Referendum on Scottish Independence
Debate between Martyn Day and Stephen Kerr(7 years ago)
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Martyn Day
I would be quite happy to block the UK leaving—I say that unashamedly as a remainer. I hope that we can create a situation in which the 62% of the Scottish people can have their wishes respected. The Scottish Parliament put forward a sensible compromise position, which comes a long way from where I would start but allows us to stay in the single market.
Stephen Kerr (Stirling) (Con)
Having heard what the hon. Gentleman just said and his earlier description of himself as a democrat, what is democratic about overturning a referendum of the people of the United Kingdom, when on the ballot it clearly stated that the issue was the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union? He just said that he will do what he can to block us leaving. What is democratic about that?
Martyn Day
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments; I will come on to that in my speech. We have a clear mandate: 62% of the Scottish people voted to remain. We have a different constitutional opinion from the UK: we believe in sovereignty of the people, not necessarily sovereignty of Parliament. Our people have expressed a democratic wish and I am striving to maintain that. However, if we do not manage to maintain that position, we clearly have the potential for another route and a second referendum.
As I was saying, unlike the UK view of parliamentary sovereignty, the Scottish view clearly states that sovereignty rests with the people, so it will be for the Scottish people to decide. That view is well entrenched from the claim of right and legal precedent, but I want to bring us to a more recent one, because this debate is about Scottish independence and the referendum we held. People may remember the Smith commission, which did not live up to many of our hopes, but paragraph 18 of its report states:
“It is agreed that nothing in this report prevents Scotland becoming an independent country in the future should the people of Scotland so choose.”
That was signed off by all the political parties in Scotland —a very democratic position.