After 10 years Scotland has chance to move on - Alex Cole-Hamilton

Nicola Sturgeon and John Swinney during the 2014 indy campaign

I remember so much of that day, it was an emotional rollercoaster. While I was able to knock doors all morning and cast my vote, I was in youthwork at the time and had to leave for an event in London that evening. It meant walking a mile through central London in full highland dress and the sense of warmth from passers-by was palpable. Shouts of “Stay with us Scotland” punctuated my journey.

I watched the results at my aunt’s flat in Kings Cross. When the Clackmannanshire result came in, the first of the night, it was clear that ‘No’ was going to win. I was relieved, but any sense of elation I felt was soon tempered by the impact of the result on several people close to me who had voted the other way, some of whom were utterly devastated.

Since that night a decade ago, the dividing lines drawn during the referendum campaign have lingered. While the result had been emphatic for No, the grief response of Yes voters has seen them coalesce around the SNP in election after election.

That has led to a kind of paralysis in Scottish politics, and it has benefited the governing party. In an attempt to keep the commitment of their base, the SNP has spent a large part of the last ten years picking at the scab of defeat.

They had an interest in boiling elections down to whether your vote could be used to either trigger a second referendum or prevent one, rather than their record on the economy, NHS waiting lists, schools or care. Brexit was weaponised, never mind that the SNP had actually spent more losing the Shetland by-election to the Scottish Liberal Democrats than they spent on the whole of the 2016 Remain campaign.

The independence referendum and the years that have followed, felt like such a reductive time and it starved everything else of oxygen. Ministerial attention was always fixed upon a prize other than the competent delivery of public services.

That government disinterest in the day job is now being reaped across nearly every area of public policy - in the difficulty you experience trying to get a GP appointment, in the length of time children are waiting for mental health support or the violence in Scottish classrooms.

At the recent general election the people of Scotland expressed their will emphatically and the SNP were finally reacquainted with the laws of political gravity.

Time and again on the doorstep, people spoke of how fed up they were with how nationalist and Conservative politicians have ignored the things that really matter to them and make a difference to their quality of life. At long last independence was off the agenda and it was so refreshing to talk about the things that actually matter to people.

The voters sent a clear message to the SNP, and a great number of people placed their trust in the Liberal Democrats for the first time in a long time. It feels like Scotland is finally moving on from the divisions of the past and has a chance to move forward.

It is now up to those newly elected Liberal Democrat and Labour MPs to focus squarely on serving the people who sent them to parliament as eyes begin to turn towards a Scottish election which could be just around the corner.

Alex Cole-Hamilton, MSP for Edinburgh Western