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Just as tomorrow will not be as today, the next independence referendum will not be as the last.

That Scotland is a nation and could be independent has never been at issue.

What has been in doubt is the independent nation’s wealth.

The arguments about this are utterly different and potentially far more positive second time around.

There is a reason why lifelong nationalists rejected the SNP’s bid of 2014 – it was based on a lie.

Politicians who can’t tell the truth do not deserve the people’s respect.

Yet a movement which can be honest with the people deserves trust tomorrow and the day after.

This next referendum will be different because it will be based on an honest economic prospectus and will be set against a world that has lost its bearings.

It will be plain Scottish pragmatism for calculated change against an alternative of chaos.

Indyref2 could be the £15billion question – that is the size of the current deficit between what Scotland spends and earns.

But that’s fiction – it is real only in a world where an independent Scotland spends tomorrow exactly as the UK does today.

The £15billion becomes as solid as smoke the moment you admit that Scotland would not spend as the UK does.

Last time round the SNP wanted to have it all – no cuts to anything.

They pretended they would spend as the UK does – and so dug themselves a deficit hole.

This time they won’t be so stupid. Scotland earns enough to pay for a decent, socially just society. In the last year, Scotland raised about £53billion in taxes. That is enough to cover the NHS, education, pensions and benefits without a single cut.

It even covers debt repayments with billions to spare.

That is not a surprise – our neighbour Ireland raises about as much in taxes and manages to provide health, education and social protection.

What Ireland doesn’t do is pay for the remnants of empire in the form of a big defence budget, large embassies and the lot.

And Ireland isn’t burdened by the costs of a ballooning global city (London) or foreign dependencies.

What is really astonishing about the £15billion deficit figure is what it says about the profligate spending by the UK on services which do not benefit the working man and woman.

Independent Scotland can afford to run all its core social services of health, education and benefits without a single cut. What it can’t do is afford to replicate the UK’s spending.

But this second referendum will be different in that way too – it will not be the mini-me offer of 2014 because events have shown that being like the UK is not smart.

The UK once stood for stability and pragmatism, a happy combination of fudged solutions and good

intentions which made it a leading nation without dogma or prejudice.

That UK is gone – in its place is a state hostile to its near neighbours, antagonistic to the single greatest peace treaty in world affairs (the EU) and at odds with the values of European social democracy.

Once the UK and US were beacons of success in the realm of human affairs but those lights have dimmed.

The next referendum for Scotland will in truth be about the UK – what is it for, where is it going?

The answer will be hard to grasp for unionists who are divided over Europe and torn by that most un-British phenomenon, nationalism in Downing Street.

Scotland on an honest economic footing is something Alex Salmond flatly rejected last time – it became his and the Yes campaign’s undoing.

We cannot be some weird mix of globally important nation and Scandinavian paradise – it would have to choose and, even then, paradise would never come.

But in that decision, it would face reality and choose to start building a successful, small European nation which is inside the EU and which does the best it can by its people while not meddling in global affairs.

Such a vision has served many European nations well – we would join their number. To get there, we would have to make sacrifices but not to our core social services. Instead, we’d have to jettison the baggage of the past and start afresh.

It would be tough but, once achieved, would leave us stable, independent, socially just and at arm’s length from the chaos caused by old allies.

We would be small but still among the rich nations and still Scottish. It’s not been such a hard burden these past centuries, so why not see where it gets us tomorrow.