The Scottish National Party (SNP) leader was speaking 10 years to the day since Scots voted against independence, and as the movement licks its wounds with another vote currently off the table.
Some 55% of voters answered “no” to the question “should Scotland be an independent country” on Sept 18, 2024. Just under 45% said “yes”.
“Even though I was devastated by the result, I am in no doubt that Scotland’s independence referendum has left an overwhelmingly positive legacy on our country,” Swinney said in Edinburgh to mark the anniversary.
The issue of independence has dominated Scottish politics since the SNP came to power at the devolved parliament in Edinburgh in 2007.
The 2014 result was seen as a blow to the SNP’s long-standing central policy, with the government in London assessing that the issue was settled for a generation.
But just two years later, a nationwide vote in favour of the UK leaving the European Union reopened the debate, as a majority of Scots opposed the move.
Nicola Sturgeon, then pro-EU SNP leader and first minister in Edinburgh, pushed for another vote, arguing that Brexit had changed the terms of the UK union.
SNP under pressure
Polls indicating greater support for independence edged ahead from 2020, in part due to Sturgeon’s popularity and criticism of then UK prime minister Boris Johnson’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
But after the UK Supreme Court in 2022 blocked the SNP from holding a non-binding advisory referendum without UK government permission, the issue has quietened — and since then, the SNP has become engulfed in a funding scandal.
The party has also faced public criticism for pushing independence at the expense of day-to-day issues such as health and education. It lost dozens of seats at the UK general election in July.
A YouGov poll released on Tuesday indicated that if the referendum was held again today it would result in a similar outcome with a 56 to 44% split.
Giving the SNP hope, however, is that the survey found that younger voters appeared more likely to back independence. Swinney called on supporters to continue making the case for independence.
“As a nation, we can’t just regret the things that we cannot do –- it is time for us to start focusing again on the things that we can. And that is exactly what we are going to do,” he added.
“Today, in 2024, we must reawaken that sense of hope, of optimism and of possibility that was so prevalent 10 years ago,” he said.