No future here for many Scots

YOUR editorial last Sunday expressed concern that post-referendum Scotland might emerge with a substantial minority “feeling they have no personal stake in its future”, thus imperilling the realisation of Scotland’s potential.

Your comments were valid. Many of the 830,000 migrants of Scottish birth now living in England have, in practice, arrived at the same conclusion and voted with their feet.

With hundreds of thousands also scattered elsewhere in the world, emigrant Scots probably account for about one in three of all born in Scotland.

During 300 years of Union, Scotland’s share of Britain’s overall population has roughly halved.

That relative decline continues year on year, and is not cost-free. It represents a skills drain on the economy, denuding Scotland of the talents of many of her brightest and best-educated young people.

Our haemorrhaging of population is the most clear-cut evidence of the Union’s long-term failure to provide economic opportunities in Scotland.

Giving our rising generation “a personal stake” in Scotland’s future, by enabling those who seek employment and fulfilling careers to find them in their own country, is the exciting prize that must be grasped on 18 September.

(Dr) Kenneth J Cameron, Dunblane