On referendums, and when you have them
Jul. 31st, 2015 10:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andrewduckerThere's an ongoing fuss being made intermittently in the newspapers, about when, where, and how any future Scottish Independence referendum would occur.
The papers are, as always, wanting shiny headlines. And also, apparently, craving some kind of certainty. They want to know exactly when, and how everyone is going to react, and what is going to happen.
And the answer to that has seemed fairly simple and obvious to me, and made clear by Nicola Sturgeon today - the next referendum will happen if it looks like a clear majority of Scottish people want to be independent.
Because there is absolutely no point the SNP holding a referendum that they will lose, and they know this. The first referendum was there as a way of _possibly_ getting independence, but it never looked very likely apart from a few moments in the final stages. Support, when they first proposed a referendum, was in the high 20s/low 30s. But having the referendum meant being able to have a very public conversation and shift the window of public opinion.
Having done that, there's nothing more to gain unless something happens which shifts public opinion significantly - to at least 55% Yes, if not more.
"No politician can impose a referendum on Scotland, no matter how much some of us would like Scotland to be independent," argues Sturgeon, but "if the Scottish people do vote in future to have another referendum, no politician has the right to stand in their way."
The papers are, as always, wanting shiny headlines. And also, apparently, craving some kind of certainty. They want to know exactly when, and how everyone is going to react, and what is going to happen.
And the answer to that has seemed fairly simple and obvious to me, and made clear by Nicola Sturgeon today - the next referendum will happen if it looks like a clear majority of Scottish people want to be independent.
Because there is absolutely no point the SNP holding a referendum that they will lose, and they know this. The first referendum was there as a way of _possibly_ getting independence, but it never looked very likely apart from a few moments in the final stages. Support, when they first proposed a referendum, was in the high 20s/low 30s. But having the referendum meant being able to have a very public conversation and shift the window of public opinion.
Having done that, there's nothing more to gain unless something happens which shifts public opinion significantly - to at least 55% Yes, if not more.
"No politician can impose a referendum on Scotland, no matter how much some of us would like Scotland to be independent," argues Sturgeon, but "if the Scottish people do vote in future to have another referendum, no politician has the right to stand in their way."
