Competition blog: My New Scotland, Sunday Herald

We can’t seem to shake off this notion that Scotland needs its freedom. Braveheart. Flower of Scotland. ‘Free by 93!’ Remember that! Soon after we were lambasted for being 90-minute patriots. John Buchan would have agreed as he said, “The truth is that we are at bottom the most sentimental and emotional people on earth.” Well, certainly the case when our national identity is being debated.

Freedom for Scotland? Doesn’t this put it best? “Scotland will be reborn when the last minister is strangled with the last copy of the Sunday Post” alleged Tom Nairn. Ask a granny and she’d say ‘it woudnae be possible to strangle somebody wi’ a newspaper!’ Typically pithy, practical, and dour. A glass-half-empty worldview. McConnell at least tried to do something about the poverty of ambition, and then said what all the problems were, but nothing about what the ambition could be.

I’m with Tom Nairn’s assessment. We need to throw off our wee encumbrances. Our ‘cannae dae’ and ‘aye been’ culture. Its great there are signals of this abandonment already even with our in-by-the-pants-of-wan-seat Nat government. Why not have a Scottish Broadcasting Corporation. Why not have a seat at the UN?

Isn’t it odd that the Irish, Italian, Indian, Pakistani and now a plethora of diasporas find their new found freedom in Scotland? Yet Scotland’s own that find themselves with a perceived barrier to that same freedom. Like these entrepreneurial and risk taking immigrants we Scots need to reintegrate ourselves with some ambition and vision. What do I want Scotland’s freedom to be like? One that's moved on from subsidy junkie talk, and had some inspired grand dreams fuelled by hubbly bubblies on Great Western Road cafes. No more what’ll it cost us? What about the cost of staying on as constitutional co-habitees?

“Scotland's separation is part of England's imperial disintegration” said John Mclean. Of course a new Scotland means a new England, new Wales and new Ireland. A determined diversification rather than a homogenous huddling. Bring it on! Until the last Sunday Post wraps the last deep-fried mars bar supper in Scotland.