Margaret Curran tells Labour Conference that people ‘were standing on Irn Bru crates’ talking about change

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Margaret Curran MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Scotland, gave a speech to Labour Conference today praising the successful no campaign. The full text of her speech is as follows:

Conference, my fellow Scots have spoken.

And we have said no to separation, no to division, no to the end of solidarity – and no to a false border being erected between the working people of our four great nations.

But I tell you what else conference – we said yes too.

Not yes to independence – but yes to recognising our interdependence, yes to cooperation, and yes to a strong Scotland inside a changed United Kingdom.

As we meet here in Manchester with the referendum behind us, the call for change that we heard on Thursday still rings out.

And let me tell you this Scotland – you have been heard.

That’s why I will not rest until you get all that you have been promised – not just more powers for the Scottish Parliament, but the full use of the whole range of powers to build the kind of Scotland we all want to see.

And I want to begin by thanking the people who helped us win the argument to keep our nations working together.

So let me pay warm tribute to Alistair Darling, to Anas Sarwar and to my friend, the woman who takes the fight to Alex Salmond every week in the Scottish Parliament, our Scottish Labour leader, Johann Lamont.

And let me give a very special and heartfelt thanks to a man who electrified this campaign.

Gordon Brown.

A son of Scotland whose speech last Wednesday, on the eve of the vote, reminded people what they were really voting for.

And let us say as a result of that speech we can be confident that the No campaign won this argument not through fear, not by default, but as a positive, patriotic and above all progressive choice.

But I don’t just want to thank the politicians; I want to thank the thousands of Labour Party activists and trade unionists from all across the United Kingdom who campaigned in Scotland and proved in practice what has always been our highest ideal – that we achieve more together than we ever can alone.
Conference, the result of this referendum was a decisive moment in Scotland’s story.

It is undoubtedly clear that devolution – Labour’s legacy – is indeed the settled will of the Scottish people.

But, conference, just as we could not be complacent during the referendum campaign, neither can we be complacent after the result.

We have to be honest when we look at the results and see that some of the people who think that Britain can’t work for them are Labour voters.

They are terrified of Tory governments, they are worried about the future of our public services, and they are looking at their living standards which have been ground down year on year.

We need to understand why they are angry and what we need to do about it.

We need to understand why, in areas like Glasgow, Lanarkshire and Dundee people feel so let down that they want to opt out entirely.

But let us remember this: the Yes campaign did not win.

They could not convince people that they could provide any real positive future for the people of Scotland.

But when we, as a movement based on partnership, community and co-operation look at Scotland today and see a country divided, we cannot be satisfied.

While the decision of the Scottish people is absolutely clear, I understand that many of my fellow citizens are hurting and they believe that progress on their hopes for Scotland has stalled.

Our most important task now is to persuade them they should not be afraid.

I know many good and decent people, driven by values similar to ours, who voted yes.

We may have disagreed on the means, but we share a very similar vision about the kind of Scotland we want to build.

And that vision can still be realised.

So if you voted yes because you wanted a fairer and better Scotland, then we can work together.

If you voted yes because poverty and inequality cuts you to the core, then come with us.

And if you voted yes because you want to build a movement to change our country, I say the Scottish Labour Party is not your opponent but your home.

Conference, in 2008, I lost the Glasgow East by-election.

It was a blow. Not just because of what it meant for our party.

But because we had lost people’s trust.

So I went into all parts of the community and I listened.

I listened to why people didn’t vote for us and what we needed to do to change.

And we won them back.

We need to do the same again.

And words are not enough – now is the time to act.

In the past two years in Scotland, politics has been in our streets, our shops, our workplaces, our hairdressers and our pubs.

And even on Irn Bru crates.

Not confined to Parliaments and committees.

Politics has been in every part of our communities and our country.

And that’s where it has to stay.

That’s why I will go to the ten constituencies in Scotland with the highest Yes votes and meet with Labour voters who opted for Yes last Thursday.

Because the campaign to change Scotland didn’t end on Thursday. It only started. And it needs to include everyone.

