When you write a novel, you create a fictional world and must dwell in it.
That is one reason the creative writing process is so exhausting and takes such a long time.
Moreover, it is especially difficult to write a novel that is right up against the current moment.
In Native Shore, I had to imagine an immediate pre-IndyRef2 period in Scotland.
As in right now.
Obviously, I hoped to keep it as authentic as possible while spinning a good yarn.
Therefore, it is strange when that fictional world starts to unfold in front of me, daily event by daily event.
I first started on Native Shore in the spring of 2018.
It would be May of this year before it existed in its own right as a book that the reader could pick up.
Since the UK General Election of 2019, I have, on occasion, written on the issue of Scotland’s current constitutional position.
You can read them here, here, here and here.
Last night I spoke with an old SNP buddy.
We’ve been firm friends since the 1980s.
We first bumped into each other when your humble correspondent indulged in a bit of politicking in Fair Caledonia.
For the avoidance of doubt, he is not named in this Scotsman piece from 1987, although I definitely am.
As ever, I brought an Irish Republican perspective to the proceedings back then, and that hasn’t changed.
I told him that I thought that the current situation in Alba was eerily familiar to the world I had imagined back in 2018.
Finding your writer’s voice is to tell the world how you see it.
In a sense, Native Shore is how I see contemporary Scotland.
Now a central theme in the novel appears to be worryingly prescient.
My SNP pal had called because he wanted to explore with me the options for the pro-Indy movement in the aftermath of the UK Supreme Court ruling.
I told him it didn’t surprise me that the judges In London had ruled that the regional assembly in Edinburgh had the powers of a (gasp) regional assembly.
That is what the Holyrood legislature was set up to be.
I repeatedly have, yet gently, pointed out to him that all roads lead to Westminster for as long as his party sends people to attend there.
In the end, it is about legitimacy.
Therefore, I suggested the following course of action:
That one by one, SNP MPs resign and fight by-elections on an abstentionist platform.
This would create a rolling campaign where the Yes Scotland activists would deluge the constituency in question.
Each vote count could be styled as a mini-IndyRef2.
The victorious abstentionist MP would not attend Westminster; instead, there could be some venue in Fair Caledonia where they would meet with pro-Indy MSPs.
If this were done intelligently, the last SNP MP to resign would be the leader of the Parliamentary Group.
That resignation speech before the impending by-election would be global box office.
The optics would be sensational.
It would be the democratic will of the Scottish people very visibly leaving the building on the Thames and never to return.
My Scottish pal warmed to the idea as I explained the significance of it in the digital age.
Unlike many of the new breed at Westminster, my pal was tramping the soggy streets of Glasgow in the 1970s when the very idea of SNP dominance in Scotland was a locked-ward narrative.
It was a Sisyphean task that only a true believer would undertake.
He had no problem in accepting my Irish Republican logic about how to withdraw legitimacy from the British legislature peacefully.
I reiterated to him that his colleagues at Westminster were only being asked to give up the subsidised din dins and the generous salary.
The Honourable Members of the SNP do not need to spend a day in prison or break a window.
In Native Shore, those who would seek recourse to violence to suppress Scotland’s claim of right work for Westminster.
I imagined a scenario whereby the country becomes, in a sense, a British colony.
Given Scotland’s bloodstained imperial past, that is an irony that any Irish writer would want to explore.
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I support an independent Scotland. My conclusions on going forward match yours Phil. I have been arguing for this on Twitter and Facebook for some time now. Elected SNP MP’s to Westminster are a bombastic indulgence whose efforts are fruitless and derided by the others in the Commons and by the media.
In accepting the stipend they become self important, rhetorically impotent, and used to the benefits of membership of the private Westminster club.
Your proposal would, if chosen, release their potential back here in Scotland. It would reverberate internationally drawing support therefrom. Unfortunately, striding down the legal path inevitably produces insurmountable obstructions.
Sorry chums, Scotland will never vote in favour of this madness.
Madness? You prefer being run by Tory England?
When devolution was touted a certain Enoch Powell stated bluntly…. ‘Devolution allowed (note the allowed) means Power Retained’!!!
Remember, the SNP for all their faults are only the means to the end of London rule. With independence we can vote for whichever party we want.
What’s mad about a country of 5 million wanting to govern itself and getting the government it votes for instead of being governed by an extreme right wing party it hasn’t voted for in the past 67 years.
A country that was rich on fossil fuel for the past 50 years but most of the population got poorer in real terms while a few have got very rich. Scotland is now rich in renewable power we have to make sure the wealth from this source also doesn’t disappear down the Westminster drain.
In my opinion the SNP have done a decent job over the past 15years with limited resources, especially compared with the omnishambles in Westminster.
Independence isn’t just about the SNP, it’s all about Scotland getting the government it votes for.
Sorry chum, you are no (who uses such language) ” chum” of the right thinking folk of Scotland.
