What Scotland’s big independence debate is about and should be about
What Scotland’s big independence debate is about and should be about Gerry Hassan Bella Caledonia, 15 June 2022 Nicola Sturgeon has fired the gun on Scotland’s independence debate, standing in Bute House yesterday with Patrick Harvie, co-leader of the Scottish Greens, launching the first of several papers on independence. This has brought forth the usual and predictable claims and counter-claims. SNP, Green and independence supporters are excited and hopeful; Labour, Tories and Lib Dems along with pro-union advocates of no party are filled with scorn and fury that anyone would want to progress independence in such times of upheaval and
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What independence has to do to win
What independence has to do to win Gerry Hassan The National, 14 June 2022 The Scottish Government will make an important announcement on independence today; one long awaited by independence supporters. It has long been apparent that the 2014 offer needs not just updating but completely revising and that serious, substantive work needs to be done. Fundamental to this is not just the usual suspects mentioned – currency, borders, finance, EU membership – but the issue of how independence embodies and champions democracy. The independence offer is often portrayed by its supporters as personifying democracy in principle – Scotland’s right
The rise, fall and rise of party and movement and the changing idea of Scotland
The rise, fall and rise of party and movement and the changing idea of Scotland Gerry Hassan Bella Caledonia, 7 January 2022 Review of The National Movement in Scotland, Jack Brand, Routledge The SNP have been in existence for a long time and a serious electoral force since the 1960s. But at the same time there have been few studies of the party that have contextualised it within the wider nationalist movement and the changing nature of Scotland, and that have attempted to analyse and understand the dynamics of this relationship. The National Movement in Scotland by the late Jack
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Scotland needs to learn the lessons of how we defeated Margaret Thatcher
Scotland needs to learn the lessons of how we defeated Margaret Thatcher Gerry Hassan The National, 28 December 2021 Margaret Thatcher looms large in the history of modern Scotland. Her minority rule of Scotland, her dogma and indifference to hardship and suffering, her English nationalism wrapped in the flag of the Union Jack: all this and more irritated an overwhelming majority of Scots. She did change history here, although not in ways she intended. She underlined that the old union of compromise was broken; she weakened the strength of the unionist case; and she was a handmaiden in creating the
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Scottish independence needs to offer “a shining city on a hill”
Scottish independence needs to offer “a shining city on a hill” Gerry Hassan The National, 14 December 2021 Scottish politics feels once again stuck in a Groundhog Day. We are only seven months from the endorsement of the SNP in the May elections, and only weeks from the English political commentariat being convinced that Boris Johnson was a sure-fire winner who would continue to carry all before him. Things that seem secure can suddenly change and crumble. Yet there is currently low-level trench warfare in Scottish politics as the forces of the union and independence psyche each other out, waiting
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Scotland’s progressive politics needs some championing
Scotland’s progressive politics needs some championing Gerry Hassan The National, 30 November 2021 Scotland’s progressive values have defined much of our politics - the first 20 years of devolution, majority opposition to Thatcherism, and the independence debate. And yet for all their wide support they need attention, nurturing, and championing. On Saturday Plaid Cymru voted to endorse a deal with Welsh Labour for a co-operation agreement in government covering 46 areas including free school meals for primary children, free childcare, and tackling the second homes crisis. Adam Price, Plaid leader, said that this renewed “trust in a new democracy with
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Seven years of Nicola Sturgeon and resolving the tensions between party and movement
Seven years of Nicola Sturgeon and resolving the tensions between party and movement Gerry Hassan The National, 23 November 2021 Nicola Sturgeon has been First Minister and SNP leader for seven years. This formidable achievement is part of a bigger picture of the SNP’s emergence as the dominant party, the rise of independence, and the relationship of the Nationalists to the wider independence movement. This is an appropriate time for reflection and assessment not just of her leadership but of the wider context in which it sits. Specifically of the SNP as a party and its record in office, and
The world comes to Glasgow: Time to Think and Act Big
The world comes to Glasgow: Time to Think and Act Big Gerry Hassan Sunday National, 31 October 2021 Glasgow can do big things. It has revelled in being an international host city – from the most memorable European Cup finals to European City of Culture 1990 and the 2014 Commonwealth Games. The city’s sense of swagger, ambition and constant reinvention has sustained it through good times and bad, and aided it through difficult periods such as post-war deindustrialisation and the Thatcher era. But alongside that, the city has been constantly battered by external forces and had huge change imposed on
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How to defeat the Tories and aid democracy
How to defeat the Tories and aid democracy Gerry Hassan The National, 5 October 2021 Tory problems mount by the day. There’s fuel and food shortages evoking the 1970s, a Brexit that seems only to be delivering problems and, in Boris Johnson, a PM who seems to know and care little about detail and the real lives of people. Despite all of this and more the Tories are still in the lead in the polls and the odds remain against Labour winning the next election outright. Labour has a mountain to climb to win the next election that could be
Seven years on independence has serious work to do to win
Seven years on independence has serious work to do to win Gerry Hassan The National, 21 September 2021 Last weekend was the seventh anniversary of Scotland’s big date with destiny on independence – and for some this is an understandable seven-year itch. Cue the demand from some that Scotland holds another indyref as soon as possible. The previous weekend at the Alba gathering Alex Salmond made the case for an indyref in the midst of the COVID pandemic on the grounds that the 2021 Scottish elections were held against the same backdrop (when legislation would have been required to postpone
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