Summer Convention 2025 - An Eventful Day in Perth
The weather outside may have been dreich, but the mood indoors was extremely positive as over 100 delegates filed into the Salutation Hotel, Perth, on Saturday 14 June for the second gathering of Independence Forum Scotland’s Convention on Scotland’s Future.
As well as plenty of weel-kent faces from our inaugural meeting in Edinburgh in March, we welcomed several new participants, dipping their toes for the first time into Convention waters. Local independence supporters, many connected with the Perth & Kinross Yes Hub, turned out in large numbers, eager to see what the fuss was about.
For starters, they were treated to a tour-de-force from historian Stuart McHardy and architect Roger Emmerson. Their talk, ‘Wha’s Like Us?’, an exploration of identity, language and cultural issues, caught the audience’s imagination and gave plenty of food for thought.
Stuart and Roger emphasised that culture must lead politics, not the other way round. We must understand our history – not just the ‘official’ version written by establishment historians, but the people’s history. They identified aspects of our history which have been distorted, such as the Union, Jacobite rebellions and British army domination of Scotland post-Culloden.
Both were confident that we were belatedly making progress in education, and in civic Scotland’s attitude to Scottish culture. Some audience members were less sure, given the attitude towards Scotland of BBC and other media. It was a lively hour, with the debate continuing afterwards!
Convention participants then heard updates on the three topics discussed in the Spring: Land, Energy and Democracy. It was something of a whirlwind tour, but with plenty to take in along the way.
John Hutchison reported on the recent Community Land Scotland Conference, and also on the progress through Parliament of the Land Reform (Scotland) Bill. There was some pessimism amongst Convention participants about the prospects of the Bill achieving anything substantial, but we shall see.
John Proctor, Chair of Energy Scotland, outlined his group’s vision of a secure, decarbonised energy supply that would reduce the cost of energy and support Scottish innovation and industry. He also presented some propositions to the Convention.
There was unanimous support for
- the Scottish Government’s continued moratorium on new nuclear facilities;
- a call to the Scottish Government to push, pending the achievement of independence, for devolution of reserved powers over energy policy in Scotland;
- a call to the UK Government to expedite energy market reform, with Convention expressing concerns that large incumbent energy companies are subverting the process.
The Convention also strongly supported a call to the Scottish Government to establish a group of energy professionals, independent of the influence of large energy operators, to monitor the activities of the UK Government and its agencies regarding Scottish energy matters.
On democracy, Geoff Bush also gave us some decisions to make.
- Convention overwhelmingly agreed that regulation of media in Scotland should be devolved. Meanwhile, since the UK Government was unlikely to agree to that, the Scottish Government should consider establishing independent Scottish broadcast and print media.
- Convention called for reform of local government, with smaller, more local councils, coupled with a form of direct democracy modelled on Switzerland.
- Convention also unanimously supported Respect Scottish Sovereignty’s petition (PE2135) pressing the Scottish Parliament to incorporate the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights into Scottish legislation.
The afternoon was devoted to a wide-ranging exploration of Poverty and the Wellbeing Economy, a massive topic to which we’ll no doubt return.
Amongst the highlights of this discussion was a passionate and authoritative analysis by lawyer and activist Eva Comrie of the effects of poverty on her clients’ day-to-day lives. She argued that, in a rich country such as this, politicians should be aiming not to reduce poverty according to arbitrary targets, but to eliminate it entirely. However, she expressed doubt about whether our current elected representatives possessed the political will actually to do so.
On the Wellbeing Economy, William Thomson of Scotonomics provided an excellent introductory video with guiding principles. Craig Dalzell, Common Weal’s Head of Policy, emphasised the need for fundamental changes in our economic approach, and Annie Miller of Basic Income Network Scotland made the case for one example of the type of radical policy this might entail.
Convention members had an opportunity to discuss amongst themselves possible additional policy choices for the Scottish Government, both before and after independence. To round off the day, Eva and Craig were joined by Dave Thompson of Christians for Independence and Jim Osborne of the Scottish Currency Group for a sparky panel discussion with an audience Q+A.
What an eventful day! We’d like to thank not just our speakers, but everyone who attended and participated so enthusiastically.
