A LONE GRR protester targeted an event with SNP MPs, but the leaflets ended up “recycled” while the discussion focused on the details of a de-facto referendum and a Yes win.
While the debate around Scotland’s gender recognition reforms continues to make headlines, one opponent of the reforms targeted a Q&A event in Kinghorn, Fife, organised by Yes Inchkeith.
Ahead of the panel with SNP Westminster group leader Stephen Flynn, deputy leader Mhairi Black and Stewart Hosie, at the Bay Hotel on Friday, one protester handed out an A4 page leaflet decrying the three MPs as the “three muffketeers”.
While the leaflet accused the SNP politicians of supporting Scotland’s gender reforms and “destroying women’s rights”, within moments of entering the hotel the leaflets were “recycled” by one woman who had been collecting them from attendees.
And, while the issue around the gender reforms was raised, it did not dominate the two-hour long session, as members of the public grilled MPs on the details about the future of the independence campaign and their role at Westminster.
Earlier, Flynn told The National that he was “not interested” in becoming the official opposition at Westminster after a poll suggested the SNP could return more MPs than the Tories if a General Election was called imminently.
Ahead of the event, we showed Flynn the leaflet, and asked if he had any concerns that it would dominate the discussion. He said: “I think when it comes to the GRR everyone’s aware of the fact that there’s different opinions within society and we should always be respectful of people’s opinions.
“I don’t think that literature like that is in keeping with that, but if anyone wants to raise any points in relation to that I’m happy to engage positively, and hopefully have a constructive discussion.”
The issue was raised twice during the event, with one member of the audience asking for their view on if the gender reform row is damaging support among unaligned voters and providing the “right-wing press with a stick with which to beat us”.
Later, a female member of the audience described the gender reforms as “pseudoscience” and claimed it would be a “vote loser”, but only gathered a smattering of applause.
Instead, the focus of the majority of the discussion related to how to achieve independence and the campaign. Early on in the event, the MPs were asked for their preference on a de facto referendum.
Hosie told the audience: “That’s a really good question. Fundamentally the answer is, without a cop-out, that the party will determine at the special conference what the best mechanism will be.”
Flynn agreed with Hosie’s comments, adding: “We all know none of us want to be in this situation. We want to just have a legally binding referendum.”
Another audience member asked how this time round activists can “campaign differently and get out of our bubble”, suggesting that knocking doors might not be as effective as in 2014.
Hosie said: “Whether this is online, whether it’s paper-based, whether it's any technique available to us, whether it is, and I fear it will be, knocking a heck of a lot of doors - we get to win, remember that.”
The upcoming election
Westminster leader Flynn pointed out that the reality is a General Election will be at the end of 2024.
He added: “What message are we taking to the people of Scotland at the next General Election?
"Are we taking them a message which says in another two years time we’ll have a vote, or are we saying to them you know what we’re going to have a vote now, because this Union is not working for us, cannot work for us and we have a better real hope for the future as an independent country.”
👏 Our open meeting on Scotland’s future is about to end - and look at those numbers on a wet, cold Friday night! Plenty of energy, hope and determination in the room - let’s move forward to independence! Big thank you to @MhairiBlack, @StephenFlynnSNP and @StewartHosieSNP! pic.twitter.com/TlyTXCxSxp
— Inchkeith SNP (@InchkeithSNP) February 10, 2023
Flynn said that for those reasons he favoured holding a de facto referendum at a Westminster election compared to a Holyrood one, adding that he had a caveat that the everything should be approached democratically and with discussion with the movement first.
At the end of the even Hosie said it had been “first class” and he had seen a surge of enthusiasm and that the movement is “up for a fight”.
George Kay, Yes Inchkeith convener, told The National that while the group didn’t advertise the meeting, they had to turn away over 200 people - the same number who had booked to attend the session.
He said: “I think the leadership very much sold themselves tonight.”
Olaf Stando, vice convener for the group, said that the discussion was intended to “empower” activists to ask questions to the SNP leadership. He added: “A lot of the time the Yes movement gets accused of tribalism. There's a picture painted by Unionists that is divisive and it's battering itself.
“If you look at that [event], there was disagreement on stuff like GRR but actually, the atmosphere was super cordial.
“Everybody applauded, everyone listened, and I think having that approach to campaigning as we go on to 2024 I think that's really important because if you only win if you convince people.”
