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Should anybody be too surprised to see an audience of 12,000 cheering Nicola Sturgeon to the rafters inside Glasgow’s SSE Hydro? Or to read that SNP membership is now over 92,000?

These Nationalist successes (and the Yes movement more generally) are part of a much wider phenomenon. In parts of England, we have Nigel Farage and Ukip. In Italy, there’s Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement. In France, it’s Marine Le Pen’s 
National Front. In the US, there’s the Tea Party.

Just like the SNP, all claim to be fighting “the establishment”, “the elite” and the “political class”. All accuse the mainstream media of being biased against them.

All promise “fairness”, “justice”, “prosperity” and/or “equality” via some imaginary silver bullet – or, as Nicola Sturgeon prefers, “one master key which unlocks all of the doors”.

This Yes movement is beginning to look and sound an awful lot like a substitute religion.

I wonder how many more will be taken in by it – and for how long.

Keith Gilmour

Netherton Gate

Glasgow