Alba Party is the key
But the need for a more radical independence agenda, a far more competent administration with integrity and probity, and a strategy which can deliver independence remain essential. - Kenny MacAskill in The National
Who could disagree? There’s an urgent need for a “more radical independence agenda”. That we require a “strategy which can deliver independence” is a truth so obvious it shouldn’t need to be stated. But should we be looking to Alba for these things? Is Alba Party’s offering radical enough? Does Alba Party have a clear and credible strategy for restoring independence?
Whatever the answers to such questions, Alba Party clearly isn’t selling itself to voters. Kenny MacAskill’s idea of radical is actually so conservative it once was SNP policy. It’s not markedly different from current SNP policy. Both parties seek a mandate from the people of Scotland. In both cases, what ensues from that mandate is some kind of negotiation with the UK Government. In the case of the SNP, these negotiations revolve around a Section 30 order. Alba Party is less specific, but there is nothing else the UK Government might negotiate other than a Section 30 order. And, of course, there is little to no chance that they will even do that.
Kenny MacAskill’s idea of radical is actually so conservative it once was SNP policy.
Neither John Swinney nor Kenny MacAskill offer a strategy for restoring independence. We know this because independence isn’t the endpoint of the strategy. Both strategies end well short of independence. Both strategies end at negotiations with the British state. If the British state declines to negotiate, the strategy fails. Both strategies put Westminster at the centre of the constitutional issue. Both strategies are ultimately and critically dependent on the British political elite behaving in a way that would be contrary to the nature of the beast.
If your strategy for protecting your chickens involved asking the fox to behave more like a chicken, you would hardly expect the chickens to be enthusiastic about your idea.
Neither the SNP nor Alba Party has started by reframing the issue. They are not even framing the issue with independence as the goal. Both parties frame the issue in a way that prioritises their electoral success and not the restoration of independence. Neither gives consideration to the practicalities of restoring independence. Because that is not the goal. The goal is to win seats in the Scottish Parliament, with all the rewards this entails.
When you remove Westminster from the calculation, put the people at the centre of your thinking, and define the destination as independence, that is reframing the issue. None of the nominally pro-independence parties has done this.
If you are clear that independence is the endpoint and fully appreciate where we’re starting from, then you can work backwards identifying the actions which got you to that place. What is the thing that makes Scotland independent? It has to be an Act of the Scottish Parliament. Before that there must be a Bill. Before that Bill can be introduced, the Scottish Parliament must have the necessary legislative competence. How does the Scottish Parliament acquire that status? By asserting it!
What is the thing that makes Scotland independent? It has to be an Act of the Scottish Parliament.
To be in a strong position to repossess powers over the constitution, there should be a mandate from the people of Scotland for the Scottish Parliament to take back power to legislate for an end to the Union subject to a vote of the Scottish people. How do we get that mandate? We use a democratic event such as the 2026 election. How do we make that election result in a mandate? We have all the pro-indpendence parties stand on an identical commitment to take back the power to legislate in matters relating to the constitution.
This is just a brief exercise in reframing and rethinking the constitutional issue. Neither the SNP nor Alba Party has performed such an exercise. Until they do, they will be pro-independence parties in name only.
Alba Party is in a unique position. It has nothing to lose by being genuinely radical. The party’s current troubles could be an opportunity to make significant changes. With a bit of imagination and courage, Alba Party could remake itself as the radical pro-independence alternative to the SNP that it always should have been.
Now is the time for Alba Party to embrace the #ScottishUDI strategy and switch from proposing a plebiscite election on independence to proposing a referendum on the powers of the Scottish Parliament. Alba Party has the potential to be the key that unlocks Scotland’s cause. Alba could take the lead on the constitutional issue and begin to put real pressure on the SNP. Is there anybody in Alba Party who will grasp the thistle?
"Neither the SNP nor Alba Party has started by reframing the issue. They are not even framing the issue with independence as the goal."
A key problems also appears to be that neither national party leadership really knows what independence means, which is decolonisation, and liberation from oppression, with one key mechanism - UDI. Which confirms their rudimentary understanding and that of the people still.
Which then brings us back to your linkage of these three key elements, Peter: UDI, Decolonisation and Liberation - as the most urgent matters for any colonised people:
https://peterabell.wordpress.com/2023/08/27/the-new-thinking/
On the positive side, despite their apparent absence in polling, the Alliance to Liberate Scotland will be offering their solution in May's election which is heavily influenced by, if not based on 'the new thinking'. And Liberation Scotland/Salvo still maintain focus on the complementary UN Decolonization process.
This also reflects Fanon's predicted rupture in the independence movement between 'legal' and 'illegal' tendencies, the former dependent on the domestic law and everlasting goodness of the imperial power plus 'rudimentary understanding', the latter on international law and a more considered appraisal of the colonial condition.
I'm not crying over the demise of Alba, given their ineffectual policies, as Peter describes.
Will the Liberation Alliance be any better, with their 'Independence, nothing less' slogan?
They claim they will force the Scottish government (if enough of them are elected to have any influence on that body) to declare UDI on the grounds that a majority of Scots electors have voted for this.
Is that enough for other countries to recognise Scotland as a Sovereign Nation?