot
— BBC R4 World Tonight (@BBCWorldTonight) September 16, 2014
It is unfair and should be stopped, it is a mistake. This way is
terrible and can never be sustainable, it is a national embarrassment
and personally embarrassing to me as well.
If we want to give them some money after devo-max OK, but do it honestly and openly. Not by doing so under the table like this.
Perhaps we should just rename it the Cameron/Miliband/Clegg formula,
or the Brown formula (after Gordon Brown, the former Labour prime
minister, who was instrumental in getting Cameron, Miliband and Clegg to
make their commitment)? AS
Updated
There are also campaign events in England today. The Day of Unity
campaign is organising rallies in various cities in England, Wales and
Northern Ireland to allow people to show their support for Scotland
staying in the UK.
There are details on its website.
The three polls out this morning are not the last, Political Betting’s Mike Smithson says.
YouGov and Ipsos-MORI polls still to come. The latter has one this evening & another tomorrow
— Mike Smithson (@MSmithsonPB) September 17, 2014
Q: What have you learnt about Scotland?
We are more self-confident than we were 20, 30 years ago. Q: That’s because of the referendum.
Darling says that the creation of the Scottish parliament played a part.
And that’s it.
Q: How do you heal the divisions afterwards?
It is going to be hard. The vast majority of people are reasonable.
But some have stepped over the mark. To see people demonstrating outside
the BBC,with pictures of journalists ... you should not see that in
this country, he says.
Some people have stepped over the line on the internet, he says. Q: But doesn’t calming it down mean people like you should play a part?
Darling says he is fighting to persuade Scots to reject something that would plunge Scotland into years of uncertainty.
Updated
Q: If there is a yes vote, will you accept Alex Salmond’s offer to join Team Scotland?
Darling says it is deeply offensive to suggest that only yes supporters are patriotic.
He says he has always made it clear he is not going. He is staying in Scotland, whatever happens.
We will all play our part, he says. It is our country too.
Q: The no side has lost its clear lead. Do you think if no wins, that will only hold back independence a short time?
No, says Darling. He and Alex Salmond have both said this will settle the matter for a generation.
People are still swithering, he says.
It is not like a general election. If we vote to go, there is no coming back.
Updated
Q: Deputy prime minister and Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg
signed the “vow” yesterday. People remember Clegg breaking his previous
pledge on tuition fees.
Darling says the main parties agree on this. Q: Lord Barnett said the Barnett formula should not stay [on the World Tonight last night - I’ll post the quote later].
Darling says Barnett is a very fine man, but the parties do support the Barnett formula.
He says Scotland and the UK will be stronger by decentralising power.
We have built the UK together, he says.
Updated
Alistair Darling interviewed on Today
James Naughtie is interviewing Alistair Darling, the leader of the pro-union Better Together campaign. Q: Why don’t we know what new powers the three main parties are promising?
Darling says people are clear new powers are coming. What was
announced during the campaign was a timetable, so the “relatively small”
differences between the parties can be reconciled. Q: The Tories want to devolve more tax powers than Labour.
There were differences before 1997, and there were differences before the recent Scotland Act. That is not unusual.
Darling says he has been asking questions about what currency Scotland would use, and others. AS
Updated
Here’s my daily engraving from the wall of the Scottish parliament.
It’s a quote from Alasdair Gray. Alex Salmond references it in his open letter this morning (“wake up on Friday morning to the first day of a better country”).
Within less than 24 hours, the polls will have opened in a vote on
Scottish independence that could break up the United Kingdom.
The polls suggest that that is a realistic possibility, although a no vote seems more likely.
Yesterday we had open message to the Scots from prime minister David
Cameron and the leaders of the UK’s other two main parties, Ed Miliband
of Labour and Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats.
This morning it’s Alex Salmond, Scotland’s first minister, who is putting an appeal in writing. In his own letter to the Scottish people, the
SNP leader acknowledges that an independent Scotland will not be
perfect, but insists that Scots must be allowed to run their own country
for themselves:
For my part, I ask only this.
Make this decision with a clear head and a clear conscience.
Know that by voting ‘Yes’, what we take into our hands is a
responsibility like no other - the responsibility to work together to
make Scotland the nation it can be.
That will require maturity, wisdom, engagement and energy - and it
will come not from the usual sources of parties and politicians but from
you - the people who have transformed this moment from another
political debate into a wonderful celebration of people power.
Does every country make mistakes? Yes.
Are there challenges for Scotland to overcome? Undoubtedly.
But my question is this - who better to meet those challenges on behalf of our nation than us?
We must trust ourselves.
And he concludes:
Don’t let this opportunity slip through our fingers.
Don’t let them tell us we can’t.
Let’s do this.
Salmond’s letter coincides with the publication of three polls giving exactly the same figures (with don’t knows excluded): No: 52% Yes: 48%
The polls are: ICM in the Scotsman; Opinium in the Daily Telegraph and Survation in the Daily Mail.
Salmond and Alistair Darling, the leader of the pro-union Better
Together campaign, are being interviewed shortly on BBC Radio 4’s Today
programme. I will be covering those interviews in detail.
And here’s today’s full agenda, with campaign events that have been flagged up to the media. 7.30am: Alistair Darling is interviewed on Today. 8.10am: Alex Salmond is interviewed on Today. 9.15am: Nicola Sturgeon, Salmond’s deputy, and Humza Yousaf, the Scottish government’s external affairs minister, campaign in Glasgow. 10.30am: Yes Scotland holds a rally with celebrities and other supporters in Buchanan Street, Glasgow. 11am: Gordon Brown, the former prime minister who has become a key figure in the no campaign, speaks at a campaign event in Glasgow. 1.50pm: Alistair Carmichael, the Lib Dem Scottish secretary, and Sir Menzies Campbell, the former Lib Dem leader, campaign in Fife. 8pm: Salmond gives a speech in Perth.
I’m Andrew Sparrow (AS) and I’ll be writing the blog with my colleague Paul Owen (PO). We’ll make it clear with initials who’s written what, unless it doesn’t seem to matter.
If you want to follow me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow. Paul is @paultowen.
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