OUR Scottish Future is to stage a major rally next month to make the case for a plan that makes Britain work for Scotland.
Welsh First Minister Mark Drakeford and Andy Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester are confirmed as speakers at the event to be held on June 1st in Edinburgh.
They will be joined by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar and comedian and actor Arabella Weir to set out the case for radical reform to political institutions across the UK.
Mr Brown said yesterday that the vision of a new UK can unite people in Scotland and across Britain who are looking for a better future.
Our Scottish Future was formed three years ago to make the case for Scottish devolution and for reform of the UK.
Last year, the Brown Commission published its report on the UK’s Future, proposing major reforms to Westminster, a replacement of the House of Lords, and further devolution across the UK.
The June 1st rally will aim to bring together supporters from across the UK to show the united demands for change both in Scotland and outside it.
Gordon Brown said:“There are many things we are divided about as a country, whether it’s over culture, the constitution, or on the economy. But we can all unite around a mission to change the UK and tackle the great challenges of the 21s century: poverty, inequality, climate change, and sustained economic growth.
“In our politics, people are looking for a hopeful message which shows how Scotland and the UK can work together.”
Mark Drakeford, First Minister of Wales and Leader of Welsh Labour, said:“The current union of the United Kingdom isn’t working for people in any part of this country we are proud to call home.
“We need a new, strengthened union, which guarantees that no one will find themselves unable to eat or relying on a food bank; facing old age or illness at the margins of society. A union which offers strong devolution for all parts of the UK; a union where all four nations are treated as equals.
“In Gordon’s report we have a blueprint for real and lasting change to transform our country for the better.”
The Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham said:“Just like Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, the North of England has suffered from an over-concentration of political and economic power in the South East of the UK.
“This is changing with the devolution of power out of Westminster but in our experience it works best when it goes deep. Places in all parts of the UK should have the ability to build a better future from the bottom up and collaborate with neighbours.
“The creation of Mayoral Combined Authorities in England is enabling places like Greater Manchester to begin to chart our own destiny. But whilst devolution needs to spread throughout England, it’s also important that powers are devolved out of Holyrood and into local areas.
“Gordon has set out a route map for the empowerment of communities and the strengthening of the bonds between all the regions and nations of the United Kingdom.”
The event will take place at Central Hall in Edinburgh, at 730pm on June 1st.
Attendees must register their intention to come and can do so here:
The official society studying the life and work of Winston Churchill has called for greater recognition of the former war leader’s links to Scotland.
Churchill’s birthday falls on St. Andrew’s Day (November 30, 1874). No greater or emblematic, and perhaps ironic, connection exists than Churchill’s close friendship with a founder and leader of the Scottish National Party, Andrew Dewar Gibb.
HGF9BY 1916.Churchill as Lieutenant-Colonel,commanding the 6th Battalion.the Royal Scots Fusiliers.Near Ploegstreert, Belgium.
Churchill commanded the 6th (Service) Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers in 1916. He was a Lieutenant Colonel. Serving as his adjutant was Major Andrew Dewar Gibb, then a captain, who went on to become a founder and leader of the SNP (1936-40).
Dewar Gibb released a book in 1924 about his time with Churchill in the trenches. He published the book anonymously as Captain X.
The book was re-released in 2016 (With Winston Churchill at the Front, Winston in the Trenches 1916), this time with a foreword by Randolph Churchill, Winston’s great-grandson and an introduction by Dewar Gibb’s son, Nigel (now 88years old, who resides in Glasgow).
To mark the centenary, Randolph and his family returned with Nigel to Ploegsteert near Ypres, Belgium in 2016 to visit where his father and Winston served with the Royal Scots Fusiliers in the trenches of Flanders. The people of Ploegsteert gave them a reception, and also celebrated Nigel’s revised and enhanced edition of his father’s book.
