THE Scottish Liberal Democrat leadership yesterday saw off a grassroots revolt against the refusal to countenance a second question in the independence referendum calling for extended devolution.
Denis Mollison, a delegate from East Lothian, had claimed the party would pay a heavy price for insisting on a straight yes or no to independence, telling the conference in Inverness they were "in danger of being dragged into negativity".
At a fringe meeting on Saturday it became clear a significant number of LibDems would like to see a Home Rule option short of independence as a choice in the referendum, but when Mr Mollison submitted this as a topical motion senior party figures were successful in urging delegates to reject it.
The motion called on the leadership "to engage with the Scottish Government so as to get the option of Home Rule included in the referendum in a fair way," to run a "positive campaign in favour" of this option and to back the Scottish Government in seeking to give 16 and 17-year-olds a vote in all ballots, including the referendum.
But party president and Gordon MP Malcolm Bruce described the motion as "a naive response" and described Alex Salmond as the most "brutal, cynical manipulator in British politics". He said: "You would be playing into the hands of Salmond, handing him a get out of jail free card. He loses this referendum, he goes. Do we want him to stay?" Delegates yelled "no".
Mr Bruce had earlier likened an independent Scotland to South Sudan and other emergent nations, saying: "It was a sobering list of countries like Republic Srpska, South Ossetia, Kashmir, Basque Region, Catalonia, Chechnya, Greenland, North Cyprus, Transnistria."
He questioned why the SNP would wish to "disassociate" Scotland from UK institutions such as the BBC, the World Service and the Department of International Development which employs 500 people in Scotland.
He said: "Do we really want the world to break up into a growing list of tiny countries nursing their grievances through the international community?
"Before you consider the economically uncertain world in which we live and in which the SNP want to cut Scotland adrift, this is the confused international background we face.
"It is quite extraordinary that we should be considering cutting historic ties and launching ourselves into this maelstrom."
Argyll and Bute MP Alan Reid said Alex Salmond was simply seeking to muddy the waters and compared him to Stalin: "It's not who votes that count, but who counts the vote."
Alex Cole-Hamilton, who contested Edinburgh Central constituency in May said the First Minister had created "half-baked measures of smoke and mirrors" and urged rejection of the motion. But Galen Milne warned: "You are going to be seen to be denying people the chance to vote in favour of something which a majority support."
Mr Mollison, summing up in favour of his motion, said: "I want us to adopt a positive, distinctive position. Refusing to accept a second question on Home Rule is cutting off our nose to spite our face."
His motion – which noted "the party's long-standing commitment to Home Rule and a federal UK, the only major party in Scotland with such commitments" – was voted down in spite of his pleas. The leadership insisted that rejection of independence had to come first in a straight yes-no referendum and only then could there be a move towards a greater measure of Home Rule.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article