I’ll go wherever people will have me – pubs, miners’ halls, tenants’ forums, school gates, colleges, bowling clubs and bingo halls.

If you’re a community group tweet or email me and let’s talk.

And when I say let’s talk – I mean really talk – no media, no notes, no planted questions, no printed placards.

Just me and my fellow Scots talking about the future, until they’ve had their say.

And this has to extend all the way through our Party.

Which is why today, I’m also asking every Scottish Labour representative to join me in doing the same.

To go out into their communities and talk to the people who did not vote with us last Thursday.

Conference this is how we will heal our society and how we will rebuild our country.

And with Scotland’s place in the UK now confirmed, it is our responsibility to make Scotland, and the whole of Britain, the fairer and better place that Scots voted for last Thursday.

That means no longer allowing Scottish politics to be fuelled by grievance and blame.

It means coming together to work together to find solutions to the problems we face.

And it means being bold and radical in the approach we take.

Now that we have settled the matter, we have that opportunity to move forward with a plan to rebuild Britain so that it works for Scotland.

Addressing those issues of low pay and insecurity that so many people spoke to me about during the campaign.

With an increase to the minimum wage and an end to exploitative zero hours contracts.

Responding to the unfairness in our tax system by introducing a 50p tax rate so that those with the broadest shoulders bear more of the burden.

And taking on the powerful and calling out abuses when we see them, starting with freezing gas and electricity prices and fixing our rip off energy market.

That is what people expect a Government to do.

And, conference, under Ed Miliband that is exactly what the next Labour government will do.

Conference, it has been a long, hard two and a half years.

And I have to tell you I have enjoyed it.

The Scottish people have taught us a lot about our politics.

But people across the rest of Britain have done the same.

It was great to have the backing of David Bowie and David Beckham – but we were even more pleased to have the support of ordinary people from England, Wales and Northern Ireland, who overwhelmingly said in the closing weeks of the campaign that they wanted us to stay.

So please take this message from this conference to your towns and cities.

Thank you.

Thank you for saying that we have more in common than we have apart.

Thank you for standing up for co-operation and solidarity.

And thank you for staying with us throughout this campaign.

Friends, in this campaign, we argued that the better future for Scots lay in working together, in partnership with people across Britain.

Together pooling and sharing resources, building prosperity and addressing poverty and inequality wherever we found it.

Together, not embracing a race to the bottom, but arguing for and building social justice for all.

Together, uniting our movement and now our nations.

And, conference, we will look forward now to the new and better Scotland we can build together.

On Thursday, our cause was national unity, let our cause now be national renewal.

The vote is firmly over, the work of change must now begin.

Thank you.

What are your thoughts? Do you feel persuaded to trust Labour going into the 2015 General Election? Are you prepared to work with them?

Calls for unbiased Scottish broadcaster

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Following the Independence Referendum coverage by the BBC, there have been calls for a new Scottish broadcaster who will fairly report on political affairs.

Cargo Publishing MD, Mark Buckland, and writer Karyn Dougan have set up a crowd-funding page for ‘Freedom TV’, with the hopes of raising £6000 over the coming weeks:

It has been very clear in particular over the last year that the BBC’s news coverage is not only poor in quality, it is incredibly biased. We have all witnessed this. We have sat in front of our screens and watched the truth being twisted beyond recognition. This is why so many of us have cancelled our TV licences. Countless newspapers all at the beck and call of the editors in London, offering an inaccurate version of the current affairs happening in our country.

Enough is enough.

Freedom TV is the alternative broadcaster that Scotland so desperately needs; an internet TV channel that actually tells what’s going on. Covering current affairs, culture, grassroots activism involving people from all over Scotland and putting the media directly into the hands of Scots – Freedom TV offers open, fair, unbiased news coverage on Scottish affairs.

We have a crew already in place that has over 30 years of TV experience and multiple BAFTA Award winners among them. (Due to their day jobs within the media, we cannot reveal the names of those involved at this moment, for the risk of compromising their jobs. We hope you can understand this.)

