This time it’s personal

I was a keen and eager participant in the first independence referendum campaign, and I was as devastated as everybody else on Friday the 19th when we realised we had lost.

Campaigning was about creating a fairer Scotland that would be a great place for my weans to grow up in, but I didn’t really expect the result to have massive implications for my family and myself in the short to medium term.

This time it’s different, however: My family depends on this country remaining in the EU (or at least in the EEA) because we are a truly European family. I am a Danish citizen, my wife has a UK passport, the kids we have together are Danish/UK and the kids from my wife’s previous marriage are French/UK (however, for the under-18s getting a French passport might depend on cooperation from her ex, and this might not be forthcoming).

Brexit means that I could lose my right to live here (or at least lose some rights, such as access to the NHS and getting a pension), but at the same time my wife could lose the right to live in the EU. There could also potentially be problems moving my stepkids to the continent if their father doesn’t cooperate. Furthermore, my parents would lose the right to come and a live with us in Scotland when they get frail, and the same would happen to my mother-in-law if we move abroad. Furthermore, permanent residence gets nullified after more than six months abroad, so I would also lose my right to work abroad temporarily, or to spend more than six months with my parents if their health requires it (they’re staying in a tiny village in the mountains of Italy). It could also make it financially impossible for the kids to study abroad if they so desire. Retiring abroad together would probably also become an impossibility for us.

My wife and I have thus been feeling utterly distraught because of Brexit (and not least because of the UK government’s decision to use me and others in my situation as bargaining chips), and if it hadn’t been for Nicola Sturgeon’s wonderful speech the morning after Brexit, we might have left for the continent already.

I therefore felt absolutely delighted that Nicola yesterday announced that the new Scottish referendum will be held before the UK leaves the EU. Finally somebody is offering us a solution to our worries.

This might be our last and only chance to keep our family together, so it’s hard to describe in words how important it is for us to win this. All I can say is that if we lose, the consequences are too horrible to contemplate.

So it’s no game. We have to win it. Scotland in Europe has to happen before the Tories wreck our family.

This time it’s personal.