RuPaul's Drag Race UK: Lawrence Chaney reveals support for Scottish independence

The former Hermitage Academy pupil said the different approaches to Covid-19 between Holyrood and Westminster demonstrate why “we need to have power over our own country”.  

The Glasgow-based 23-year-old, who is in the running to be crowned the UK’s next drag superstar this Thursday, told the Advertiser's sister paper, The National, that he backed Yes in 2014 and wants to see another vote held in the future.  

RuPaul’s Drag Race UK has been a huge hit for the BBC, with the first series bringing in over 12 million views for BBC Three. It’s understood there's also a significant number of international viewers.  

READ MORE: Helensburgh star Lawrence Chaney reaches Drag Race UK final

Viewing figures for the currently airing second season will be revealed once the series finishes, but the programme’s impact has already been huge.  

The song UK Hun?, a Eurovision-style parody which contestants Chaney, Tayce, Bimini Bon Boulash and A’Whora recorded for one of the competition’s challenges, shot straight to the top of the UK iTunes charts last month – beating the likes of P!nk, Dua Lipa and Taylor Swift.  

Scottish contestants Chaney and Ellie Diamond, from Dundee, have reached the final four of the contest, with the winner to be crowned at the finale this week. They sat down with The National to discuss Scottish drag and representing their country on the world stage. 

“I totally support Scottish independence,” Chaney told the newspaper. 

The performer rejected claims that there shouldn’t be another vote due to the 2014 referendum supposedly being “once-in-a-generation”. 

“A lot of people are slagging it because it’s ‘oh it’s been done before, we’ve had the vote. It’s done, you had your say’. Yeah, a lot of the promises as well that we were offered and told you’re definitely getting these things – we weren’t given,” he said.  

READ MORE: Drag queen star Lawrence namechecks Helensburgh home in hit song

Explaining his motivation for backing Yes, Chaney said: “Look at Covid. We were keeping it under control better I think, Nicola had a better grip at some points than Boris did with opening and relaxing rules and getting us back to a sense of normality.  

“But because there wasn’t just one chef in the kitchen – there was Nicola, Boris, [Mark Drakeford] – there were so many people going I think this, I think that. The truth is Scotland is its own thing.” 

Chaney said that despite a few exceptions – including the mass gatherings following Rangers' league win last weekend – “Scotland has dealt with Covid really well”.  

“On the whole I think us as Scots, we’ve gone ‘we need to get this under control’, and we’ve really pulled out finger out and made it happen,” he went on. 

“So I think when it comes to coronavirus even, we have shown we need to have power over our own country. And what goes on in our country. Because other people aren’t living here so they don’t actually get the day-to-day things of what is actually going on in our country.” 

READ MORE: Helensburgh drag queen Lawrence wows RuPaul judges with Mackintosh dress

Chaney opened up on voting Yes in 2014, telling The National he had been “really nervous” about his stance given his home town’s proximity to HMNB Clyde, the home of the UK’s nuclear weapons. 

“There were a lot of people in Helensburgh who worked for Trident, and obviously if there was a vote for Yes that would be against Trident.” 

Ahead of the referendum in 2014, the SNP promoted a Yes vote as a way to rid Scotland of Trident. 

But Chaney said his values overshadowed those concerns. “My thing was it’s like we are so unequal on this planet,” he said. “There are so many more people richer than us, there are so many people more famous than us, and we get overlooked.  

“But we have one thing that we all have the same equivalent right to and that is to vote. So it’s vote for what you stand for in my opinion.” 

The National’s interview with Chaney and Diamond will be included as part of a feature on the future of Scottish drag in this week’s Seven Days supplement, available in the Sunday National on March 21.  

BBC Three brings the final episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race UK to BBC iPlayer from 7pm, Thursday 18 March