Define terms

Former Prime Minister Sir John Major has risked irritating everyone in Scotland with his intervention in the in dependence debate, saying we should have a referendum, but that it should be in two parts. The first part would be a vote to secure the mandate to negotiate, the second would be on the outcome of those nego - tiations. With all the things we have to live with at the moment, none of this should be an issue at all, of course, but the reality is that the 2014 vote did not resolve this problem, and the six-year-long, one-sided campaign has kept it alive as an issue. If a referendum did not resolve the issue in 2014, another vote, whatever the outcome, will not resolve it either.

So, John Major is right. Any vote in future has to be done in a different way, and it is worth just going back to basics and remembering what the purpose of a referendum actually is. A referendum is where the government ask the people for permission to take them from their current constitutional position, to some new position. In order for the electorate to be properly informed in their choice, they need to understand what that new position actually is. In 2014, we were given a vague and often contradictory indication of the rough direction of travel. We had the same problems in 2016. Politicians need to show more respect to the electorate and define properly what the alternative actually is, and the only way to do that is to negotiate it. Interestingly, George Galloway and his colleagues have come to more or less the same conclusion, asking for a Clarity Act.

If Nicola Sturgeon gets her majority of seats next May, the UK government should organise the first vote themselves in September 2021, to not let the SNP string things out for as long as possible. If they achieve a mandate to negotiate, star t talks immediately, and allow 18 months to complete them. We have to give people the clarity of information that they require, and indeed, deserve.

VICTOR CLEMENTS Aberfeldy, Perthshire