Indy ref: There’s no man with a plan for the rest of the UK

Still suffering from jet lag and with no obvious Plan B in mind I quickly opted for my preferred Plan A and stretched out on the sofa for a night of TV binge-watching.

I chose to watch Scotland Votes: What’s At Stake For The UK? presented by renowned Scottish journalist and TV presenter Andrew Neil on BBC 2.

It was a brilliant piece of TV. Straightforward and concise, unbiased (which is rare these days from the Beeb), balanced and, for those who cannot contemplate a split, very disturbing.

In just under two hours Scotland Votes answered more questions about Independence and what it might mean for rUK and Scotland than the Westminster elite has in two years!

Politicians of all parties, academics, statisticians and former advisors to UK Governments all agreed that in the event of a YES win Westminster has no Plan A, B,C, D or E in place for change.

In fact they have a capital F, for completely failing to engage, plan or cost in any shape or form Scottish Independence.

They may have now woken up to the real possibility that it might happen, but their sheer arrogance and fear that any exploratory discussions might be used as ammo for the YES campaign has stopped them from looking at how we would achieve a painless and peaceful transition.

There have been no preliminary discussions, exploratory talk to work out our share of the national debt, the welfare state, the NHS, pensions, fishing, tax, transport, Europe, oil, defence and nuclear weapons at Faslane.

The arrogance and contempt shown by Westminster is simply breathtaking, especially coming from a Government that has had more experience than most when it comes to negotiating a country’s democratic secession.

Even before Malta broke away, and that was a close run contest, they had started talks. Not here in Scotland, though. They have quite pointedly refused. They really do reckon a NO vote is in the bag so why should they bother?

They have promised all sorts of incentives and bribes. But Boris Johnson, who many expect to be in charge of the Tories come the next general election, and oily Farage’s UKIP, his expected coalition partner, have already told us to sling our hook for fear of an English backlash.

So the guarantees are not worth the paper they are written on. Have talks taken place in Westminster yet about what will happen if there is a Yes win?

When it comes to the next general election, it could put Labour in charge but have nearly 50 Scottish Labour MPs leaving Westminster half way through the term making them a minority Government. How are they going to sell that one to the electorate?

It is a total disgrace that discussions haven’t already started.

Even the Bank of England have drawn up back up plans, admittedly because project fear has suggested there could be a run on the banks, but at least they are putting plans in place to guarantee stability. No such joy with Westminster.

Now because of their intransigence, arrogance and fear of losing the vote, transition talks are in great danger of becoming protracted, expensive, bitter and divisive, dangerously feeding the bigoted ire of the English far right which already think Scotland receives too much support. They will also divide many Scots for generations to come.

It’s not the Yes campaign that has no Plan B, it is the visionless and arrogant “nawbaggers”. They can’t have a Plan B because they don’t have a Plan A and they’re being economical with the truth to say they have.

Either way, Yes or No, Plan A or Plan B, politics across the UK will change demonstrably after September 18, and that can only be a good thing. And we’d all better start planning for that change!