There will be FUD
In under a week as of this writing, the Scottish independence referendum will have been held and the votes will either have been counted, or will be in the process. Last Sunday in the Observer, Will Hutton proposed a constitutional settlement to save the union: a wholesale change to the British constitution, giving each of the constituent nations an assembly of its own, including England, the replacement of the House of Lords with a "House of Britain" representing the nations and regions, and greater autonomy for cities and towns. The major parties have already promised to transfer more powers to the Scottish parliament in the event of a No vote, in particular greater control over taxes.
The campaign for a No vote styles itself "Better Together" but its major tactic seems to consist of what the computer industry calls FUD: fear, uncertainty and doubt. The spectacle of London politicians like Cameron, Miliband and Gordon Brown showing up to warn people to vote No is very reminiscent of those computer monopolists (originally IBM but more recently Microsoft) scaring people that bad things would happen if they invested in competitors' products. The fears are mostly about the economy: of major companies moving their headquarters to London, of prices in shops rising, of North Sea oil running out (or sometimes, of a large part of it being claimed by England), of what currency Scotland will use or of it having to join the Euro, of whether it can join the EU immediately, of whether the British armed forces will still get ships built there, even of border controls at Gretna (which, of course, there aren't on crossings to Ireland; you did not need a passport even during the Troubles). Last week it started to appear that the FUD tactics were not working and that opinion polls showed that support for a Yes vote was increasing (in some cases that the Yes vote was ahead); Prime Minister's Questions was cancelled so that the leaders of the three major Westminster parties could go up to Scotland and campaign against independence, and promises of more power for Holyrood were made. Nobody was suggesting a comprehensive reform of the British constitution. The last thing any politician down south wants is more power slipping away to the English regions, or having to share power with anyone unless it's absolutely necessary, or of meaningful regional assemblies in England. Labour and the Tories are used to power being an all-or-nothing affair.
As a British citizen of English and Irish origin, I do not particularly want to see the UK split up, but I do not blame Scots for wanting out, particularly in the present political climate. If I was a Scottish voter the topmost thought in my head would be "no more Tories". Of course, independence will give the political right a chance to re-emerge in Scotland once it is no longer associated with support for the union (witness Alex Salmond's fondness for Donald Trump's developments and golf courses), but they will in the short term be free of the mindless, uncaring vulture capitalism which has been imposed by the present coalition (and even then, the Scots are partly protected from it by devolution). I am more worried about what it will mean for the rest of the UK. Many minority populations in Scotland identify as Scottish, but not many in England identify as English; they use the term to mean white (although in my experience, they can often spot the Irish in someone at ten paces). Much like those with a Soviet national identity in parts of the former USSR after that union broke up (notably Russian speakers in eastern Ukraine), there are a lot of people around the UK who identify as British, and their home country will no longer exist if Scotland leaves (even though the name "Britain" in fact refers to the Celtic ancestors of the Welsh and Cornish). I am less worried about the "perpetual Tory government" scenario; the recriminations over the break-up of the Union may well prevent the party winning the next election, particularly when the party faces competition with UKIP. Nobody seems to have considered the status of Northern Ireland; the loyalty of its mostly Scottish Protestant population is to Britain, not England.
The major reason why nationalism has grown in the past couple of generations has a lot to do with the failure of the British state to adapt to modern times. Britain likes to pride itself on taking the first steps towards the Rule of Law and constitutional government, but it was left behind by other large modern democracies such as the USA, Germany, Spain, Canada and Australia decades ago. We now have a political structure built for a time when most of the population was illiterate and disenfranchised; the political classes resist reform because it would likely mean neither of the big two parties would ever form a single-party government again. We have had decades since the end of the Empire to redress the political balance, but the political classes have formed a vested interest in their own right and resisted at every step of the way. Even the current "five-year Parliament" law was enacted only to stop the coalition being broken up if the Liberal Democrats decided to back out. The signs are that the Tories want to sink us deeper into the past, celebrating the feudal Magna Carta while campaigning to strip away from British citizens the rights that citizens of those countries take for granted by removing us from the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Union. Elsewhere in Europe, physical borders and obstacles to travel have been torn down; the Tories and their press defend ours, despite the unnecessary expense and inconvenience they cause.
I do agree that in the event of a Scottish No vote, the UK will need major constitutional reform, but it should happen regardless of which way the vote goes. It should have happened decades ago, rather than merely being discussed in a panic just as it seemed that Scotland would leave the union in a referendum held as a challenge to Alex Salmond. A hundred days was probably too short to "save the Union"; ten days certainly was. We have no hope now, except to pray that the Scots vote No. But we cannot blame them if they voted Yes. Our sclerotic and antiquated political system and the political classes and press that defend it are to blame for the current crisis.
Image source: @YesVoteScots.
