CAMPAIGNING FOR SCOTLAND (Owned, Edited and Printed in Scotland since November 1926) "Promoting all that is best in Scottish Nationalism and all that is best in Scotland." Content of the Flag in the Wind Web Site is the copyright of the Scots Independent Newspaper. [ Issue 363 -  18th May 2007]

Compiled by Ian Goldie

BREAKING NEWS - PAST

The Scottish Parliament at Holyrood has elected its third Presiding Officer.  He is Alex Fergusson, not Manchester United football club’s super-successful Glasgow-born manager, but the Conservative member of the Scottish Parliament for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale.
 
His is not an enviable task, for two main reasons.
 
It will be difficult to follow in the steps of the first two Presiding Officers David Steel and George Reid, who both carried off the post with distinction and panache.
 
And with the result of the elections being so close and with Scotland heading for its first ever minority government under Alex Salmond and the Scottish National Party we are all heading for uncharted waters.  
 
No doubt MSPs will get upset and make mistakes, but if the goodwill shown by all sides and parties to Alex Fergusson on his appointment is carried through into the four-year term of the Parliament then this third Parliament could be more controlled than expected as well as being ground-breaking and exciting.

Retiring Presiding Officer George Reid said Mr Fergusson was a ‘decent and honourable man’, while Alex Salmond said that there was enormous goodwill from across the political spectrum for Mr Fergusson, who possessed ‘formidable qualities’, adding in a touch I liked that we are living in ’interesting times’, which was a situation that had moved from being ‘a Chinese curse to Scottish hope’.
 
Labour’s Jack McConnell indicated that Mr Fergusson possessed the qualities inscribed on the Parliament’s mace: ‘justice, wisdom, compassion and integrity’, while as part of an elegant tribute Conservative leader Annabel Goldie said: ‘We have been lucky in having two exceptional Presiding Officers in this parliament.  I believe in you we will have a third.’
 
In his turn Mr Fergusson praised his predecessor George Reid: ‘He has set an impeccably high standard and has been a shining example for all who follow in his footsteps.’
 
The two deputy Presiding Officers elected were Alasdair Morgan of the SNP and Trish Godman of Labour.

 

WHITHER THE REFERENDUM?

For the time being an actual referendum on Scottish independence itself is on hold.  However, by simply being in government, the SNP is able to draw on resources that it has never been able to do before.
 
Now should start a massive campaign of education about independence – it is in Scotland’s interest that when a referendum is finally held the people themselves should make an informed choice.
 
The SNP should also use this interim time to inform itself and organise for such a vote.

Incidentally, it is still, it appears, the legal position that London alone should instigate such a referendum.  Such a position cannot be long sustained.

I am indebted to Councillor Tom Johnston of Cumbernauld, who in a letter to The Herald newspaper of Monday 14 May points out the opposite and intriguing legal position in Northern Ireland.
 
He writes: ‘Already, under the 1998 Belfast Agreement, Section One, the British state formally recognises “the legitimacy of whatever choice is freely exercised by a majority of the people of Northern Ireland with regard to its status.”
 
‘Schedule One of the Belfast Agreement allows the Secretary of State to hold a referendum on Northern Ireland leaving the UK.  The Secretary of State “shall” exercise this power “if at any time it appears likely to him that a majority of those voting would express a wish that Northern Ireland should cease to be a part of the United Kingdom and form part of a united Ireland.”
 
‘Schedule One also allows for repeat polls on this issue every seven years.
 
‘Clearly, too, the timing of a united Ireland referendum will be decided by the expressed will of any future Irish nationalist majority and not by the state.’

Fascinating stuff, which no doubt will be highlighted many times over the next four years.

SPINNING THINGS OUT FOR OIL 

History is on the march – but will it march fast enough for Scotland?
 
It is now pretty clear that the independence of small nations is part of the historical process.  From Norway in 1905 to Montenegro in 2006, small countries throughout Europe have become free.  The same will happen in Scotland.
 
Sadly, dominant states rarely accept this process with good grace.  In the case of the British state there is a further reason to hang on to Scotland for as long as possible, and that is the fabulous wealth that oil brings to the London government.

Our oil wealth for the last thirty years has been squandered and frittered away by London – initially, in the 1970s, by Labour to pay for massive debts incurred by Tory and Labour governments; then, by Conservatives, to pay for unemployment benefit; and finally, by New Labour to pay for vainglorious and questionable wars.
 
We probably have about 30-40 years of oil revenue still to come.  It would be a tragedy indeed if all this revenue were still to be squandered by London, rather than to be used to kick-start the new Scotland and to fund massive infra-structure improvements and build a fund for future generations, on the sensible Norwegian model.

London has successfully conned the Scots out of oil wealth for years. It looks, sadly, set to continue. The oil is not essential for wealth, as many other small independent states have shown.
 
But what a bonus it would be!