A NEW national campaign organisation to help win a future independence referendum on Scottish is set to be launched on St Andrew’s Day.
The announcement comes on the fourth anniversary of the 2014 plebiscite and amid continuing protracted negotiations over Brexit.
It also comes weeks after a poll revealed a majority of Scots supported independence with 47% saying they would back a Yes vote after the UK leaves the EU, with 43% backing No.
READ MORE: Yes activists welcome new campaign body fighting for independent Scotland
The Scottish Independence Convention (SIC), a voluntary cross and non party organisation, is to launch a fundraising appeal to provide staff and resources for the new group to be unveiled on November 30.
|The organisation will help provide a strategic vision for the Yes campaign, carry out research and media work including a fact checking and rebuttal service.
Convenor of the SIC Elaine C Smith said: “We don’t know when the next referendum will be but we know we need to start campaigning now.
"We know we need to be getting on the front foot with the media. We know we need to be harnessing the power of our grassroots organisations. We know we need to be preparing to take the argument to the doorstep and the keyboard.
“Four years after the last independence referendum there is still so much energy in the Yes movement but we need to harness it if we are going to successfully listen to and persuade our fellow Scots that the only safe way forward is to be in charge of our own destiny.
“The movement has successfully crowd-funded many initiatives since 2014. But this is the chance to take it to the next level.
"If we are serious about winning independence then we need to start campaigning on it now. And that means backing this fundraiser when it comes."
She added: "Make no mistake, we are faced with a stark choice. We can either be responsible for our own future or we can rely on the increasingly shaky and erratic Westminster set up to take us on a rollercoaster ride of chaos and disaster. Brexit - something the majority of Scots did not vote for - is just months away and yet Westminster is obsessed with infighting rather than the best interest of our country. It is clear now that Scotland going its own way is the only safe and sensible option.”
Supporting the move Paul Kavanagh, The National’s columnist, said: “I’m proud to be a part of this campaign. It’s time. Time to work. Time to build. Time to make our better Scotland real. We can only do it by pulling together, by collaboration and cooperation, because the way we campaign for our better Scotland will define that Scotland once we win it. This is our Scotland, and it contains multitudes.”
A spokeswoman for Women for Independence (WFI), said: “There’s no time like the present to make our case to the people of Scotland and to women in particular, that we can create a better future in an independent Scotland.”
A spokesman for the SIC said: “Having a movement-run independence campaign is immensely important as it will show voters in any future referendum that independence is about more than just party politics....It’s the people of Scotland who will deliver independence for our country and this campaign organisation will offer every support possible to show our friends and neighbours that no matter how they voted before, an independent Scotland can be theirs as well.”
The SIC is a stakeholder organisation for those who wish to see an independent Scotland. It's made up of Scotland’s national level pro-independence supporting groups, pro-independence parties and representatives from regional Yes groups.
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