75 years fighting for Scotland

North Sea Tragedy

It was with great sadness that we learned of the appalling tragedy which unfolded off the Buchan coast last week, with a helicopter going down and taking the lives of the sixteen people on board. The nation has been united in expressing its condolences to those families and communities which are suffering as a result. The personal impact of the accident will fall heaviest on families in the north-east of Scotland, but it will fall also on other parts of Scotland and the United Kingdom, as well as further afield. The north-east, and indeed the whole nation has been united in expressing its deepest sympathy and condolences to the families, friends, colleagues and loved ones of those who have been killed in this tragic accident.

75 years fighting for Scotland

On April 7 the Scottish National Party celebrated its 75th anniversary. The last 75 years have seen Scotland and the SNP journey together. Throughout, we have always stood with and for the people of Scotland in achieving our nation’s ambitions.

The SNP has seen the election of our first MP, Robert McIntyre, in 1945 and Winnie Ewing’s historic by-election victory in 1967 that led to a steady increase in SNP MPs in following years. It has endured the low times following the 1979 devolution referendum and celebrated the highs of Scotland’s parliament reconvening ten years ago. The last two years have seen fresh landmarks in the SNP story, with the triumph at the last Holyrood election, including the election of the late and much missed Bashir Ahmad as the first Scots Asian MSP, and then last year’s epic by-election victory in Glasgow East.

When the party was founded few could have imagined the distance we have travelled in the years since, with an SNP Government now in place and an independence referendum planned for next year.

The sad loss of Neil MacCormick reminds those of us who have the privilege of serving in the first SNP Government, that without the support of the people, and the efforts of so many members over the decades, we would not be in the position we are today. It is that support and the strength and determination of the people of Scotland that will take us forward together.
Now it is time for the SNP and the people of Scotland to move into a new era, to look to the future, and to build the smarter, wealthier, and healthier Scotland that will take us forward to our rightful place as an equal and independent nation on the European and world stage.

An anniversary that won’t be celebrated

Recent days have also seen a very different anniversary, but one that was certainly not celebrated in Scotland. The twentieth anniversary of the hated Poll Tax’s introduction north of the border served as a timely reminder of the problems of Westminster governing Scottish affairs.

Scotland was used as a guinea pig for the Conservative Party’s failed experiment, with devastating effect. The democratic outrage of a party that had been rejected by Scottish voters imposing such an unpopular policy on Scotland, before the rest of the UK, is something which 20 years on has neither been forgotten nor forgiven by the Scottish electorate.

Whether it is unacceptable taxes or illegal wars the need for Scotland to be able to make our own decisions has not changed. The whims of a remote Government in Westminster have damaged Scotland time after time and only the full powers of independence will change that.