WE NEED to talk about Scotland.

Over the past 12 months the cacophony of voices from both sides of the independence debate has got louder and louder until it built into a hysterical din last week.

Headlines screamed “11 days to save the union!” and “Downing Street engulfed in panic!”

But, lost in the coverage of what JK Rowling thinks of the whole thing, is the question of just what happens after September 18.

If we wake up on September 19 – which is my birthday, just in case you want to pop it in your diary – to find Scotland has voted to stay with the union, life both sides of the border is likely to stay roughly the same.

Alex Salmond will probably find himself forced to resign and some disgruntled nationalists will rant for a while about how “the fight isn’t over”.

But for everyone else it will be business as usual.

And up until a couple of weeks ago I would have said this was almost certain to be the way it’s going to go.

But either the Yes campaign has saved up all its juice for the final push or something has gone seriously wrong in the Better Together camp because pro-independence support seems to be pulling ahead at an alarming pace.

So come a week on Friday, we could be looking at a very different Britain.

David Cameron will certainly face calls to quit, although if he’s got any conviction – which the jury is still out on – he’ll take in on the chin and cling on until next year’s election.

Meanwhile, we’ll be forced to listen to and read about the actual logistics of transferring power to Edinburgh for the foreseeable future.

But maybe things won’t be that different after all.

A lot of independence supporters seem to think they’ll suddenly find themselves in a state of glorious isolation, but the truth is its going to take much longer than that.

As someone who was born and raised in England – aside from a short stint over the border in Cardiff – I have no horse in this race and am more than happy to sit back and let the Scottish people make their own minds up.

But where will it leave the rest of us?

Only time will tell.