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Leftwingers face off over independence debate at Star Scottish conference

Those on both sides of the referendum meet and debate in Glasgow

Left-wing supporters of both sides in the independence referendum challeged each other yesterday at a packed Morning Star Scottish conference in Glasgow yesterday.

Convener of Yes Scotland Dennis Canavan said: “I don’t imagine there will be a socialist revolution in the aftermath of a Yes vote. But independence gives us a huge opportunity to do things differently and better.”

He said the Commonweal proposals from the Jimmy Reid Foundation were ideas of economic self determination which the left could agree on “but the basic question is how to achieve this.”

Scottish Green Party Zara Kitson said the tribal nature of politics was a turn off for her as a young person and a woman.

“The SNP white paper is only one vision,” she said. “After a Yes vote we can move on and create further change together.”

Left Labour MSP Neil Findlay said it was vital to consider the real consequences of a Yes vote.

“What is actually proposed in the white paper and will it help or hinder the fight for economic self-determination?” he asked.

“How can we build economic self-determination when our economy will be controlled by firms outside our sphere of influence; when the currency is controlled by the Bank of England and when we will be engaged in a race to the bottom on corporation tax with the other nations of the UK?”

GMB Scotland political officer Richard Leonard said: “If we want to change the relations between capital and labour we have to challenge capital where it is organised — and that is in the City of London — at UK level.”

Communist Party of Britain international secretary John Foster said that Scotland could not expect economic self-determination within the European Union.

“EU treaties require applicant states — such as Scotland after a Yes vote — to write neoliberal provisions and economic austerity into their constititutions.”

Cat Boyd of the Radical Independence Coalition challenged left opponents of a Yes vote.

“What is your plan for strengthening trade union rights, for getting rid of Trident, and for challenging the power of finance capital — what is your plan if we vote No?”

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