St Andrews, Scotland —<\/span><\/span>It\u2019s a bitterly cold November day in the Scottish town of St Andrews, the kind of morning when the grass crackles underfoot like broken glass.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Undeterred, tourists swaddled in puffer jackets and armed with selfie sticks ascend the cathedral tower that has overlooked this coastal spot for 800 years.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n From the top, gazing in one direction, the sea stretches towards Europe. Looking the other way, rolling hills lead to England.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n As the United Kingdom faces its most momentous election in recent history, Scotland is grappling with which view to set its sights on.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n For Scottish voters, a key issue in the December 12 general election will be whether, in the long term, they want to remain part of the UK or to break away and become an independent country.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIndependence is not about \u2018oh we hate the English,\u2019\u201d says 22-year-old Scot and pro-independence campaigner Iona Fraser-Collins. \u201cIt\u2019s about us wanting to be in charge of our own laws, and England being in charge of its own laws.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Scotland rejected independence at a 2014 referendum, 55% to 45%.\u00a0But circumstances have changed dramatically since then, according to the Scottish National Party (SNP) — the third-largest party in the UK Parliament.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In 2016 Scotsvoted overwhelmingly<\/a><\/span>\u00a0to remain in the European Union. Instead, they got Brexit \u2013 setting the country on a path it hadn\u2019t agreed to and re-energizing the fight for independence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In the event of a hung parliament \u2013- one in which no party secures an outright majority — the pro-independence SNP could play kingmaker, potentially propping up a Labour government (they\u2019ve dismissed the idea of doing the same with the Conservatives).<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The SNP\u2019s key condition for this would be securing a second Scottish independence referendum. It\u2019s a prospect Labour hasn\u2019t ruled out completely.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Support for Scottish independence has crept up slightly in the last five years and is now<\/a>neck-and-neck<\/a><\/span>\u00a0with those who favor remaining part of the union. With many seats in Scotland resting on razor-thin margins, this will be the scene of a fierce battle that could have major consequences for the future of the UK.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n No battle will be fiercer than that fought in the constituency of North East Fife. This is the most marginal seat in the UK: In the 2017 election, the SNP won by just two votes against the Liberal Democrats.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Both the SNP and Lib Dems want to stop Brexit and both are fighting for pro-European voters. Their methods though, are starkly different.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The SNP believes an independent Scotland is the best way of staying in the EU; the Lib Dems say Scotland is stronger in Europeand<\/span>\u00a0in the UK.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The SNP currently controls 35 of Scotland\u2019s 59 constituencies -\u2013 every seat they could gain in this election would strengthen their negotiating hand for an independence referendum.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n At the heart of North East Fife is the university town of St Andrews.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n It\u2019s best known abroad as the place where Prince William started dating Kate, and as the \u201chome of golf\u201d thanks to the 600-year-old course that dominates the rugged landscape.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The town\u2019s prestigious university also has a reputation, Scottish commentators told CNN, as the place where wealthy English and American students go when they don\u2019t get into Oxford or Cambridge.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Students loom large here; cycling down pretty streets and teeming out of grand stone university buildings. They gather outside cafes handing out political flyers, all too aware that in a constituency where just two votes decided the winner last time around, they could make all the difference.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019s pretty unusual for there to be an election during term time,\u201d says the university\u2019s student president, Jamie Rodney, who has been part of a campus-wide drive encouraging young people to register to vote. \u201cSo students have a real opportunity this year to potentially swing the result of the whole election.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Some, like the university\u2019s<\/a>pro-independence union<\/a><\/span>, are adamant about the direction they want that swing to take.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Every Tuesday evening the students meet at one of the town\u2019s many traditional pubs. They come armed with clipboards and political buttons, eschewing pints of beer for tea and Coca-Cola.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n A handful of the group were too young to vote in the 2016 EU referendum. Even those who did vote Remain feel they\u2019ve been flung under a Brexit bus that is beyond their control.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cBrexit is just a prime example of Scotland getting the exact opposite of what it voted for,\u201d says 24-year-old Harry Stage, his black curls bobbing with emphasis.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWhen your mandate is not accepted, or your people are not listened to, then how can you want to stay part of that union?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The students say Scotland feels like a \u201csecond-class country\u201d where Westminster overlords dictate everything from their finance to defense policies. \u201cWe want to sit next to England at the table,\u201d says Stage, \u201crather than in the back taking the scraps they can throw.