Meeting of the Parliament 08 November 2018
It is an honour to move this motion today. I suspect that everyone in the chamber will be able to picture the war memorials in their local communities. The one in Dreghorn, where I grew up, stands on a hill above the village and looks down on the primary school that I attended. It contains just over 50 names from world war one, from James Andrew to Andrew Wylie. The main war memorial of the Canongate kirk—just up the road from our Parliament—contains more than 200 names, from John Aitken to John Young. Those are just two of the more than 5,000 memorials across our country.
In total, the rolls of honour for world war one in the Scottish national war memorial contain more than 130,000 names. Those names include members of the armed forces from Scotland and of Scottish descent along with nurses, munitions workers, merchant navy sailors and others. When 134,712 names are projected on to the walls of the Parliament as part of the armistice day commemorations on Sunday, the display will take seven hours. That fact on its own gives some idea of the sheer scale of the suffering that was caused by the first world war.
It has been estimated that more than 15 million people from around the world died. Every single one of those people was somebody’s son or daughter, somebody’s sibling or somebody’s fiancé or spouse. Many millions more were injured, often grievously.
The psychological impact of the conflict, which was borne mainly by very young men and women in an age that often did not recognise or talk about mental health, is difficult for us to comprehend or even to conceive of.
In November 1919, The Scotsman newspaper called the first armistice day commemoration
“a reminder of vacant niches in our memories … of lost heartache in millions of homes”.
It is maybe hard for us to fully grasp not just the intensity, but the universality of the grief that must have been evident on those earlier armistice days. However, the debt that we owe to those who served does not diminish with the passage of time. It is vital that today we remember and honour their courage and their sacrifice.
Other aspects of world war one are also worthy of reflection. Earlier this year, we marked in this chamber the centenary of the start of women’s suffrage, which was partly a consequence of the war. The map of Europe was completely redrawn after the first world war, and the settlement reached at Versailles would ultimately lead towards world war two. In many respects, therefore, the first world war was instrumental in shaping modern Scotland and determining the world that we live in.
It is therefore entirely appropriate that the past four years have seen a nationwide programme of commemorations to mark the centenary of the war. The programme has been carefully considered and immaculately planned by the Scottish commemorations panel, which has been ably chaired by Norman Drummond, and its team of advisors. The panel’s expertise and hard work have played a significant part in making the events such a success. It is also worth noting that the free books produced for each of the commemorations have been hugely and deservedly popular. As First Minister, I put on record my heartfelt thanks for everything that Norman, the panel and its advisors have done. It is absolutely right that today’s motion gives the Parliament as a whole the chance to demonstrate our gratitude.
The panel has worked with a large range of partners, including the Royal British Legion Scotland, Poppyscotland and Government agencies. The armed services have been heavily involved and have supported all the commemorative events. They have also conducted their ceremonial duties with the professionalism that we have come to expect but which we must never take for granted.
At a local level, hundreds of community groups, faith organisations, veterans societies and many others have organised and participated in ceremonies, gatherings and cultural events across the country. For example, on Sunday after I attend the national remembrance service here in Edinburgh in the morning and the Glasgow cathedral service in the afternoon, I am hugely looking forward to seeing “Far, Far from Ypres”—a production that has received warm praise from audiences right across Scotland on its current tour.
Our schools have been heavily involved in commemorations. Almost all schools in Scotland have played a part in marking the centenary.
I have seen at first hand how successfully those different organisations have worked together at each of the commemorations that I have been privileged to attend, including the Loos commemorations in Dundee and commemorations for the Quintinshill rail disaster, the Gallipoli campaign, the battle of Jutland, the battle of the Somme and the battle of Amiens. The beating of the retreat at Arras last year, marking a campaign where 18,000 Scots died in little over one month, is something that will stay in my memory for a very, very long time. Many of those events have had a strong international element, including, rightly and very movingly, from countries that were opponents in world war one and are now valued friends and partners.
To get back to the point about schools, one of the other things that has stayed with me from the commemorations in Arras is meeting students from Monifieth, Alloa, Duncanrig, Crieff and many other places besides, several of whom had great-grandparents or other relatives who had died or served in the great war. All of them were learning about the conflict—not just its geopolitical consequences, but its impact on people and communities.
The opportunity that this commemorative period has provided for that—not just for school students, but for all of us—may indeed prove to be its most valuable legacy. Service in world war one has now passed entirely out of living memory, and the same will happen before too much longer with world war two, but as those wars recede further into the past, our obligation to remember them is, if anything, greater now than it has ever been. After all, one of the lessons of those conflicts is that peace is something that no nation and no continent can ever take for granted—it requires constant hard work and continued attention and dedication.
When the then Prime Minister David Lloyd George addressed the House of Commons on armistice day, he famously said:
“I hope we may say that thus, this fateful morning, came to an end all wars.”—[Official Report, House of Commons, 11 November 1918; Vol 110, c 2463-4.]
His words then expressed a universally held hope that has, of course, never been fulfilled, but it is one that we must continue to cherish and work towards each and every day.
One of the ways in which we can work towards peace—not the only way, but a very important way—is to remember and understand the cost and the sheer horror of war. These centenary commemorations have given all of us an opportunity to do that. Today, as we do every November, we remember with respect and with gratitude all those who died. We honour all those who contributed to the war effort and we resolve once again to do everything in our power to promote a more peaceful world, because ultimately that is the best, the most fitting, and perhaps the only meaningful tribute that we can pay to those who lost their lives.
I am proud to move the motion in my name.
I move,
That the Parliament acknowledges that the First World War had a devastating impact around the world, including on our nation, in which no community was unaffected; recognises the importance of honouring all those who have lost their lives in armed conflicts; notes that 2018 marks the centenary of the First World War Armistice; commends the work of the Scottish Commemorations Panel and partner organisations, which have developed a fitting programme of events to commemorate Scotland’s Armistice centenary, both nationally and for communities; notes that the centenary of the Armistice will be commemorated with a National Service for Scotland in Glasgow Cathedral; recognises the many other organisations and community groups in communities across Scotland that will be delivering commemorative events that inform people about Scotland’s involvement in the First World War while helping them recognise the effects of the war on their local communities and the wider world and its lasting impact on life today, and calls on the nation to come together and pay its respects on 11 November 2018 to ensure that those who suffered so much will never be forgotten, and in the hope that conflicts such as the First World War might end.
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