BackScotland independence: Emotional appeals surge ahead of final vote
Former PM Gordon Brown's evokes Macbeth against independence on last day of campaigning; 'Yes' supporters march to Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow
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Glasgow: On the final day of campaigning over Scotland’s future, both sides made emotional appeals to wavering voters to come to their side.
Several hundred supporters of independence massed on the steps of Royal Concert Hall on Buchanan Street in Glasgow on Wednesday waving flags and banners.
“Yes we can! And we will!" they chanted. “Hope, not fear!"
Across town in a hall in the Maryhill district, there were more bagpipes and kilts, this time for the “no" side. Former labour prime minister Gordon Brown’s voice cracked as he exhorted voters to stay in the UK and emphasized the finality of Thursday’s vote. “Once it’s done, it’s done," he said, in an echo of William Shakespeare’s Scottish play, Macbeth.
“If you have any doubts, and if you don’t know, the answer has to be ‘no,’" Brown said, to cheers. To “people who were thinking of voting ‘yes’ yesterday, but are wavering today," he warned that independence would be “an economic trapdoor down which we go, from which we might never escape."
Three polls last night showed the anti-independence “Better Together" group backed by Prime Minister David Cameron and the main UK parties leading “yes" campaign by 52% to 48%, excluding undecided voters. All the latest surveys showed the gap was closing fast.
Painful thought
In the audience for Brown, 64-year-old Lynda Angerson’s mind was made up. “We’re British, that’s our nationality," the retired teacher said. “I just hate the thought our country’s being broken up."
Earlier, in the centre of the city, the “yes" side were confident of victory. Blair Jenkins, leader of the “Yes Scotland" campaign, told the rally they were part of “the largest grass-roots movement Scotland’s ever seen."
Sharon Jessop, 49, an academic, was born in Canada and moved to Scotland age 8. She said she’d be voting “yes." “It’s an amazing opportunity for a democratic and fair society," she said. “At the moment, we’re overwhelmed by the vote from south of the border. Forty percent of children in this city live in poverty, and I’m deeply ashamed of that. We don’t have the power to make the kind of difference we can make."
Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond, head of the semi-autonomous government in Edinburgh that pressed for the referendum, will address supporters in Perth today.
“Don’t let this opportunity slip through our fingers," he said in a letter to voters. “It’s the greatest, most empowering moment any of us will ever have."
Pound gains
Amid the threat of political and economic volatility, the pound was little changed in London trading today. Since slumping to a nine-month low on 10 September after a YouGov Plc poll showing the “yes" campaign ahead for the first time, sterling has gained. It was up 0.4% at $1.6334 as of 2:35pm.
Spain, struggling with its own secessionist movement in Catalonia, stepped up its resistance to the Scottish referendum, with Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy saying that independence votes were damaging for the European Union. Foreign minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo went further during a parliamentary debate in Madrid on Wednesday. “Secession would be a catastrophe for Scotland," Garcia-Margallo said. “It would start a process of balkanization that nobody in Europe wants."
When the latest findings were included, a poll of polls compiled by John Curtice at Strathclyde University put “no" lead at two points, 51% to 49% for the “yes" side.
Standing in the front row of the Buchanan Street “yes" rally was a dissenting voice. Elizabeth O’Sullivan, 72, held a home-made poster warning “Scotland becomes a banana republic". The independence activists next to her seemed amused, rather than angry. “My first husband was a Spaniard, my second one Irish," she said. “I’m international." Bloomberg
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