SCOTLAND voted to Remain in the European Union – but more than one million of us marked their ballot papers for Leave.

Five years on, Leave voters have told the Sunday National they don’t regret it, they’d do it again and they’re tired of being left out of the national conversation on life after Brexit.

“There’s definitely not a voice for the ones who voted to Leave in Scotland,” says Paisley woman Bella, who asked us not to use her last name. “I know a lot who voted to Leave – most of my friends and contacts did. It’s not because we are anti-other nations, though you can get those nasty groups of people who say we are. My son is married to a girl from Africa and my brother to a girl from the Philippines. I love speaking to people from other nations and learning from them.

“We had been losing control,” she went on. “Brussels would decide what was best for an island up north – we complain about Westminster doing that but it’s even worse when it’s Luxembourg.”

Dundee anti-poverty campaigner Ewan Gurr is a member of Restore Scotland and counts himself as “a double ooter”, seeking independence for Scotland outwith the EU. “In 2016, I asked myself ‘do I feel our voice is adequately represented?” he says. “I felt the European Parliament was not as democratic a system as it could be and came to the position that the institution was unreformable. I feel the same way about Westminster. How can you rail against unelected bureaucrats in the house of Lords but you can’t rail against unelected bureaucrats in Europe?”

Renfrewshire man Craig – who also asked to withhold his surname – is an ex-SNP member who says Yes must not be treated “like a monolith”. “There is a range of opinion out there and one of those is that we are better off outside the EU,” he says. “I cannot understand the logic of staying inside one political union while trying to leave another. It just doesn’t add up to me when there are other ways of doing European politics, as we can see with bodies like Efta [European Free Trade Association].

“I wouldn’t like to see Scotland reenter the EU in the future. I don’t see what the point would be if the rest of the UK is outside it because you then create another problem for trade and the movement of goods and people.”