Nationalists at least need to take the same line, even if it means being honest with voters, writes IAN SMART

 

I had a really weird dream last evening (I say evening because I fell asleep on the couch).

I was invited, in the dream, to sing, in full Highland dress, “The Bonny Lass o’ Ballochmyle” to an after dinner company.  I protested however that I would look ridiculous in full Highland dress and I thus found myself preparing to sing while wearing a lounge suit. Only on facing the audience did I find myself realising that this was more ridiculous than if I’d been kilted up. You’ll be pleased to know that at this point I woke up.

Now, whether you be a country maid or a happy country swain you can make of that dream what you will. I’m inclined however to think of it as a warning that there is no point in doing something half-heartedly.

That was obviously the thinking of the Better Together team when the leaked Scottish Government document about the financial challenges facing an Independent Scotland landed in their in-tray.

I have no idea what possessed the normally ultra-cautious John Swinney to write a sentence like:

“I expect that the Working Group will consider the affordability of state pensions as its work on fiscal sustainability proceeds” , but on any view it was always going to be disastrous if uncertainty about such a basic state provision was revealed as a possible consequence of separation. Indeed, if Labour had made such a claim the cries of scaremongering would have been deafening.

The boys and girls at Better Together didn’t put this out in a lounge suit. They waited their time, sat on their leak, and then threw the kitchen sink at it; publishing it in a way that then effectively wiped out coverage of the SNP’s own preferred GERS figures. Well done them.

I’ve said before that this campaign will be war to the knife and I can’t help thinking that this episode demonstrates the professionalism of one side as against the gifted (or not so gifted) amateurs at Yes Scotland. Faced with a potential equal opportunity does anybody think they’d have handled it as deftly and devastatingly?

On the Nationalist side, there are two public visions of the economics of an independent Scotland. There is the view that we’d be pretty much where we are just now, or possibly slightly worse off but with opportunities to improve. That’s the view of the Scottish Government’s own Council of Economic Advisers and the one articulated by Andrew Wilson  (“neither a black hole or a pot of gold”) in this week’s Scotland on Sunday.  And then there is the alternative “Joan McAlpine” view that we’ll be rolling in it; fortuitously able to have Scandinavian public services at American levels of taxation. All paid for by oil. And indeed even money to save up for when the oil runs out, not that it ever will.

The problem is not so much that  both these visions cant be true, it is that if the Nationalists can’t agree among themselves about this then it raises the question of whether they know what they’re talking about at all. That their hearts are ruling their heads. Just some less than others.

In the aftermath of Wednesday’s debacle we are told that all John Swinney’s fears of last year have somehow proved unfounded in less than twelve months. All of them.  Nicola has assured us that an independent Scotland will “abolish child poverty” and Eck and Mr Swinney are apparently planning to pop up in Aberdeen tomorrow to announce that they’ve just noticed, over the weekend, that there is even more oil than they previously realised. This looks like amateur hour and somebody at Yes Scotland should be telling them that. It just keeps the leak story alive for another week. Remember Healey’s first rule of holes.

They’ve apparently, finally, got the paving bill this week. A perfect opportunity to change the subject. They should get on with that.

But in the longer term they need to get a line on the economics of independence, any line, and stick to it. I say “any line” but surely better that of Wilson and the economists and indeed, privately, John Swinney. It has the advantage, not least, of being somewhere near the truth. And somebody with authority at Yes Scotland should be telling them that. And if no-one has the authority to do that then such a person should surely be appointed.

But then that would be no Yes man.

Ian Smart is a lawyer and founder member of Scottish Labour Action. He is also a Past President of the Law Society of  Scotland. Follow Ian on Twitter at @IanSSmart. This post was originally published on Ian’s blog.

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3 thoughts on “Amateur Hour

  1. “The problem is not so much that both these visions cant be true, it is that if the Nationalists can’t agree among themselves about this then it raises the question of whether they know what they’re talking about at all.”

    Mr Smart. How many versions of Devo plus are there? How many people within the No campaign can agree on a single level of devo plus as being the most beneficial to Scotland? How many within the No campaign believe that Devo plus should be devo minimum we can get away with to keep Independence at bay?
    As you say If a campaign “cant agree among themselves then this then raises the question of whether they know what theyre talking about at all”.

    Did I previously mention hypocrisy? Would this not be another fine example of it?

  2. “There is the view that we’d be pretty much where we are just now, or possibly slightly worse off but with opportunities to improve”

    This isnt true at all. It is not a version of an economic future shared by anybody in the Yes campaign this is in reference to the No campaigns think tank investigation into the cost of Independence being 1 pound per person per year.
    The Yes campaign mocked this claim by saying they would be willing to put up their 1 pound now to pay for their Independence.
    Spin and waffle is all the No campaign has ever argued with.

  3. Mr Smart,

    I am relieved that you ‘woke up’ at that point in your dream.

    I am not relieved that you fell into an alternate reality where Labour is good.

    Best wishes

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