Tens of thousands of Scottish nationalists are to fan out across Scotland, knocking on doors to find out if there is support for a new vote on independence that could make or break First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.
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“So today, we are launching the biggest listening exercise in our party’s history”.
Two million Scots will be asked their views on independence this autumn as part of the new SNP campaign.
Alongside the party’s new drive for independence, the SNP administration is already drawing up legislation for a fresh ballot.
But in a nod to her critics, Sturgeon vowed not to skirt the hard economic questions and said a specially commissioned SNP group would consider an independence policy program aimed at expanding the economy, cutting fiscal deficit and deciding a monetary strategy.
“It’s an unanswerable question, I just don’t know”, she said.
Sturgeon insisted the case for independence was about more than European Union membership, telling her audience: “Brexit is simply one illustration of the democratic deficit at the heart of the Westminster system”.
Her speech in Stirling on Friday morning took place nearly two years after the September 2014 referendum, which saw Scots vote by 55% to 45% in favour of remaining in the United Kingdom.
A second “no” vote would likely also be politically fatal for Sturgeon, one of Britain’s most respected politicians.
The Scottish Government has already set up a new business information service to provide advice and support for firms anxious about Brexit while a post-referendum business network is being set up with the Scotland Office, Scottish Trades Union Congress and business organisations to help shape future policy and support.
She will highlight 29 new or refurbished school buildings due to open to pupils during this academic year under the Scottish Government’s £1.8 billion Schools for the Future programme.
THE Scottish Government has this weekend officially launched another bid for independence, declaring the United Kingdom post-Brexit had fundamentally changed the debate of Scotland’s place in the world. “And sometimes, for whatever reason, having a baby just doesn’t happen – no matter how much we might want it to”. Labour now find themselves in third place behind the Conservatives.
Sturgeon, who said that she wished she would have had children if she was able to “turn back the clock” but not if having a family meant sacrificing her career. It is utterly unjustified and unnecessary.
“And second, important though the issue of European Union membership is, the case for independence is about more than that”.
Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale described Ms Sturgeon’s decision to go public as “exceptionally brave” on Twitter.
Her pitch today is that the case for independence has changed, and that she will not be seeking to win people over with the same lines used two years ago.
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“My view is absolutely clear, I think Kezia is a fantastic, young, strong, woman leader of the Labour Party in Scotland and she is doing a fantastic job in hard circumstances, having inherited a set of circumstances where Scottish Labour is at a very low ebb, and she’s got Jeremy Corbyn hanging around her neck like a millstone”, he said.
