OVER recent months and weeks, much of the attention of the Yes movement has been concentrated on the – certainly important – question of how we get to another referendum.

What we have paid far less attention to is the more fundamental question of what independence is for, and what do we want to see happening in the independent Scotland that we are all striving so hard to achieve.

I have been involved with this movement ever since I returned to live in Scotland after two decades away. Before lockdown and prior to my recent stroke, I had the immense privilege of travelling the length and breadth of Scotland with the much-missed not-so-Wee Ginger Dug speaking to local SNP groups, Yes groups and independence campaigners. Despite the oft-repeated claims of the Tories and their Brititsh nationalist pals, in all that time I never met a single person who wanted Scottish independence because they hated the English. Indeed, very often some of the most committed and energetic local activists were English themselves. Neither did anyone want independence because they believed that Scottish people were better than anyone else or were morally superior.

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Time after time what is most striking about independence activists is that they are motivated by the recognition that there is a great deal that is wrong with Scotland – problems of poverty, of social exclusion and structural inequalities – and they seek independence in order to ensure that Scotland has the power and ability in order to address these issues.

The Conservatives hypocritically rail against independence supporters for supposedly being divisive. What they really mean is that they are upset that they can no longer parrot their “too wee, too poor, too stupid” guff in the pub or the golf club without being challenged about it. And all the while they support policies which entrench and deepen far more significant and damaging divisions in Scottish society, which divide the haves from the have-nots, the kids who have every opportunity from those who go to bed hungry.

Those are the divisions that really matter, not differences of political opinion which challenge the self-serving assumptions of the Scottish Conservatives. Independence is the means to address and to start to heal those wounds in Scottish society which have been created by generations of Westminster neglect and Conservative greed.

Of course independence is not a magic bullet. It will not solve all of Scotland’s problems overnight – or even quickly. We are currently living in a house which is in need of some serious repair. Independence is like a trip to the DIY store to buy all the power tools necessary to do the repairs.

We are still living in a house that is in need of serious repair, the difference is that we don’t have the tools and the ability to do something about it. Restoring Scotland’s independence doesn’t mean job done, and there’s no-one in the independence movement who believes that it is. Independence means that the job can begin. Despite what the Conservatives might tell you, we want independence not for its own sake, but because it is the key to unlocking the door to a more equal, fair and humane Scotland.