The Point
Last updated:
27 June 2022.
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Follow us on TwitterThree weeks to go, an appeal to fellow citizens of Scotland: Tommy Sheridan
The Point marks 21 days to go till the referendum with a magnificent seven appeals to undecided voters from both rank-and-file activists and leading figures in the YES movement.
Tommy Sheridan: Hope Over Fear tour, Co-Convenor, Solidarity
If Scotland is to become an Independent nation on September the 18th then all of us advocating a Yes vote need to convince those who have not yet made up their mind as to why they should vote for Independence. We have to try and persuade people to have the confidence to take their own destiny in their hands. Many other countries that have fought for Independence over the years have actually had to take up arms to fight for that type of sovereignty. We’re getting the chance without one single bullet getting fired. All we have to do is to go to a ballot box and put a cross beside “Yes” and we can become a nation.
Politicians and commentators are keen to tell us what this referendum is about. I can tell you what it’s not about.
The Independence debate is not about narrow nationalism. I am not a nationalist. I have been an Internationalist all of my political life. Some people have said to me, “You know, Tommy, you’re a socialist. Are you not abandoning the working class in England and Wales, who’ll never get rid of the Tories if Scotland goes independent?” It’s a myth deliberately promoted by people who know better. In all of the elections where Labour have won a majority in Westminster, they didn’t rely on the Scottish votes. But, since 1955, 32 years out of the 60 years since 1955, we’ve ended up with Tory governments that we never voted for. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a country where you actually get the government that you vote for? Is that too much to ask? It’s called democracy. If we choose Independence then never again will Scotland have a Tory Government it didn’t vote for. Solidarity does not stop at a country’s borders. I have supported workers and peoples in struggle all over the world and that wouldn’t stop just because Scotland had the right to elect its own government and make its own decisions.
The referendum is not about the SNP. From those promoting Project Fear we hear constantly, “It’s all about Alex Salmond”, “Do you really support the SNP?” Yet this vote is bigger than any single political party. This vote is about the very future of our country, of our children, of our children’s children. This referendum isn’t about whether or not you like Alex Salmond or you support the policies of the SNP or The Scottish Government’s white paper. My vision of an Independent Scotland certainly won’t be shared by the higher echelons of the SNP. I don’t want to be part of Nato. I’m not interested in putting the monarchy on a diet. I don’t want it slimmed down – I want rid of it! I also don’t want oil, and gas, and electricity to be run for private profit. I think it should be nationalised along with our railways and the post office and run for social need. If we win the vote then I will put my energies into campaigning for a socialist Scotland but first of all we need a majority on September 18th.
Voting for independence isn’t the end destination - It’s only the start of the journey towards a new type of Scotland where we can start to reverse the trend of inequality by having a small country that puts social justice and equality at the forefront of its policies, rather than being a mere sound-bite that is discarded at the first opportunity. That is not the trajectory of politics at Westminster where all the main political parties are united in their desire for austerity policies that make the poor pay the price for the mistakes of the rich.
The referendum is not about the past. It’s not about historical battles but the struggles of the future. This vote is about whether your country is going to put people before profit. About whether Scotland is going to send young kids to die in illegal wars; about whether Scotland is going to spend money in giving kids a decent, healthy, nutritious free meal, and whether Scotland is going to have a publicly-owned health service, and a mail service, which this Westminster Government is privatising in England.
The main issue with the referendum is not, as BitterTogether would have us believe uncertainty. Of course there are issues that will have to resolved and negotiated. Not every i will be dotted or t crossed if we vote Yes. But it’s not uncertainty that is the main problem – its certainty. The certainty that a No vote on September 18th means more austerity on September 19th.
These Tory spivs and millionaires don’t think they haven’t gone far enough with cuts to public spending or the pay and conditions of workers. This government has already introduced a programme of billions of pounds worth of cuts and they’ve now announced another £40 billion worth. There is no escape from the wicked austerity consensus by voting Labour. At every time Prime Minister’s Questions, Cameron and his cabinet of millionaires goad Ed Milliband: “What would you do? Are you going to reverse the cuts?”
The reality is Labour are not going to reverse a single cut. They’ve said, “We’ll do it differently.” They’ve even said they wouldn’t do it as quick, but they will do it all the same.
We have an opportunity on September 18th to say we are taking a different path, making different choices.
The choice to not sell off our health service to the Tory’s rich friends.
A choice that values humanity itself.
The choice to break from decades of the disastrous foreign policy of the British state and to stand shoulder to shoulder with oppressed peoples the world over.
That we actually recognise something called human solidarity.
Where we actually believe that our old folk should be looked after.
We actually believe that our children should get a decent start in life.
We actually believe in something called the “welfare state” that looks after people from cradle to grave rather than stigmatising and hounding them.
Where we can be a country that welcomes immigrants from all over the world rather than persecuting and blaming them.
Where we say that we are not going to waste billions of pounds on offensive, inhumane and barbaric weapons of mass destruction currently based on the Clyde.
I think that they, above all, represent everything that’s wrong with the world. We’ve got kids starving, we’ve got children dying of easily preventable diseases, like cholera, because we don’t have enough money to spend on medicines. But there’s always enough money to spend on nuclear weapons.
We are a small country that is absolutely rich in land, water, the ability to generate energy, not just in relation to gas and electricity, but from wind and wave power as well. We have got an abundance of universities. We have got fantastic engineering capabilities. We’ve also got something which, personally, in an independent Scotland I’ll be fighting hard for, I can never understand why it is, that we’ve got a publicly-owned health service, and a privately-owned pharmaceutical industry. Why the hell should we allow them to rip us off? Let’s have a publicly-owned pharmaceutical industry to feed our publicly-owned health service. That’s the type of things we could do in an independent Scotland.
I have spoken at over 70 meetings across Scotland during this campaign and addressed over 14,000 people. At every one I make the same appeal. Vote YES and lets begin the process of transforming our country for the better and making it an example of how there is another way we can chose to run our society.
Let’s build a triumph of hope over fear.
