1 May 2020updated 26 Jul 2021 4:10am

Why Resilience Scotland is an idea worth taking seriously

The SNP’s proposal of a new citizen training scheme reflects deep thinking about what makes our society secure.

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND - NOVEMBER 10: Military personel attend a wreath laying at the Stone of Remembrance outside the Edinburgh City Chambers on November 10, 2019 in Edinburgh, Scotland. Nicola Sturgeon lead the Remembrance Sunday event in Edinburgh commemorating those who lost their lives in armed conflict. (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

To modern eyes National Service, phased out in 1960, seems like a solution in search of a problem. What is it for? What good would it do? The response from golden-agers that it would knock some discipline into the nation’s increasingly feckless youth only cements its place in the policy graveyard.

Nevertheless it is a shotgun-raddled zombie that refuses to die. Another iteration came this week in the form of an MoD-commissioned study by the military historian Professor Sir Hew Strachan. And, interestingly, progressives in the SNP are looking at a non-military version called “Resilience Scotland” that might sit more easily with modern mores.