Quintin Jardine's blog

For an issue that was always meant to be decided by the people of Scotland, we are sure seeing a hell of a lot of interference from outside. This is being co-ordinated in the main by the London media, although it will be interesting to see how their Scottish editions declare, should the polls on which they lean so heavily show ‘Yes’ in the lead next Wednesday.

One part of their strategy is clear, their determination to focus attention totally on Alex Salmond, and to demonise him in the process. Apart from being as vicious as we have come to expect from what used to be Fleet Street, it is also a gross distortion of the truth . . . another London editorial norm.

‘Yes’ is my campaign just as much as it belongs to Alex Salmond. I had my first flirtation with the SNP when he has just begun secondary school. He was still there when I was in at the birth of the party’s modern era when a diffident Winnie Ewing visited my newspaper office just before winning the Hamilton by-election.

The ‘Yes’ campaign is the culmination of her efforts, and those of thousands more, stretching back to Dr Robert McIntyre, elected in 1945 by my home town, Motherwell, as the party’s first MP. Today ‘Yes’ has millions of co-owners, in Scotland and beyond. For our opponents to focus their venom on one single man is stupid. It is also dangerous, for all they are doing is hardening attitudes and encouraging more and more independence votes, from those who after a lifetime of being bullied by London, are mad as hell and ain’t going to take it anymore.