We have big name guests and inspiring people signed up for recording the first shows in a few weeks,  interviewing artists, politicians, musicians, businessmen, journalists and we’re speaking to some of the alternative media groups you’ll be familiar with to get them involved – but this is not what this campaign is all about. We want to give the people of Scotland a voice.

We will be releasing an application process to put forward your idea for the TV shows you’d like to create. We’ll whittle these down to five and shoot these as pilot shows; our audience will then decide which go on to be regular shows. In this way it is YOU choosing what you want, instead watching what the current media think you SHOULD be watching. This will be at no cost to the creators who will be free to use our facilities. Freedom TV will be a platform for everyone to have their say. We want all of our voices to be heard.

To find out more, and donate to Freedom TV, visit Indiegogo.

Tommy Sheridan: Unity for Independence statement

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Posted on Tommy Sheridan’s Facebook page, 21st September 2014.

Over the last couple of days I have been inundated with thousands of facebook and twitter messages from disappointed YES supporters looking for a way forward. I am encouraged so many have decided to become politically involved and stay politically engaged. Leaving politics to the politicians is a recipe for poor governance.

Obviously I welcome those wishing to join my own party Solidarity. We have some of the best activists around and can be contacted at solidarityscotland.org New members are positive. However it is not enough.

What I am about to say is uncomfortable for a socialist like me. I oppose the SNP position on NATO membership, cutting corporation taxes for big businesses, retaining the Queen as a head of State, sharing sterling and other policies. BUT in order to maximise the pro-Independence vote in next May’s General Election I believe all YES supporters should vote for the SNP and all other pro-Independence parties should not stand if the SNP candidate will commit to fight for a new Referendum as soon as possible AND against all Westmonster austerity cuts to welfare and public services.

In other words I suggest we in the YES Movement promote continued unity by backing the most likely Independence supporting candidate at next May’s election. In concrete terms that means advocating an SNP vote to try and unseat as many pro-NO party supporters as possible. Let’s punish the reactionary and dishonest NO parties at the ballot box next May. Let’s punish the shameful Labour Party in particular for siding with the Bankers,Bosses, Billionaires and Millionaires to try and crush our dream of a new and better Scotland with an avalanche of fear and lies.

The Holyrood elections in 2016 allow for more socialist, green and diverse candidates to be elected. The Westmonster system doesn’t. If SNP candidates commit to fighting for a new Referendum and against austerity cuts let’s unite behind them. If successful then we should insist all pro-Independence candidates in the 2016 Scottish election commit to a March 2020 Referendum. This magnificent movement for independence and change can continue and grow. We have youth, energy and hope on our side. Hope can triumph over Fear in 2020. I realise some socialists will find it difficult to support SNP candidates. That is understandable. BUT the stakes are huge now. We cannot let down the 1.6 million who defied the threats and intimidation from the rich to vote for a new and better country and world. Unity is strength. Don’t let our differences weaken our cause. ‪#‎HopeOverFear‬remains our clarion call.

Tommy (My personal opinion)

How do we make 45% a majority?

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With over ten thousand people joining political parties in Scotland this weekend, it looks as though the momentum of the Yes Campaign has life in it yet. Many people are saying they feel more determined than before the referendum, more empowered to deliver change.

But the fact remains: at present, those who campaigned and voted for yes are a large minority. How do we make this movement sustainable, and inclusive for those who later down the line wish to join from the 55% of no voters?

Yes voters are still undoubtedly Scotland’s largest grassroots movement at the moment. “#Wearethe45” has been trending on twitter since Friday afternoon. Some have adopted this with the same gusto the Occupy movement championed “the 99%” a few years ago. And it’s a powerful image. Those who wanted change are angry and bitterly disappointed – and yet, if it’s possible, more energized than before September 18th.

But if we are to continue to hope for an independent Scotland, we cannot be 45% alone. It is not enough to wait for the oldest among us, who voted in droves for the Union, to pass and presume that then our day will come. We must not exclude those who voted no this time and then wish for a do-over. Most of us have regretted a choice we’ve made at some point: for me it was believing that the Lib Dems could be trusted as an alternative choice in 2010.

