The case for voting Yes in the coming referendum Fellow Bankies, I dont know if there are any undecided or swithering No voters left on this debate page but I really hope that anyone considering their vote can find the information they need and the confidence in us to vote Yes. Heres my lame arsed reasons (as if anyone doesnt already know! :)) Ive lived in our town since I was born in 1967, with a brief excursion to Yoker, I think I lived 400 yards from Clydebank for 8 years. In that time Ive seen huge changes, Im not special, we all have. Our town has transformed from a dark and busy community of toil and industry, one with a very strong sense of itself to a town with its best days behind it, a history but little future, and all around us we can easily see the evidence in a shopping centre full of pound shops, loan sharks and clearance outlets. Other than public sector jobs the vast majority of jobs in our town are low wage, service sector and very poor security. If youve not got a job getting one is a nightmare. If youre young youre screwed. If youre older than your 20s or 30s youre screwed too if its a decent job youre after. Our town has lost its soul and the proud identity it had, an identity running through my family just as it does with everyone on here. Singers, John Browns, Fairfields, Babcocks, Galbraiths, the Big Co, the Argylls Clydebank regiment in the First World War, and Scottish regiments in the Second. The family lost many in The Blitz, but Im not special, most families did. My point is that like others on here I have Clydebank in my life and I am proud of that, moreso I care about it and care about us as the embodiment of our town. So when it comes to this referendum were all considering I want the best for my family, of course I do, but I am aware that the best for my family is the same thing as the best for all of the families I share a town with. A working class town. The things I began with, all those changes, losses and defeats, those werent accidents, freak occurrences or some aberration with no explanation. Our town has declined in line with the whole of central Scotland since between the wars when our specialism for heavy industry became something that the rest of the United Kingdom grew increasingly out of step with. Our town became more and more redundant and out of step with our wider economic context within the union, and our families became more and more redundant as factories and jobs closed and disappeared. Now we hear our policians and a few clowns on here, no sorries, blaming victims is a crap thing to do, blaming people us and towns like ours for their own demise. We are where we are because of our own fecklessness, benefit dependency and poor ability to adapt to a changing world. No. We are where we are because people in government decided that towns like ours and people like us dont matter. Tories weve always known about. Theyre rats in the rat race they adore. But Labour, we expected, hoped and remembered so much better. Government after government, blue or red, the decisions made far away reflected the needs of voters in leafy vales and wealthier worlds. Not us. Not my family, not my town. Not us. Not by Labour, not by Tories, support did not come because we would always give them our votes (or not) in exactly the way they expected. Our town declined and the folk we expected to represent our interests just didnt. So our jobs, pride and soul of our town all but left us. Who did get their interests represented? Its not hard to see and its not just our town or country struggling with it. Our United Kingdom government has become utterly entwined with corporate interests. Our government, regardless of who forms the government, acts primarily to protect those interests and explain that as representing our interests. It doesnt, look at our town, think about ur families. It just doesnt. Our government, no matter who we vote for, does not respresent our interests. Thats important, Im going to say it again, but louder. OUR GOVERNMENT, NO MATTER WHO WE VOTE FOR, DOES NOT REPRESENT US. The same can be said for pretty much everyone in the United Kingdom. Government is not performed in the interests of the people being governed. It has become nothing more than a committee for the organisation of the common affairs of the elite who grow more rich as we grow more poor. And yet here we find ourselves with our finger on a big red flashing YES button. If we press it we get to break our governance by a government that has not and cannot represent us. If we press it we get to attempt to form a government in our interests. I am voting Yes because this vote, this chance I have, and share with you is the one time in my life that my vote really matters. I share incredible power to change the world with all of you, and all I have to do is choose to put a cross next to Yes on a ballot paper. I dont know if we can build the country of our dreams, I know it will be bloody hard, but I also know that if I vote No then the long nightmare and slow death of our town, pride and identity will slide on into my future and the future of my kids. Bugger that. I am voting Yes because me, my mum n dad, my wife, my kids, my bloody dogs too, we could all be doing with hope for a better future as the centre of our lives, not being told in each day in new ways that we are redundant. Im voting Yes and I plead with you all to do so too. This is our chance to make it different.
Posted on: Fri, 25 Jul 2014 20:40:40 +0000
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