What Scots are

If by “Scots” we mean Scottish-born, then a majority of these voted Yes in September, and that percentage will almost certainly have increased since then.

The vast majority of non-Scottish residents will be English-born and/or educated (somewhere between 10 and 14 per cent) and most of these will, unsurprisingly, have voted No.

A 5 per cent swing to Yes would have resulted in a different outcome.

This is, hopefully, the last twitch of the English tail wagging the dog, or would be if we introduced a residency requirement – ten years, say.

Most other countries would barely raise an eyebrow at this; few of us would expect a vote on a crucial constitutional issue if an expat in, say, France or Spain.

It cuts both ways, of course – I believe a majority of non-English migrants in Scotland voted Yes, but there is no danger of Scotland becoming “Polska-nised” or Bulgarianised (or of England becoming “Scotticised”, whatever racist Jockophobia is currently being spouted in Westminster).

I also enjoyed, in the same issue, Ashley Davies’s wry observation on farmers’ markets that “in an hour we did not hear a single Leith accent”.

The tide of Anglification of Scotland is turning, though, after centuries, and that is an entirely healthy trend which will defuse a great deal of the “anti-English” sentiment being trumpeted by sundry tabloids and the aforementioned braying MPs (with the pathetically transparent intention of trying to tarnish the SNP).

David Roche

Hill House

Coupar Angus