It is beyond frustrating that only 3 days after the referendum we are seeing no voters regret their decision. But when ‘The Vow’ is broken (which I am sure it will be) we must not be the movement who chastises those who experience the same political awakening we have all felt. We must be the movement who says, “you’re here now. And that’s what matters.”

A post-referendum statement from National Collective

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We know that you are completely exhausted and utterly heartbroken. We are too.

On face value we lost, but there is more to the result than meets the eye and this was anything but a fair fight. Two years ago, we started off with Yes on a poll of 25% and yet we ended up with 45%. The sheer resilience of the Yes movement in the face of the full might of the British state, corporate and media power, that was designed to demonise, smear and alienate anyone who chose to side with it will not die down. We’ve been looking straight into the eyes of the British establishment, and we don’t think much of what we see sneering back at us.

From the very beginning, the then ‘Better Together’ turned ‘UKOK’ turned ‘No Thanks’ campaign threw every toy out of the basket, played every dirty trick in the book, and ran a campaign based on negativity and scaring the population into thinking that we were not actually capable of running our own affairs. What we were faced with was a campaign based on stifling engagement, dumbing down politics and deadening thought whilst portraying a No vote as the rational, educated and realistic option.

One of the most heartbreaking moments in the campaign will be a familiar one for many. Knocking on doors and being confronted with an elderly person who had postal-voted No because they were told that they would lose their pension. The No campaign had shamelessly managed to convince people that, in the 14th richest country in the world, we could not afford pensions. The fear tactics employed were sickening. They threw everything under the sun at us, but not once did it dampen our spirits. We canvassed, we danced, we wrote, we sang, we campaigned. And we will continue to do so.

Aside from the fear tactics, this was a campaign aspiring to deaden thought, simplify politics and close minds. #PatronsingBTLady proved an excellent illustration of such, as was the ‘I love my family, I’m saying No Thanks’ billboards, and let’s not forget the ‘independence stresses me out’ stress balls handed out at freshers fayres. This is how they see us. They think we are passive, disinterested, selfish and stupid. In contrast, National Collective toured the country on Yestival, Radical Independence knocked on tens of thousands of doors in a day on their Mass Canvasses, tens of thousands of activists reached out to apathetic communities through local groups, Generation Yes ran open platforms on social media where young people could ask us anything – the entire Yes movement was about encouraging people to think and imagine.

Despite the ‘Better Together’ campaign being what is unquestionably one of the most incompetent political campaigns in the history of British politics, what hindered the steady surge to Yes was a largely compliant mainstream media. For example, a Guardian journalist sent us sarcastic e-mails refusing to publish details of a list of 1,300 prominent artists and creatives who had signed a letter backing a Yes vote, Dr John Robertson’s academic work proved the evident systematic bias of the BBC, and we were constantly demonized as anti-English separatist nationalists and, at times, ‘fascists’ despite many of us being English, and some of us knowing the journalists personally. If they cannot win through an honest factual campaign, what does this say about their case?

Aside from the blatant smearing of anything Yes, the press did something significantly more sinister. They controlled the dissemination of information, closed the space for Yes voices to be heard, and thus facilitated and legitimised the scaremongering onslaught from the No campaign. How many times did you hear that ‘there are just too many unanswered questions’, despite the questions being answered? How many times did you hear that people were voting No because they didn’t like nationalism, despite us not being nationalists? To suggest that British identity is in no way nationalistic derives from a neo imperialist mindset. How many times did you see Alistair Darling and Alex Salmond compared to Dennis Canavan? How many people do you honestly think were aware that Salmond wasn’t the leader of Yes? This was most evident during the last week of the campaign, when we saw the Telegraph stating that voting Yes was an insult to dead soldiers and their families. The establishment’s compliant media was the cherry on top of the cake; a systematic abuse of power.

