The theme of the STUC's 2014 Congress is "A Just Scotland," the title under which we have been conducting our consultation and engagement initiative with unions and their members on Scotland's constitutional future.

Inevitably, given this will be our last annual congress before the referendum, it is the issue that is sure to dominate discussion.

While it is always dangerous to prejudge the outcome of any Congress debate, anyone who expects either a Yes or No position to emerge should not hold their breath.

While many union members have made their choice, for a significant proportion the answer "isn't obvious" and they are in the process of balancing the advantages and disadvantages of both referendum outcomes based on the recognition that changing Scotland's relationship with Britain involves a "trade off" of powers and/or opportunity.

Unfortunately, exaggerated and increasingly hysterical claims from both campaigns, and the febrile tone of debate, are not helping these considerations and are a disservice to the importance of the debate and to the people of Scotland

While some may be disappointed, I make no apology for our approach. Our starting point is to help union members and their families be fully informed and empowered to consider Scotland's constitutional future within the wider context of the collective values we hold.

For us the referendum debate is not just a means of discussing the form of Scotland's constitutional arrangement, but an exciting opportunity to reawaken a debate on social justice and equality - to talk about the sort of Scotland we want to see now and in the future.

Therefore our approach is one that takes a detailed look at the issues and asks hard questions of both sides, concentrating on which of the referendum outcomes is most likely to advance our social justice agenda and reduce economic inequality.

We are delighted that the First Minister and the leader of the Scottish Labour Party will not only address the Congress but will participate in a Q&A with delegates. I fully expect the questioning to be astute and incisive, focusing on the issues that are exercising Congress and the wider public.

While the Congress is unlikely to reach either a Yes or No position, what it will do is set out a progressive policy agenda to be advanced whatever the outcome in September.

At the heart of that agenda will be our economic alternative and our demands for fair employment.

While Britain's economy has started to recover, that recovery is well behind competitor economies who adopted an alternative to austerity and has yet to translate itself into higher wages and greater job security.

It has not performed as the coalition predicted in 2010.

In 2010 when the coalition took office George Osborne said that as a result of his austerity policies, economic growth in 2013 would be 2.9 per cent. Actual growth was 1.9 per cent.

He said that business investment would increase by 11 per cent in 2013. It actually declined by 1.2 per cent.

He said that exports would increase by 2.5 per cent in 2013. They increased by 0.1 per cent.

He said that the deficit would be £89 billion in 2013. It was £120bn. In fact the deficit has been cumulatively £76bn more than anticipated in 2010.

The British economy is 1.4 per cent smaller than it was in 2008 and 14 per cent smaller than it would have been if the recession hadn't struck.

Austerity has failed even in the terms set by its own architects.

But as well as exposing its failure, it is also essential that we continue to campaign for a genuine, credible alternative.

Congress will set out that alternative - based on fair taxation and a living wage, on quality jobs and decent services, on fair benefits and stronger communities and on a comprehensive industrial strategy including a statutory scheme of sectoral collective bargaining.

The biggest threat to the cohesion of our society and the stability of our economy is inequality. Britain is one of the most unequal nations in the developed world. This has its roots in short-term thinking, share-price driven, profit-obsessed, bonus-grabbing financial capitalism.

It is no coincidence that the decline in real wages as a share of our national income, the growth in zerohours contracts and forced self-employment and other forms of insecure work have occurred at the same time as unions have been under attack politically and industrially.

And the power imbalance we see in our economy will not be reversed until the legitimate role of unions in the workplace and in wider society is recognised and an environment exists where unions can function effectively and responsibly in the interests of working people, their families and wider society.

That is why we need the removal of all anti-union laws and a framework to put in place collective bargaining arrangements across our economy.

The Scottish constitutional debate is a debate about where power should lie and why. It will be of little real relevance unless government - wherever it sits - has the power and is willing to use it to prevent the destructive actions of private equity capital or if workers, through their unions, don't have the power to take on employers and to achieve a fairer share of our national wealth.

Grahame Smith is general secretary of the Scottish Trades Union Congress