MP Anne McLaughlin believes Scotland will be independent within a decade – and possibly sooner.
As one of the 56 SNP members elected to the House of Commons in May’s political earthquake, she will continue her fight for the country to become an autonomous nation.
“I have never been able to understand why people wouldn’t want Scotland to be independent,” she told The National.
“I think we will see an independent Scotland in ten years and I would be surprised if it took that long. I think if we were to say today we were going to have a referendum next year there would be an appetite for it, but not a big enough appetite. But I believe if things carry on with the Tories in power and with their austerity agenda, that appetite will increase.”
She added: “The Tories can stop the groundswell of opinion building up for a second referendum, but I don’t think they get it. They don’t understand the political independence movement and they don’t understand Scotland.”
McLaughlin was elected in the key marginal seat of North East Glasgow, overturning the Labour majority with a swing of more than 39 per cent, breaking the existing British record.
But as she fought the campaign, the stakes could not have been higher. She was standing in one of the most marginal seats, with one poll suggesting it would be the only Scots seat remaining in Labour hands – and she was also facing an enormous personal risk.
Having given up work in January 2013 to run the Yes campaign in Provan, she was living on savings and would have been financially ruined if she lost.
“A lot of people were saying 'you need to look for a seat with less of a Labour majority',” she said.
“If I hadn’t won, I would have become bankrupt. There is no doubt about that.”
Her triumph came after four earlier parliamentary campaign defeats and a by-election defeat.
But in the final weeks of the campaign she began to see that things may finally go in her favour.
“The people who came out were the people who had stopped voting altogether,” she said.
“I remember on polling day there was a family of five all crowded into a car and singing loudly, and they told me they had not voted for years. But they were going to do so that day for me and they were really excited about it, and I felt humbled,” she said.
BORN in Greenock, McLaughlin, 49, spent spells in Germany and Aldershot, in the south of England, when her father was in the Army, before returning to Inverclyde where she attended Port Glasgow High School.
A keen performer in school plays, she was one of just 20 out of 800 to win a place at the then Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, now the Royal Conservatoire.
Like most budding actors, after leaving college she made ends meet by working in various jobs, including doing voiceovers for broadcasting, teaching drama, bar and factory work, and also earned her living as an auxiliary nurse. Latterly, she was employed as a fundraising manager.
But soon after graduating her passion became politics, and after joining the SNP in 1988 she became active in the party and served as MSP between 2009 and 2011.
She said her acting experience had been vital in helping with public speaking.
“I still think of myself as shy, but I think the acting training helped me to come out of myself and to speak publicly,” she explained.
“I didn’t find it easy during the election campaign to be standing on a street with a microphone where anybody can come up and say anything. People were hanging out of windows to watch and listen to me. Some of them were cheering, but there were others shouting abuse and you never knew what was going to happen. But I knew how to fake confidence while I was trembling inside.”
As a SNP MP, she wants to champion a more positive attitude towards people requiring welfare support and to support those who have had their benefit sanctioned. Another priority is improving the built environment in Glasgow North East, where she will working with local groups to use the new Community Empowerment Act to convert derelict buildings into new community hubs.
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