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A united Yes movement can give Scotland the confidence to choose independence
Around 80 delegates gathered at SNP Conference last week, determined to restore urgency to our party’s core mission.
It was a conversation that deserved to happen on the conference floor. But when the Conference Committee rejected a motion backed by 50 branches and our largest affiliate, the demand for that debate didn’t disappear. It found another platform.
Those who sought to stage-manage Conference so tightly found that the newly formed Independence group were the ones who grabbed the headlines.
There's a lesson here for the Conference Committee. Accommodate debate, don't try to suppress it. Otherwise, Conference will become increasingly irrelevant.
The SNP has always been a broad coalition. Independence is the gel that binds us together whatever our disagreements. When that shared vision stops doing the heavy lifting, our differences begin to pull us apart.
So it’s no surprise that the party is grappling with disagreements on issues ranging from Jackdaw to data centres, to public sector reform.
But if we’re to build an alternative to Westminster, we need a clear sense of the destination we’re working towards.
That's where the Independence Group can play a role. Not as a “faction”, not as a “splinter group”, but as a member-led effort to rekindle the fire that brought us into this party in the first place, with renewed urgency and action.
And as part of its five-point-plan, there are two things the SNP must do right now.
First, the First Minister should invite civic Scotland to convene a constitutional convention.
Five months ago, Scotland elected the largest pro-independence majority in Holyrood's history.
That was the best moment to unite political parties, trade unions, business, faith groups and civic Scotland to agree a democratic route for Scotland to exercise its right to choose.
The second-best moment came following shifts in the positions of both the Prime Minister and Scottish Labour's leader on Scotland's democratic right to determine its future.
We let both moments pass us by.
I recently heard a senior SNP minister, someone I have enormous time for, argue that it isn't our job to find a route to a second independence referendum.
Whose job is it then? Do we think Westminster will hand us a Section 30 on a plate?
We're the ones seeking constitutional change. If we're not shaping what that change looks like, we risk having the terms dictated to us.
And the argument for a convention is gathering momentum across the movement.
Even broadcaster Bernard Ponsonby, in his latest podcast, one of the sharpest minds in Scottish political commentary, made the case. His advice to the First Minister: "just get on with it."
A convention wouldn't require everyone to agree on independence. It would seek agreement on the democratic mechanism through which Scotland can choose its future.
We must be bridge-builders. An independent Scotland will belong to all of Scotland, not just those who voted Yes.
What a message it would send: that our constitutional future is decided here, not controlled by Westminster.
And with politicians in London talking about a second EU referendum, good luck to them explaining why a second independence referendum is off limits.
So what are we waiting for? If we don't take control of the narrative and announce one in the coming weeks it risks not happening at all.
Secondly, we need a national Yes campaign built around a new social contract with the people of Scotland.
In 2014, we started at 29% and finished at 45%. We achieved that because the campaign reached beyond the SNP.
And twelve years later, we still haven't adequately addressed some of the questions that led us to defeat in 2014.
Currency. Pensions. Border.
How is it possible that, twelve years on, the Yes movement still can’t agree which currency Scotland would use on day one?
Different parties have different visions of independence. That's democracy.
But people aren't interested in three different answers depending on who they ask. They deserve clarity on the essentials.
That's why I want the Yes movement to negotiate a memorandum of understanding setting out the "Day One Guarantees".
The currency in your pocket.
The passport in your drawer.
The pension in your bank account.
A social contract with the people of Scotland, agreed across the movement, providing certainty on the fundamentals regardless of which party subsequently forms a government.
The Independence group is writing to the leading voices in the Yes movement, including the SNP, the Greens, Believe in Scotland and the Scottish Currency Group.
We need them around the same table, working towards common answers on the practical foundations of independence.
Nobody needs to abandon their principles. But we cannot keep asking voters to take a leap of faith.
These aren't technical details to leave to future negotiations. They're questions of trust.
A national Yes campaign must take those guarantees into communities across Scotland, alongside a compelling vision of the country we can become.
Some argue we should secure a referendum first, then build the campaign. I disagree. The campaign builds the majority – and the majority delivers the referendum.
For twelve years, we've convinced ourselves that the key to unlocking Scotland's future lies in Westminster. It doesn't.
Countries don't become independent by waiting for permission.
They do so when they create the conditions themselves.
When support becomes unstoppable and when they build a national consensus for change.
The power lies in our hands - it always has.
It's time to use it.
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