Kenny MacAskill: We must mobilise the grassroots if we are to achieve Independence

THE Alba conference held in Edinburgh at the end of last week saw the party in good heart and readying for the vital Holyrood elections next year.

The conference had, of course, been delayed from last November with leadership elections brought about by a tragedy which befell not just the party but Scotland.

The loss of Alex Salmond was felt by all but, as was said by many, he would expect no less than that we maintain his efforts to deliver his dream of Scottish independence.

Alba will use the strategy he formed for the 2021 election of standing on the list only. It was the right strategy then and remains so now. We’re not turning the page on Alex but reading from his script.

Back then, Covid, along with siren voices demanding it had to be SNP one and two, drowned out the call to create an independence supermajority.

But it was the right call and Scotland would be a better place had that happened. We should have struck when Brexit and then Boris Johnson were foisted upon us.

A convention should have been called and our elected representatives should have been championing the sovereignty of the Scottish people. It was a missed opportunity but we need to go again.

But this time we must neither hesitate nor prevaricate. It’s the right thing for 2026 and indeed it’s essential. We were promised change in 2024, but the only alteration has been the extent of austerity which has morphed under Labour. 

The deindustrialisation started under the Tories is accelerating and hardship for communities and citizens is growing by the day.

That’s why next year is vital. Scotland needs to move for independence and Alba are laying out the how and why. 

The how is by making it a plebiscite election where every vote for Alba is a vote for independence and a mandate for it provided for by the election.

The Supreme Court ruling still allows for an election to be used, something even Margaret Thatcher recognised when she stated that if the Scots voted for it then of course they’d get it. That’s why this must be a plebiscite election. 

The why is not just the dignity of one of the worlds oldest nations being a sovereign state once again. It’s about showing people the absurdity of an energy-rich land having half of its citizens in fuel poverty, the perversity of a major oil-producing country facing the closure of its refinery with the devastation which will follow.

The tragedy for Scotland is not how bad things are. For sure, the levels of child poverty are scandalous despite the best endeavours of the Scottish Child Payment.

The shameful drug and alcohol death figures are a testimony to the despair of so many. But for many, if not most in Scotland, life is good even if not as comfortable as it should be.

The real tragedy of Scotland is how much better things should be. Comparable nations lacking either the natural bounties that Scotland is blessed with or without the same assets in the talent and ingenuity of our universities and industry have delivered so much more for their people and their countries.

Without independence, the gap between what others achieve and Scotland delivers will only grow. Under both Labour and Tory governments, Scotland is but a resource to exploit.

Our resources are taken while our economy is strangled and our environment trashed.

People realise they were lied to in 2014. A hard Brexit was foisted on our land, the “broad shoulders” of the UK more like a sharp elbow in the face, the security of sterling instead a plummeting pound and Britain being a force for good in the world supplanted by being a lapdog of the United States and complicit in the Israeli genocide in Gaza. It’s why support for independence is now higher than ever. The how and the why are needed, though, to make people realise not only that it can be done but that it must be.

Alba will be reaching out to other independence-supporting parties seeking to forge common cause. But we also require the mobilisation of the grassroots.

The real strength of the independence movement in 2014 wasn’t the numbers in Holyrood supporting the cause, welcome and necessary though they were to drive it on. Instead, it was in our communities, large and small across our land.

In the housing schemes and the arts venues people were galvanised by what might be, the hope and opportunity for a better land mobilising countless numbers who’d neither participated in politics, or had but let it lapse. That was what took us so close to victory back then.

That’s why the Alba Party will be reaching out to the grassroots Yes movements and groups. They are still there even if some have decreased in membership numbers and a few have been moribund for a while.

The need is even greater now. For too long they have been marginalised or told to stand down. Well no more. We need the grassroots to get back out marching, campaigning and knocking on doors the length and breadth of our land. 

They need to be respected not rejected. And Alba will be there with them, for it’s together that we’ll maximise our strength.

We in Alba grieved for our lost leader when we met. But we left our conference committed to delivering his dream. It was his goal, it’s now our duty. As was sung elsewhere, our land, so long a province, must rise and be a nation once again.

[This article was first published in The National on 31/03/25]