Sunday, 21 September 2014

United We Stand



I love Scotland.  I have made many visits there over the years on holiday and on business and it is always a pleasure.  It is quite a big place and accounts for 32% of the land area of the United Kingdom.  I have never been much further north than Inverness and I have never been to any of the islands.  My first visit was as a 10 year old when I was still at St George's school and we had a school trip for four days.  We spent most of our time around Edinburgh and visited the castle — of course — saw the Scottish Crown Jewels and shivered in the dungeons.  In later years I have holidayed on the west coast and worked in distilleries, creameries, chemical plants, and pharmaceutical plants.  For most of my life I have lived in Sussex and sometimes the people I visited in Scotland thought I was just another bloody southerner coming to tell them what to do and to gloat over the superiority of life in southern England.  Once I had re-assured them that this was not the case and that [a] I was a northern Englander, [b] Scotland was a much better place to live than south-east England because it was so much less crowded, [c] the people were generally friendlier and [d] I liked going there.  So it was with much relief that I celebrated Scotland voting "No!" in the referendum.  

It was clear from my own experience that there are some in Scotland who suffer from a mild persecution complex when it comes to relationships with England.  This has been exploited by Alex Salmond as he fought for an independent Scotland.  It is a difficult case to make and there was a widespread belief around the world that Scotland was going mad.  The United Kingdom is probably the most successful union of a group of countries anywhere in the world, with a single currency, a stable government and generally considerable prosperity.  It has survived for 307 years since the act of union but for 411 years if we date from the first coming together when James VI of Scotland was invited to England to take the throne made vacant by the death of Elizabeth I.  He became James I of England and after one hundred years of tooing and froing and a civil war the nations came together in the Act of Union in the reign of Queen Anne in 1707.

The arguments against Scottish independence are considerable and it was important that the Scottish Nationalists set out exactly how it was going to work.  They never did this.  Alex Salmond regarded everything as being a plot against Scotland by the English.  He claimed much exaggerated oil reserves, never properly addressed the currency question — as an independent nation he could not use the £ sterling — never told us what he would do with the border, how he would finance defence, how he would keep the big banks [with all their jobs] in Scotland, etc etc.  And above all this Scotland was being controlled by rich, southern public school educated Tories.  Yes, this last does happen but it is an argument that could be made by all in the north of England, as well.  But the Labour Party was lead by John Smith [a Scotsman] and then by Tony Blair [ a Scotsman] who became prime minister for ten years and then by Gordon Brown [a Scotsman], so the southern Tory argument is a bit weak.  Add to that the fact that some 57 Scottish MPs in parliament in London vote on matters that affect only England while similar matters are decided for Scotland by the Scottish parliament.     

The independence argument has gone on for years but during the intense phase before the referendum it has been the Yes camp that has been most active. One thing that has certainly been achieved during this referendum campaign has been a resurgence in public interest in politics.  Not since 1951 has there been such a turnout to vote in any election.  At 84% overall no one can question the validity of the vote — 45% Yes and 55% No is a better result than anyone expected.  It has to be said, however, that there have been some ugly demonstrations of thuggish nationalism with threats made against potential No voters.  Even death threats!  Alex Salmond gave a vote in the referendum to 16 and 17 year olds  — not for reasons of democracy but because he thought they would give a massive vote in favour of independence — and in that he was correct.  But listening to some of the discussions from the Yes camp I came to believe that they had lost all connection with reality.  There was a universal belief that if they were independent they could have free education, free health care, no prescription charges, no Trident bases and an endless supply of money from oil.

In the last week or so, the break-up of the UK looked like a serious possibility with serious implications for the other 92% of the electorate that were never consulted — including a million or so Scots men and women living in England.  It was absurd.  Potentially, the break-up could have been decided by just 8% of the UK population including children and temporary residents from Poland, Lithuania, etc while ignoring  those Scots living south of the border.  Yet, no-one in Scotland seemed ready to question the why Scotland, alone should answer a question that affected the whole of the UK.  A key figure in strengthening the case for unity has been Gordon Brown, who on the eve of the poll made a magnificent rousing speech in Glasgow encouraging Scotland to vote for the most successful union in history.  More devolution has been promised and to a tight timetable but David Cameron has linked this to tackling matters of English devolution and the West Lothian Question.

Nevertheless, in spite of everything, I am very glad they voted "No!"
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