Did we let this deliberate misrepresentation and demonisation take us down? No. We became the media. Stephen Paton released his #IndyRef weekly reviews, websites like National Collective and Bella Caledonia became a space for underrepresented Yes voices to be heard, and we took to social media to overcome the smear and spread our progressive visions. We should point out here that the Sunday Herald, in supporting Yes, demonstrated courage throughout this movement. It’s not easy to go against the tide of mainstream media opinions and portrayals. The Yes movement should be incredibly proud of our ingenuity and tireless determination and we mustn’t let it dwindle.

Within the political landscape of the No campaign, Scottish Labour provided the front whilst the Tories pulled the strings and supplied the funds. If they were honest democrats, Scottish Labour should have held an election within their party regarding which stance to take on the referendum. The Scottish Green Party for example voted on it, and maintained that members who supported No could speak freely on the matter. This was the first indication that Scottish Labour were about to ostracise those demonstrating autonomy in their party. And boy did that happen. They were openly seen and heard mocking Yes supporting Labour members at their party conference.

Despite Scottish Labour supporting a No vote, around 38% of their voters supported Yes. The Scottish Labour Party ignored their own supporters, and instead blindly persued an agenda that panders to the Labour Party in Westminster, a party that is out of touch with the people of Scotland and one that they have overwhelmingly rejected. One of the results of this is that we are now witnessing memberships of the SNP, the Scottish Green Party and the Scottish Socialist Party skyrocket overnight. Scottish Labour have risked alienating 38% of their own vote in Scotland to preserve a failing Westminster elite. This highlights how little regard they have for the Scottish political landscape. True power, they believe, lies at Westminster.

Taking all of this into consideration, and acknowledging that we were challenging the full force of the British establishment, their corporate might and their compliant media, we did bloody well. If we were at the forefront of a campaign with that level of influence, power and money, we would see a 55% as an international embarrassment.

Part of the reason that we saw the groundswell of grassroots activism that we did is because there was a deadline, a common shared goal for September 18th 2014. Although the deadline has been removed, we still have that shared aspiration. The question now is how to we encapsulate and maintain the momentum of this progressive, diverse, grassroots movement?

The first means of achieving this is clear. The vast majority of the mainstream media have demonstrated their complete lack of autonomy and level of compliance to the British establishment and the corporate elite. We need to create and preserve alternative media channels. But there is little point in creating them as a protest to the mainstream media. These alternative channels must become the mainstream. To do so requires working together. There are some utterly brilliant and resourceful people in this movement. It’s time to unite.

Secondly, we need to organise ourselves with the common aim of holding Westminster accountable to the promises that they made to us. This starts with their pledges for further devolution. We expect that this won’t happen. 1 in every 4 No voters casted their vote under the promise of further devolution. If these promises fail to transpire, we will seek to secure a date for the next referendum on Scottish independence. We have various options as to how we can help make this happen, and we will update you on this later should it be required.

Thirdly, as stated above, the Yes movement seeks to make people think. It is our duty to continue to create a politically engaged, educated electorate. What Westminster want is a Yes movement that is so utterly deflated that it regresses into the shadows, it stops dreaming, it stops imagining that another Scotland is truly possible. There is a reason why the likes of Rupert Murdoch expressed concern at the influence of progressive Yes groups in Scotland.

We simply cannot afford to let our beautiful movement regress. 1.6 million of us stood up and dared to dream. We lost by the equivalent of the population of a small city. We can win this, we must win this, we will win this. When you get a popular revolution driven by hope and optimism like this, that energy will not dissolve into nothing. It can only grow. In the aftermath of a normal election, the losing party is disheartened and their supporters deflated. The difference here is that the whilst the official No campaign has finished and will no doubt try to delete all evidence of it ever existing, people still make the Yes movement and we will continue to campaign and dream. We will always put hope over fear.

National Collective had made plans to continue the Yes movements legacy of a politically engaged and educated electorate, regardless of the result. We will be announcing details of this shortly.

Keep imagining a better Scotland.

National Collective