Pete Wishart MP in response to alex Bell

I’ m grateful to alex bell for his interest in my recent comments about the SNP depute leadership contest. I’ll leave his charge that I am an “outdated politician” for others to decide, although I can confirm I am indeed an “outdated musician”.

I think his main gripe is that

I did not speak out about the independence White Paper, which he largely authored. His document was the right case for the right time. Since then we have moved on and we now need to construct a new independence offering for the current political environment.

Unless the Brexit crisis implodes – not impossible – Scotland will find itself out of the EU as part of the UK in less than 13 months. We need to design an approach that matches the ambitions to rejoin the EU with brakes and checks inbuilt to satisfy Scots who voted to leave and remain sceptical.

Alex asks about currency and the post-independent Scottish budget, name-checking the chair of our Growth Commission, Andrew Wilson. I await with keen interest Andrew’s conclusions and will make my views on them known when they are released.

Borders – a fringe feature in the last Indyref – look likely to replace currency at number one in the unionist scaremongering charts.

Securing the UK’S borders and satisfying its self-defeating obsession with immigration was perhaps the main reason those south of the border voted to leave the EU. We should be prepared for this renewed line of attack and take a close interest in what is happening with the Irish border.

The last issue is timing and this is the key. We should only hold another referendum when we believe we can win it and have a new case that satisfies those Scots who were unconvinced last time. There is no doubt that as this Brexit disaster hits, more and more Scots will be reaching for the constitutional lifeboats.

It won’t surprise readers to learn that I disagree with Mr Bell’s pessimism about the prospects for an independent Scotland. Scotland practically invented the modern world and we have the resources and skills beyond the imagination of other small and medium countries. We will become a successful independent nation and no carping from the Alex Bells of the world will alter that.