Churchill’s connections to Scotland are plentiful and have recently been documented by The International Churchill Society (ICS), in their journal Finest Hour with a foreword by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
Mr Randolph Churchill, Winston’s great-grandson, said:“The Churchill family is delighted that efforts are being made to bring together my great-grandfather’s relationship with Scotland. He not only had great admiration for Scotland but considered many Scots among his friends.
“Churchill had immense respect for the men under his command. This story is one of the many about Scotland that has fallen out of public knowledge.
“Whatever the political debates of today, they have no bearing on an objective view of history. My great-grandfather had a plethora of connections to Scotland, her politicians, her institutions, and her people. He was quite correct when he said he owed Scotland his wife, his constituency and his regiment.”
Mr Nigel Dewar Gibb said of his father and Winston Churchill:“I very much welcome efforts to remember this important chapter in the lives of both Winston Churchill and my father, Andrew Dewar Gibb.
“My father was very proud to have served with Churchill as his adjutant and prouder still of his country. My family and I are delighted at the efforts to bring this chapter to the fore of people’s minds.
“I hope it will serve as a starting gun for more discussion about Churchill’s connections to Scotland, as well as a happy remembrance of my father’s lifetime commitment to Scottish public life. Father went on to become Regius Professor of Law at Glasgow University from 1934 till 1958.”
Mr Andrew Dewar Gibb, MBE QC (1888-1974) said in his book: “I am firmly convinced that no more popular officer ever commanded troops. As a soldier he [Churchill] was hard-working, persevering, and thorough. He is a man who is apparently always to have enemies.
“He made none in his old regiment, but left behind him there, men who will always be his loyal partisans and admirers, and who are proud of having served in the Great War under the leadership of one who is beyond question a great man.”
The ICS is also launching an appeal for more information about Churchill’s many associations with Scotland to enable further study about how the famous wartime Prime Minister and the Scottish people affected one another.
Churchill said that the three most important things he received from Scotland were his wife, his constituency, and his regiment. During the First World War, he commanded the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers on the Western Front in 1916.
Churchill was the Liberal MP for Dundee for fourteen years. First elected in 1908, he was re-elected to the seat four times before finally losing (to a Prohibitionist candidate!) in 1922. The same year Churchill was elected to Dundee, he married Clementine Hozier, a granddaughter of the tenth Earl of Airlie.
In 1912, Churchill was among the first senior British politicians to call for Scottish home rule and UK federalism. He received his first government appointment from Scottish prime minister, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman in 1906. He was close friends with the former Prime Minister Lord Rosebery, in his time a highly regarded Scottish politician.
Despite Churchill having had many other personal and professional connections with Scotland, there is little in the country today to mark his presence.
Two plaques to his time in Dundee were erected in 2008, and there is an outstanding portrait of him by Scotland’s Sir James Guthrie in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh. Otherwise, there are merely a handful of busts around the country including a miniature sculpture in Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Museum.
Gordon Brown, former British prime minister (2007–10) said: “So much has been written about every aspect of Winston Churchill’s life that it is surprising that one important area—his relationship with Scotland—has commanded so little attention.
“That is why this set of essays in Finest Hour must start to rectify this and rescues Churchill’s Scottish connections from the condescension of posterity.”
David Freeman, the editor of Finest Hour, said: “The connections are innumerable and substantial, and we’re thrilled to be among the first to bring these together formally.
“Finest Hour, our subscription magazine, is free to view this month to kick start this conversation. If you’re sitting with old photos or other memorabilia from one of his many trips to Scotland, please get in touch.”
Allen Packwood, Director of the Churchill Archives, said:“Churchill is often thought of and referred to as a quintessentially English figure, but this overlooks a multitude of Scottish connections.
“I am certain that there is new material awaiting discovery in attics and basements that will shed more light on his reception, connections, and activities in Scotland.
“We’re delighted to start that process with our dedicated team of academics and enthusiasts, and this is a conversation that we’re delighted to begin with Scotland and, indeed, the world.”
