(Almost) Everything I think about the Scottish referendum

I've resisted saying anything about the Scottish referendum, or at least putting anything in writing,  until now so this is a bit of an info-dump / omnibus collection of everything I think about the whole situation. Apologies if it's a little disjointed.

A bit of background, I was born in England but my father is from Scotland and therefore I've always thought of myself as half and half. There's apparently some Welsh in there as well on my mother's side though so far back that nobody can remember the exact fraction. Nevertheless, my dad has always expressed pride in the fact that the Scottish portion of each of his children is a plurality if not an absolute majority. Like countless people I have family in both nations and it feels personal whenever nationalists on either side talk of separation.

The most disturbing feeling is that the nationalists have been allowed to define "we" in a way that invalidates the national identity that I and millions of others feel. It is by nature exclusive rather than inclusive and divisive rather than unifying. The nationalists don't want to separate "their" family from "ours", they want a portion of the family we all share to declare itself separate from the rest. Those who disagree with this are told that they have no right to an opinion because they are in the 'other' group, you're not Scottish, nobody cares what you think because you're not one of those who gets to vote.

Alex Salmond says that nobody is better able to govern Scotland than the people who live there. An argument that you can apply to any geographic location. Nobody is better able to govern Britain than the people who live there, nobody is better able to govern Europe, Aberdeen, Kirkcaldy etcetera etcetera. It all depends on where the "demos" is and, while there is most definitely a Scottish demos, there is a British one as well and these are in no way mutually exclusive.




Any sensible glance at the economic case or the good government case tells you that the most sensible decision, particularly for a proudly sensible, no-nonsense nation like Scotland, is to take the "No" deal of greater powers within a quasi-federal United Kingdom. To have, in the cliched words of the lacklustre Better Together campaign, "the best of both worlds". But this isn't a campaign based on logic and there is no greater admission of this than the Yes campaign's decision to claim that the NHS in Scotland will be at risk from "Tory privatisation" unless Scots choose independence. Ignoring that health spending is completely devolved to the Scottish government. No wonder Labour people are so angry.

Scotland is not an oppressed minority within a tyrannical UK any more than any other part of our country outside Westminster. The Scottish parliament has the power to set income tax rates to be slightly higher or lower than those set by the UK Treasury but is hardly chomping at the bit to break free of these UK-imposed shackles. Health is devolved, education is devolved and the offer from the UK parties for further devolution really only leaves the nuclear submarine base at Faslane but people in the rest of the UK are as anti-nuclear as those in Scotland and CND was founded in London.

There's talk of Scotland being more left wing, more progressive, than the rest of the UK but multiple studies of attitudes show that differences are "modest at best" and you would find a greater divergence of opinion between the North of England and the South or even between different parts of London. Independence is a spectacular overreaction to contemporary problems and circumstances.

This campaign is based much more on nationalism and emotion and the emotions on display do not seem encouraging.

Charles de Gaulle had a great quote: "Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first." Be wary of any political movement where it's acceptable to call your opponents traitors and quislings. It is a wonderful thing that the referendum has provoked such a level of passion that people who had given up voting are being drawn back into the process but the other side of this is that with heightened stakes and emotions come deeper divisions and more vicious arguments.
We should be deeply disturbed by the abuse piled on public figures who support a No vote and protests outside BBC Scotland if Nick Robinson presses Alex Salmond for an answer to a question (even though, y'know, that's his job). Alex Salmond is a skillful politician but his division of the world into "Team Scotland" and "Team Westminster" feeds this as well and he knows it. As if it's not possible to dislike the cosy Westminster jobs-for-the-boys, cabinet of millionaires, professional politician complex and also be against the break-up of the United Kingdom. You must be either completely on-side or completely opposed.

In this way the Yes campaign reminds me of UKIP. I expect the tone of the extremists towards opponents that the "Cyber-nats" have shown will be precisely the same problem that the "Out" campaign faces if there is an EU referendum. Anyone who doesn't advocate separation is a traitor who has sold out to a nebulous and despised "elite". Both campaigns must walk the line between taking advantage of the mob (particularly evident online) without being discredited by its behaviour in the eyes of moderates.

The referendum campaign has though made me, and many others, think about what "British" means for the first time since Gordon Brown's abortive national conversation in 2007. Daniel Hannan is one of those people with whose views I almost exclusively disagree but I've always liked this video, in particular the part where he talks about British being a civic rather than an ethnic sense of national identity.

That's how it's always seemed to me and why anti-immigration movements have never appealed to me. They've always had a tinge of ethnocentrism about them (to say nothing of the ludicrous racism of the BNP and Britain First who have turned the word "indigenous" into a racial codeword) and British has nothing to do with ethnicity. 'British' to me has always been something open, cosmopolitan and pragmatic. In the Spectator's cover feature, where ordinary men and women say what Britain means to them and why they want Scotland to stay, there's a man who talks about being the descendant of immigrants and about how the Scots' constant assertion of their own identity showed that Britain is a ramshackle melting pot for people of different backgrounds. "If there is room for the Scots, then there is room for me too".

This is what "British" means to me. Something that exists alongside ethnicity, birthplace or background. In joining together England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have created a civic family but it's one where membership is open to all who subscribe to its values. Obviously it's not a perfect system (as Jihadi John on the one hand and the Britain First on the other show) but the idea is there and that's something important and admirable. It's not surprising that the label "British" is so popular many ethnic minority groups who describe themselves as "British Indian" or "British Bangladeshi".

Britain is a family which is why the reaction I have seen in the rest of the UK has more often been sadness than anger.

Sadness because separation is such an extreme  reaction to very solvable problems. Tory governments come and go and in the post-war era Scotland has 'voted with the winner' in more general elections than the North of England. Liverpool and Newcastle just don't have a convenient border that they can detonate. The idea of something like the bedroom tax even being discussed in a debate about breaking up the United Kingdom shows how unreal things have become.

The alternative to such an overreaction is that we can all escape the over-centralised overbearing power of Westminster together. Further devolution for Scotland, Wales and the regions of England. The subsidiarity principle that (in theory) governs the European Union needs to come into play here with action being taken by the lowest feasible level.

The argument against a federal United Kingdom has always been fairly simple - you cannot have a functioning federal system when one part is so much larger than the others. England contains around 50 million people. That's 85% of the UK population and around 10 times the population of Scotland so an English parliament would be an awkward creature from birth. A far better idea is giving local autonomy equivalent to the Scottish parliament to regions that want it. London is surely a candidate, Yorkshire and the Humber as well and maybe the North West (past form not withstanding). If not formal (and artificial) government regions then more natural units such as cities or large counties which may demand further autonomy.

The West Lothian question has simmered on the backburner since it was raised but the blanket coverage of more powers being promised to Scotland will raise the issue again in England in the event of a No vote. Maybe the inevitable English backlash can be harnessed to productive effect?

I hope Scotland votes "No". I hope this family isn't broken up and that the panic that has consumed Westminster doesn't simply dissipate and can be used to effect substantial constitutional change. The British constitution is a ramshackle, patchwork creation that only changes when it is forced to. I hope that by narrowly voting "No", Scotland forces us to make those changes.