by Caron Lindsay, co-editor of Liberal Democrat Voice
When Scottish voters go to the polls on Thursday, what outcome would give them the most power?
Every year I watch the Tour de France avidly. Cyclists spend three weeks cycling around France climbing gruelling mountains, tackling death-defying descents and negotiating treacherous cobbled roads. And one guy finishes at most a few minutes ahead of everyone else.
The three-year Scottish independence campaign feels like that. We've had intense and often divisive debate, but the country seems to be divided almost equally.
The Yes campaign, with its froth and party atmosphere, has failed to convince half the nation that independence is a risk worth taking. The No campaign has been serious and po-faced, offering no melody to go along with its bass notes. So what is the voter to do?
I'm a liberal. I like change. I like breaking down barriers and challenging the establishment. It's what we do. I want to see a free, caring and compassionate society which has social justice at its very heart.
My worry is that while the Yes campaign talks about protecting the vulnerable, the reality of independence would leave those people worse off.
Experts say we'd need an extra £6 billion a year to finance our public services. What would be cut, which taxes would be raised to plug that gap? Yes won't tell us anything other than it'll all be fine. Scrutiny is dismissed as scaremongering. A Yes vote locks us in to a risk-strewn path from which we will never be able to escape.
Your Yes vote hands even more power to an SNP establishment which has put armed police on our streets and enabled unregulated, widespread stop and search. Who knows what they would do with counter-terrorism powers. I certainly don't want to find out.
Of course voters in an independent Scotland could boot the SNP out, but a No vote keeps all options, including independence at some later date, open.
A No vote gives the voter, not the politicians or the establishment, maximum power. A No vote means that from Friday, voters will be properly able to hold all the political parties to their promises. The three pro-UK parties will have to deliver more powers.
The legislation is on schedule to be passed by the 2016 Scottish Parliament elections. If they don't deliver, then voters can deliver the kick up the backside they will truly deserve by giving another overall majority to the SNP.
I seriously doubt that in that situation Alex Salmond would be able to resist holding a further referendum. Nobody takes his "once in a lifetime" pitch seriously.
Does anybody really think that half the country will just forget about campaigning for independence if they lose? Of course not. I wouldn't if I were them. After all, I've not lost my enthusiasm for liberalism after numerous electoral defeats over 30 years.
More powers is only part of the challenge facing these parties. They will have to show, by actions as well as words, how greater social justice can be delivered across the whole UK. All governments have been found wanting in that regard. We need the sort of vision that built the welfare state and the NHS to tackle the problems we face together.
A No vote puts the UK on probation. However, it also puts pressure on the SNP and the Scottish Government. It means that they will have to deliver on things that matter to people. It will also challenge them to create a more credible, inclusive, more appealing vision for independence.
For all the claims of positivity, the Yes campaign in this referendum has division and negativity at its heart. When Alex Salmond talks about the case against independence being the case against Scotland, or an SNP Councillor calls Secretary of State Alistair Carmichael a "supposed Scot", that encourages the sort of people who poured lemonade over a No campaigner the other week, or who shout abuse in the street and across the internet to anyone who disagrees with them.
When I told my Facebook friends why I was voting no, a real life friend wrote: "The names of the traitors have been duly noted."
That sort of talk, even in jest, makes people uneasy and fearful for the freedoms we all hold dear. If I were convinced that life would be better for the vulnerable in an independent Scotland and that the new country would have liberalism and pluralism at its heart, I might even be persuaded to support it.
The result is going to be scarily close on Friday. Yes puts us on an irreversible path to an independence that a couple of decimal points short of half the population opposes. A No vote offers a wide and inspiring range of options and puts the Scottish people, in the driving seat.
The message for the final few days should be that if you want to see beneficial change, to call the shots on how Scotland and the UK develop over the next few years, you need to vote No.
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