THE Yes DIY page loves to feature feedback from Yes movement groups and we were very impressed with the guest speaker “captured” by Julia Laurie, convenor of Edinburgh & Lothians Pensioners4Indy group.

She stated: “At the beginning of 2021, I was running out of ideas for speakers. So at one of our weekly committee meetings, I asked for ideas.

“Caroline MacLeod suggested George Gunn as she had read a beautifully written article by George, published on the Bella Caledonia page in the Sunday National.”

Obviously we knew of that piece, and we recall the excellent article written about Gunn in The National two years ago.

Laurie continued: “George has been writer-in-residence for the Orkney Islands Council and the Scottish Poetry Library in Ullapool. He is well known as a playwright, with more than 50 productions for stage and radio. From 1992 to 2010 he was artistic director of Grey Coast Theatre Company, which he co-founded. He has produced several series for BBC Radio Scotland and Radio 4.

“A book about Caithness, The Province of the Cat, was published in 2015, and a novel The Great Edge, in 2017. This year, George will publish his 10th book of poems Chronicles of the First Light (Drunk Muse Press), and is the Caithness Makar at the Lyth Arts Centre. He is also a strong independence supporter.”

She duly proved that with Gunn featuring in the group’s podcast. He described his life growing up in Caithness and the presence of Dounreay, before going on to tell about his priorities for Scotland.

Julia Laurie said that Gunn is “a truly gifted, fascinating and quite unassuming man. Many of our members considered the meeting to be one of the best we had ever had.”

You can hear what he had to say at https://pensionersforindependence.scot/blog and below is a short extract of his powerful message about the democratic grassroots movement, something which he says National columnist Lesley Riddoch has been “banging on about for years”.

Gunn wrote: “I think the problem in Scotland is that democracy has become a professional thing.

“How do you get engaged politically in the democratic process? For ordinary human beings, people who just go about their ordinary day, it’s not easy to become politically engaged.

“The strongest political structure should be the community council but there’s nobody on it because nobody can be bothered.

“In the Highlands we don’t have local democracy. Everything is centred in Inverness. Then the political process becomes remote, so I think that what we really need in the independent country that we’re going to have is local democracy, and the more local it is the better.”