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n They point to the UK\u2019s Trident nuclear weapons, carried by submarines based on Scotland\u2019s west coast, as an example of the \u201cdouble standards\u201d and \u201ccondescending nature\u201d of Westminster lawmakers towards their country.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cYou couldn\u2019t do it in the Thames (in London) because it\u2019s too much of a threat to human life,\u201d says Stage. \u201cBut what\u2019s a trident bomb going to do amongst lochs and glens and Glasgow.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Scotland\u2019s first minister and the leader of the SNP, Nicola Sturgeon, has said scrapping Trident would be one of her party\u2019s key demands if Labour wanted its support in a minority government.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n It\u2019s a demand that\u2019s unlikely to be met. Labour has pledged to renew the Trident program, despite its leader Jeremy Corbyn being a longstanding critic of nuclear weapons.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Of course, there\u2019s no guarantee that an independent Scotland would automatically be welcomed back into the EU. Experts have warned that Spain \u2013 which is facing its own Catalan independence movement \u2013 may veto any attempt by Scotland to rejoin the bloc.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Indeed, the St Andrews students said the Scottish independence movement as a whole had been \u201cvery supportive\u201d of Catalan activists, flying their flags at rallies and vice versa.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Regardless, Sturgeon is confident an independent Scotland would be readmitted to the EU. Even its national deficit of 7% (EU member states must have deficits below 3%) wouldn\u2019t hold Scotland back, she told the BBC during a live leaders\u2019 debate last week.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Instead, she said, the deficit would drop under an independent Scotland finally able to fully control its finances.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n In any case, \u201cwe won\u2019t be in the EU come January,\u201d says Stage, in between sips of tea. \u201cSo, what do we have to lose?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n In another pub down the road, the SNP incumbent in this constituency, Stephen Gethins, rearranges himself on a plush red barstool. Like his young supporters, he opts for a tall glass of water over anything stronger.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n In the last election here in 2017 Gethins won by just two votes, following three recounts, and admits \u201cthere was quite a lot of stuff going on at the time\u201d given his wife had just had their baby the week before.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n This election, Gethins sticks closely to the SNP script, saying Scotland\u2019s departure from the UK would be nothing like England\u2019s shambolic exit from the EU.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIt\u2019s Brexit which is isolationist, which takes us into the unknown,\u201d says Gethins. The nitty-gritty of what an independent Scotland would actually look like \u2013 its currency and border controls — are all laid out in the SNP\u2019s 650-page White Paper, he says.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Critics meanwhile, have labelled the SNP blueprint<\/a>\u201cincoherent.\u201d<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n On the other side of town, challenger and Lib Dem candidate Wendy Chamberlain is knocking on doors with her own small army of supporters.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Across Scotland, the Lib Dems\u2019 vote share pales in comparison to that of the SNP \u2013 they hold just four of the country\u2019s 59 seats, trailing behind the Conservatives and Labour.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n This election, Chamberlain is banking on her party carving out a niche \u2013 attracting voters who want to stay in the EU, but don\u2019t want a second referendum on Scottish independence.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n She believes the same argument for staying in the EU, applies to staying in the UK. \u201cWe are better off in the UK with the relationships we have across these islands, as well as remaining in the EU and maintaining those relationships we have across the continent,\u201d Chamberlain says, the sea breeze ruffling her long curly hair.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Chamberlain\u2019s biggest challenge may simply be convincing voters in her own home. Her husband is an SNP member, though she\u2019s quick to laugh off politically-induced marital strife.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Among those hitting the pavements alongside Chamberlain are students Joseph Luke, 20, and Alex Whitman, 21. Both are English, which they say \u201clends itself to unionism a little bit.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n They now live in St Andrews and \u201cjust because we were born in England doesn\u2019t mean we don\u2019t get a say,\u201d says Luke.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n He has relatives in both countries and says he doesn\u2019t want to cross a hard border \u201cjust to see my family.\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"\/\"](\"https:\/\/cdn.cnn.com\/cnn\/interactive\/2019\/12\/world\/uk-election-scottish-independence\/media\/images\/14976.png\")
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<\/source><\/source><\/picture>Student power<\/h2>\n
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<\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/source><\/source><\/picture>\u2018Second class country\u2019<\/h2>\n
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<\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/source><\/source><\/picture>Stronger in the union<\/h2>\n
<\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/source><\/source><\/picture>Knife-edge margin<\/h2>\n