Why There Must be a Plan B

The SNP want Scottish Independence. I suspect that's not a controversial statement. They also very much want that to come about as a result of a binding referendum, held under the authority of a Section 30 Order from Westminster. And I agree that that would be the ideal way forward - the two sides agreeing the terms of the contest, and then the people of Scotland being given the decision to make.

But...

Given the way the polls stand it would be the height of folly to assume that Westminster will grant that Section 30 Order, regardless of the outcome of the election next year. Indeed, the stronger the showing by the SNP, the greater the motivation for Westminster to try to avoid a referendum.

The thing is, if the polls are at all accurate (and a long sequence of similar results suggests they are), then it is likely that the PM who grants a Section 30 Order will go down in history as the PM who ended the United Kingdom. (Of course, that may be inevitable. Were I the leader of Sinn Fein, I would be biden my time until late January, and then calling loudly and long for a poll on Irish reunification. The strict terms for holding one have been met, and with the new President being a huge friend of Ireland, indeed considering himself to be Irish, Westminster probably couldn't resist that one. And with Brexit causing at least some pragmatic Unionists to value the economic benefits of remaining in the EU over the emotional pull of remaining in the UK, we may well be at, or very close to, the tipping point.)

Anyway, back to Scotland...

If we accept that there is at least the possibility that the PM of the day will just say no, regardless of the democratic will of Scots, then there must be a Plan B - what are the SNP going to do next?

Now, at this point the First Minister's loyalists will advise people just to trust Nicola, assuring them that she has a plan, and that all will be well. But there's a problem with that...

Even if we accept that Nicola does indeed have a Plan B, primed and ready to spring into action should Boris (or his successor) refuse a Section 30 Order, she will need to have a mandate to carry it out - it will have had to go before the electorate and been endorsed (or rejected, of course - but in that case all of this becomes moot).

It's not enough to have a Plan B for what happens if the Section 30 Order continues to be refused. That Plan B must be in the manifesto.

#54: "Sharpe's Regiment", by Bernard Cornwell