Ewan McGregor, actor, on Scottish nationalism

After the SNP rapid-rebuttal machine was out in force a few months ago to try and downplay what one Scot in the public eye had said about Scotland's relationship with the rest of the UK, here's another prominent Scot telling how he see things:

Ewan McGregor quoted: "If they did choose to make Scotland an independent country, I'd still live in London. I like the idea of Great Britain, of us all being together." (taken from 'thebigquestion' on the inside back page of today's Sunday Telegraph 'Seven' supplement)

Now of course Ewan McGregor's views (or mine, for that matter) are of no more intrinsic importance than those of any other Scot who happens to take a similar or wildly-different view (for example what would seem to be the views of tennis-player Andy Murray, from some of his comments), but it does serve to illustrate that not all Scots are prepared simply to fall into line with what the SNP and its hangers-on would have us believe is becoming the orthodoxy of opinion by Scots, famous and not-so-famous. The result a few days ago in the Glenrothes by-election is a clear enough indication that the SNP still has a very long way to go before it can hope to make numerous more dramatic gains in its Westminster representation, something that would hardly pose a problem were their support so overwhelming as they sometimes try to pretend to themselves and to us. The difference between these two by-election results is much more likely, in my view, to have had a lot more to do with the personal reputations of the previous Labour MPs for whom replacements had to be found than to have anything to do with a supposed nationalist 'surge' in Glasgow East.