I’M off on my Easter holidays, and so are both parliaments. Last time there was an Easter holiday Theresa May decided while treading the windswept hills of Wales that she’d hold a snap General Election. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but then so did asbestos, those X-ray machines in 1950s shoe shops, and getting that cool Kung Fu tattoo saying “concentration, energy, power” in Chinese characters across your chest and only later discovering that it really reads “condensed milk powder” in Mandarin.

The election didn’t exactly work out as planned, but if there’s anything that we’ve learned from the UK Government’s handling of Brexit it’s that foresight isn’t their strong suit. Neither for that matter is hindsight, nor looking right then left then right again before crossing the road, which is why the UK is about to be crushed because of a bus with a lie about the NHS painted on its side.

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The one-year countdown to Brexit has now begun. This time next year we’ll have no say over fishing policy and blue passports printed in France, because we’ll have taken back control and that bus will have trundled off a cliff, taking the rest of us with it. The expectations of the Brexiteers will have been dashed even more quickly than it took the British establishment to go from “We love you Scotland. Stay with us and be an equal partner and a leading part of this family of nations”, to “You’ve got no more rights than an English county. Now eat your genetically modified Brexit cereal.” That’s not even hyperbole on my part. This week the UK Immigration Minister Caroline Nokes said that she wouldn’t grant any powers to the Scottish Parliament that she wouldn’t grant to Lincolnshire County Council, a marked contrast to what was said during the EU referendum debate when no less a person than Michael Gove had dangled the possibility of the devolution of some powers over immigration to Holyrood.

The Conservatives promised that Brexit would see greater powers for the Scottish Parliament, instead they are using it as an excuse to remove powers from Holyrood and to undermine the devolution settlement which the people of Scotland overwhelmingly voted for in the referendum of 1997. Unfortunately the media narrative in this country is driven by people whose greatest existential fear is that rich people might not be able to afford a third annual skiing holiday after Scottish independence, and because of that they refuse to challenge the threats to Scotland within this so-called Union in case it stokes up pro-independence sentiment.

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This coming year is going to be an important one for the Scottish independence movement. Things are already stirring, a sense of expectation is already growing. There is increasing activity amongst grassroots organisations, existing Yes groups are expanding their activities, old groups are reforming, new groups are being founded. Local initiatives are springing up, and local groups are reaching out and contacting one another to form regional networks in order to pool resources and share ideas.

Yes hubs are opening, there are now almost 20 in existence across the country and more are planned, giving the Yes movement a permanent presence in the high streets of our cities, towns and villages. In Angus alone, four new Yes hubs have opened within the past year. Other hubs are planned in other parts of the country. The hubs help to make the Yes movement visible in a country where the bulk of the media systematically ignores pro-independence activism. They act as a base for local campaigns, and they provide a space to host events and to plan activities.

This surge in activity and energy is happening in an entirely organic and bottom-up way. This is a movement which is growing from its base, not being imposed from the top. It’s non-hierarchical and at times anarchic, but it’s a movement that is comprised of informed and talented individuals who are sharing their skills, learning from one another, and who are not afraid to stand up and make a nuisance of themselves in order to make this a better country. They’re not waiting for anyone to give them permission to start campaigning for independence, they’re taking the initiative and doing it for themselves.

All of this is happening very much under the radar of the traditional media in Scotland, with the honourable exception of The National, but the fact that it’s under-reported doesn’t diminish its significance or its importance. This time next year Scotland will be facing Brexit day, but it will be facing Brexit day with an energised and enthused independence movement that has found its voice and its power. It’s going to be a good year for Scotland, and a very bad year for British nationalism.