First and foremost I'm a mum. I want my daughter and her children beyond her to live in a prosperous, inclusive, progressive, liberal, Scotland.
That word liberal is a bit of a giveaway, however. I've been active in Liberal Democrat politics for 30 years, since joining as a curious 15 year-old during the 1983 election. I'm a federalist and my views on how Scotland's governance should work were very neatly summed up by David Steel recently: "The principle of home rule is different from devolution. Under home rule, sovereignty lies with the Scottish people and we decide when it is sensible to give powers to the centre on issues like foreign affairs and defence."
I will be voting No next year. I don't doubt that Scotland could flourish as an independent nation but I think that we benefit from being in the UK. The union isn't perfect, but the way forward is to work on that inter-relationship, not ditch it completely.
That said, I have quite a lot in common with many people who support independence. In the main, we want the same things for Scotland and its people. We want to see an end to poverty, for everyone to have a decent place to live, accessible, gold-standard healthcare and an education system which gives our children the skills they need to excel in today's world. We want a Scotland where our growing number of older people play a respected part in society and are looked after with dignity and comfort.
Where we differ is on whether we need to be an independent country to do these things. In fact, I believe that independence would hold us back from achieving some of these goals and I'll tell you why in the coming months. I want to look at some of the things I'm interested in like civil liberties, feminism, health, education and justice.
As a highlander, power concentrated in Edinburgh is as bad as power concentrated in London. I worry about the SNP and Labour instinct to centralise anything that sits still for more than 10 seconds, depriving local communities of a say in shaping the services they need.
The referendum campaign gives us the opportunity to think about the Scotland we want to see and make it happen, whatever the result of the referendum. I'll be looking at the Liberal Democrat vision and showing how Willie Rennie has led the way in making the home rule case and, crucially, has made clear to the SNP that there is a place for them in the discussions after a No vote.
Sadly, the debate so far has been mostly grumpy and fractious with occasional moments of inspiration. It's been full of spats about irrelevancies. Who cares if Salmond waves a saltire at Wimbledon? What else was he going to do? I don't want to be sweating over small stuff when my husband's retiring in the year we would become independent. I want to know he'll get the pension he's worked for all his life.
We are capable of so much better. We argued for months about the referendum process and all it took to sort it was to put a couple of grown-ups in a room for a few hours to come up with the Edinburgh Agreement. Both Yes Scotland and Better Together need to up their game. Yes needs to appreciate that scrutiny is an essential part of the democratic process that they should embrace, not complain about scaremongering.
Better Together is desperately in need of some heart, though. Alistair Darling introduced some more diverse and inclusive language in his July lecture but it's not there yet. One word I would get rid of from their lexicon is the word 'patriotic', a word that turns politics poisonous. We can safely assume that everyone involved on either side loves Scotland and wants the best for our country.
Recent polls bring comfort to both sides. The truth is that nobody can be complacent this far out. Remember that George Bush Sr enjoyed an approval rating of 91% 19 months before he was beaten by Clinton. Our basic instincts of self-preservation should tell us that both sides need to conduct this campaign in an atmosphere of mutual respect. We still have to live with each other, whatever the result on September 18 2014 and beyond. We need a campaign that enthuses and thrills, tugging on heartstrings as well as dealing with complex practical issues. We can't afford too many more false starts.
I'm looking forward to engaging in some feisty, imaginative and illuminating discussion and reflection here on Herald Scotland over the next year.
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