I DID not always support independence for Scotland. I arrived in Glasgow from Belfast in 1997, and at that point I was trying to escape nationalism.

I'd been raised in Belfast during the Troubles and, like many of my generation, I didn't want anything to do with nationalists of any hue.

Over the following decade my position began to soften, mainly from speaking to ordinary Scots who supported independence.

The tipping point for me was the General Election in 2010. Since then, Scotland's been governed by Tories it did not elect.

It's not right that Scotland doesn't get the government it votes for and that democratic deficit is my number one reason for supporting independence.

TELL US WHAT SCOTTISH INDEPENDENCE MEANS TO YOU

I was already an activist by 2016, when the Brexit vote highlighted Scotland's democratic deficit even more dramatically, and it has only made me more determined.

Now, I'm the Dad of two wee Scots and it's clear to me that they deserve much more than the UK is willing to offer them.

Austerity and Brexit have made the UK smaller, meaner and lonelier. Ironically, having seen the worst of nationalism in Northern Ireland, I am seeing it again now.

But this time the nasty, divisive nats aren't in the independence movement, they're in the Conservative Party and the Brexit movement. Scotland can only do better, and it must.

So, it's not about identity for me.

After two decades living and working in Scotland, marrying a Scottish girl and raising a Scottish family, I'm still Irish, and content with that. Independence is about democracy.

TELL US WHAT SCOTTISH INDEPENDENCE MEANS TO YOU

If Scotland is a country, then the people of Scotland should decide how to run it. Brexit and austerity are two horrendous examples of the kinds of disasters a people can be subjected to when their government is not accountable to them.

Only independence, and taking responsibility for ourselves, will give Scotland the government it votes for, and the power to hold them to account.

Only independence will give the Scottish Government the power to build the Scotland which all Scots deserve.

David Tam McDonald

Musuem educator, Eastwood