Meanwhile, a Sevco fan called Josh Smith was found guilty on Friday of making a racist Nazi salute towards the RB Leipzig fans last season; with almost zero coverage in our msm.
He is an Operations Manager at a large multinational insurance company, not a ned from the backstreets of Bridgeton.
They walk among us.
Independence yes – but the SNP no. Scotland under the SNP has regressed. Worst Drug problem in Europe, Less police, Worst NHS record – railways a shambles and lets not talk about trying to build two ferries that have yet to carry a passenger. All this on 30 percent more money per person than rest of UK. What a disaster an independent Scotland would be under the SNP with less money…Scotland needs a credible second party to challenge the SNP before independance
Free prescriptions, zero tuition fees, 10 year council tax freeze, mitigation of the bedroom tax, etc.
It’s not been all bad really under the SNP.
Scotland would actually have more money when independent because we would have all the oil money (not just a fraction of it). This is not counted in the Barnet formula.
We would save billions by not having to pay our share of the Trident nuclear weapons system and we would not have to pay a share of HS2, which will never reach Leeds never mind Scotland.
My ideal is to vote for a properly socialist Labour Party in an independent Scotland so the SNP is the best way to achieve that.
Independence for a united Ireland. Independence for Scotland.
Yes definitely the way to go how much longer can we be walked over and pissed upon with this Tory government BREAK FREE NOW SCOTLAND GET OUR FREEDOM BACK INDEPENDENCE IS THE WAY TO GO. 🏴🏴🏴
I think you’ll find the numbers around the NHS in Scotland are considerably better than the rest of the U.K. we have a big drugs problem, but the attempts to solve it by treating it as a medical problem rather than a criminal justice issue are constantly thwarted by Westminster. Police numbers are also higher. The ferries issue was indeed a mess, but if you looks at comparable projects elsewhere in the U.K, you’ll get a little perspective. As for challenging the S.N.P, the hard fact is that they are the only viable vehicle to independence and should be supported for that reason; for what it’s worth, I don’t think they’ll last as a party post independence.
Michael McCartney….You state that Ireland & Scotland’s relationship with England was different, “Ireland was conquered” the implication being that Scotland wasn’t.
I would respectfully point you in the direction of the history of the Jacobite rebellions.
The aftermath of “The 45” being the very definition of what a conquered people are subjected to.
More Scots sided with the government than with the Jacobites.
The 45 was not an England v Scotland affair.
For example the Manchester Regiment.
Im loath to argue with you Phil , but i have a whole clan history including 17 members that fell at Culloden that would disagree. Despite the widespread collusion, rightly or wrongly,It was not considered a civil war by them.
The ex member for Finchley stated, that for Scottish Independence to happen, we need only return a majority of Scottish MPs for SNP. We should take her at her word. UDI.
The SNP will never achieve Scottish Independence whilst they play by Westminster’s rules.
Scotland and Irelands relationship with England was always different, one was conquered and the other’s {Scotland] Independence was sold for gold by a handful of aristocratic and nouveau riche MP’s in the very much undemocratic Scottish Parliament of its day.
Scotland’s need for Independence is urgent, the UK as a construct is done. The UK is now governed to serve the interests of the City of London and the Uk’s tax haven off shore islands.
We now know what some of us have always known, the so called Union of Equals is a British establishment lie. The question now is how will the Scottish people and elected representatives react to this fact in the future .While the SNP play by Westminster rules I’m afraid that my mood is one of pessimism in the short term for the chances of Independence.
What doesn’t help is the fact that 95% of the Scottish and UK media, both print and broadcasting are vehemently Pro Unionist. A lot of the older members of the Celtic family and our club’s Tory board along with their Loyalist and Unionist pals are lined up against Independence.
Independence will come one day, In my opinion it may be at least 10 years down the line.
Excellent points, well made Michael. The process may have differed but the impact of empire on ordinary people was not that different I would imagine and each colony had its native ‘overseers’ and participants too.
As for SNP abstentionism, surely there is no excuse now – its the only course for them to take?
Unless, as you say Phil, they cannot bear to give up their nice subsidies, expenses and constantly increasing salaries and show they really are a ‘true believer’ and prepared to make the sacrifice. I like that idea of individual by-elections on that basis, amd of course people have nills to pay, so maybe they could even take a leaf out of the original SSP MSP’s book and only draw a salary equal to the average of a skilled worker in Scotland (with the rest going to the campaign as extra resource to fight thr MSM).
Given Scotland’s bloodstained imperial past ? would that be the same as Ireland’s bloodstained imperial past given they were part of the imperialist project till 1922 ? Iron Duke anyone…
Oh, dear.
Your inaugural comment, and you start with a historically illiterate observation.
How unfortunate.
Arthur Wellesley, the 1st Duke of Wellington, made a strenuous point of disassociating himself from the land of his birth.
He was a member of the British ascendancy here in Ireland.
Excellent article, Phil