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East Kent Scots’ group backs call to keep union together

East Kent’s Scots are backing the campaign to keep Scotland in the UK ahead of the independence referendum tomorrow.

Irene Mantle, vice-president of the Dover and East Kent Scottish Society – who has lived in Deal for 22 years – said: “I think Scots in England are against it on the whole. We’re too intertwined.

“There would be quite a lot of problems after being together for all these years. It think it’s going to be very costly to separate us.

“I still have family in Scotland. My brother, he’s a professor, he’s for it and I was very surprised. And my daughter, she’s still undecided. I have chatted with the committee and I got the feeling they felt the same as me.”

Mrs Mantle agrees that only those living in Scotland should have the power to vote: “I think the people in Scotland, whatever nationality they are, if they’re living there, they should get the vote. Just as if something was happening in Deal, I could vote.”

Treasurer Veronica Farquhar said: “I’m dead against it.”

Mrs Farquhar disagrees with the decision, backed by Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond and UK Prime Minister David Cameron, to give Scots as young as 16 the vote.

She said: “He (Mr Salmond) is foolish because he’s given the youngsters the vote and obviously they’re going to vote for it.

“They are first-time voters, who may have never voted for anything in their life before.

"It doesn’t matter where you go in the world, you’ll always find a community of Scots. We’ve actually lived more in England than we have in Scotland.

“I would have liked to vote, but I can see why we haven’t been given it.”

The result should be known early on Friday.

See next week’s Mercury for the Dover and East Kent Scottish Society’s reactions.

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