Our best shot at reform by the people.

A yes vote will be a major chance to put in place important reforms needed in our politics that have been repeatedly fudged rather than addressed by Westminster.  Four main issues, House of Lords reform, MP's expenses, issues of surrounding the lobbying of politicians by corporations, and Political Party funding reform.  These are all fundamentally important to the health of our modern British Democracy.
When the Scottish Parliament was reconvened, rules were put in place to make a greater effort at Governmental transparency.  Rules on MSP's expenses were much stricter than at Westminster.  Lobbying rules were tighter and funding rules were tighter.  We were not given a second chamber - devolution doesn't require it, so the problem of political appointee-ism that the House of Lords currently represents (notwithstanding the inclusion of the CofE Archbishops in the Lords) doesn't apply, yet.
Has anyone really forgotten the expenses scandal now that it's been pushed back from the parapet by other, more up-to-date events?  Of course we haven't, it's filed at the back of our minds as yet another reason not to trust politicians.  Are we aware that it's supposed to be fixed? Of course we are, but the real question is do we trust the fix? No, we are all well aware of the idiom about Turkey's not voting for Christmas.
Tied up with the fix was Political Party funding reform, but that has become a problem unto itself.  It urgently needs fixing, but still our Political Parties are having trouble agreeing with each other the niggling details of how they propose to do it.    Again it is reminiscent of Turkey's voting for Christmas.  How can Political Parties be left to decide how Political Parties should be funded?  Why were only representatives of the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and Labour parties attending these talks?  Are we to be expected that they will abide by the standards of 'Fair Play' taught to them in their public schools?
Then when they finally manage to come to some sort of consensus, it will be dragged before the meritocratic House of Lords.  How is a Lord made these days?  By following the party line no matter what, judging by some of the newly elevated modellers of the old ermine robes.  Jack McConnel? Michael Forsyth? George Foulkes?  Failed politicians rewarded for losing their places in democratically elected Parliaments with a lifelong seat at the table of the Lords.  Good luck getting Lords Reform past these people - those cushioned benches seem to be pretty comfortable and the ermine robes are very warm in winter!
The lobbying of Government by "interested parties"  is an issue that really deserves more coverage.  Earlier this year the Government published it's proposal for a register of lobbyists.  The proposed register will cover just 5% of lobbyists, being only those who lobby on behalf of a third party rather than those who lobby for their companies directly.  This is hardly radical reform.
And here we sit, in the midst of ongoing financial turmoil caused by piratical corporatism (or corporate piraticalism) being governed  by a party that gets more than 50% of it's funding from the City of London.  What chance of much needed reform from Westminster?  I'll tell you what chance, fat chance, frankly.
So, we all know we can't trust our political parties to deliver reform in Westminster, but what about in Edinburgh?
My biggest fear about Independence isn't that Scotland will become Skintland, or that Alex Salmond will become our perpetual Dear Leader, but that Holyrood doesn't stick itself to a constitution reigning in it's power to make decisions without the consent of the people of Scotland.  I fear, as I have said before, Westminster-lite sat in Edinburgh.
In Iceland, the recent constitutional reforms have taken on a new and radical direction. The recently re-elected President of Iceland went into a good bit of detail about it in an interview he gave earlier this year which is well worth a read, but the gist of it is this, taken from the article Why Iceland should be in the news but is not.  1

To write the new constitution, the people of Iceland elected twenty-five citizens from among 522 adults not belonging to any political party but recommended by at least thirty citizens. This document was not the work of a handful of politicians, but was written on the internet. The constituent’s meetings are streamed on-line, and citizens can send their comments and suggestions, witnessing the document as it takes shape. The constitution that eventually emerges from this participatory democratic process will be submitted to parliament for approval after the next elections.

Internet technology actually allows for participatory democracy to become a reality.  Look at the basic structure of a facebook group.  Anyone can be allowed to post questions or points of argument, anyone can be allowed to post polls or respond to them.   The polls have a useful tie-in between a user account and a vote on a poll, accurately preventing the problem of multiple votes which dogs most online snap polling.  Admittedly, for something that requires a secret ballot this is not helpful, but for voting on issues in an open forum, it's ideal.    The documents section allows for documents to be edited by a group of people together, and allows for a discussion on the contents of the document.  Put all of these things together and you can have quite an effective forum for political debate and action.  It's not perfect though, and good debates can get quickly lost as other posts displace them.
The beauty of the internet is that if we have an issue with one form of communication like this, we can simply plug in something in another format to fix it.  If you want to have more static debates, you can go and build yourself a forum from any number of free sites, put together one that meets your needs and then link that to the discussions in your facebook group.
Of course, I'm not in any way advocating our constitution gets written via facebook and free forums, but these could provide a template for a site dedicated to the writing of the constitution.  I am fully aware that the SNP already have a written constitution, but surely things have changed a great deal since it was written and it would be far more appropriate to write a new constitution for today's Scotland, and to do it in such a way as any Scot can have an input.  There should be a constitution roadshow too, to bring the process to the people who cannot either access it online or make their way to the Parliament to take part.
This is what it takes to build a true democracy, this is what it will take to build Alex Salmond's "progressive beacon" and this is what it will take to reform our democracy so that it cannot be taken advantage of by wealth and privilege.  Since the people were not consulted in 1707, then in truth they must be consulted in 2014, and not just in the ballot box.


1 I am aware of the mistakes in the cited article but feel the model provided is still an excellent representation of a model for the creation of the  Scottish Constitution.