Trainspotting star Peter Mullan blames 'Westminster blackmail' for independence referendum result

Peter Mullan is a legend of the Scottish stage
-Credit: (Image: Reach Publishing Services Limited)


Trainspotting star Peter Mullan has blamed "Westminster blackmail" for a majority of Scots voting against independence in 2014.

The veteran actor, 65, from Glasgow was a vocal supporter of the Yes campaign in the run-up to the big vote 10 years ago.

Mullan - whose screen credits include Braveheart and Lord of the Rings - has spoken of his frustration at the result, which saw 55 per cent of voters back staying in the Union.

Speaking to reporters while promoting his new TV drama After the Party, the actor questioned promises made by the No campaign in 2014 on Scotland's continuing place in the European Union.

"It was a very particular form of Westminster blackmail that dates right back to the earliest days of the British Empire - ‘If you leave us, we will bankrupt you, there will be a hard border," he told the Guardian.

"And most insultingly of all, ‘If you leave us, you’ll have to leave Europe.’ To be a Scottish republican, and to have your fellow citizens who you love and adore fall for that kind of s**t, and then two years later f*****g Brexit comes along."

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The Better Together campaign - which called for Scots to oppose independence - had warned a Yes vote would see Scotland lose its place in the European Union.

But two years later, a Tory-backed Brexit campaign saw 52 per cent of voters across the UK support the end of the country's membership of the EU.

The vast majority of Scots voters had supported staying in Europe in 2016.

Mullan has previously criticised the BBC for "horrendous bias" in its reporting of the 2014 IndyRef.

He said in 2015: “I believe in the BBC, on principle, because most of the education I got when I was a kid I got through watching the BBC.

“I, Claudius introduced me to the history of the Roman empire. BBC reruns of David Lean films introduced me to Dickens.

“Panorama made me want to go to libraries and find out about the world. I mean it when I say I owe everything to the BBC.

“So to see the horrendous bias that went on against the Yes campaign before the referendum – to see the BBC used as a political cudgel against a legitimate democratic movement – really broke my heart.”

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