The Scottish self-deception
By Pete North - January 27, 2021
In the same way that leaving the single market was quite predictably an economic hammer-blow, Scottish independence is likewise. There will be a border if it joins the EU and there will be years of uncertainty hanging over that process. This will be exacerbated by the SNP instituting bad polices it can’t afford.
Furthermore, EU membership is not the rewind they think it is. Scotland has to negotiate its own accession, and its geographic location makes rebuilding its EU exports unlikely – particularly in goods.
I don’t say this as a leaver or a unionist. That’s just my hunch as someone who knows more than any normal person should about regulation and trade. It’s an opinion. Take it or leave it.
What we can say, however, is that this will largely not feature in any referendum campaign – or rather we will see a repeat of the Brexit campaign where the final decision is made on instinct irrespective of the economic risks.
That then leads London to believe it has to make an emotional appeal – which it will attempt to do in its own cack-handed way while the UK economy is collapsing and headed by Boris Johnson. With a distinctly London run and owned No campaign, if there is a referendum, London will lose it. The SNP is better at the propaganda game and the game goes to those who can lay claim to the most authenticity.
In this, Sturgeon already thinks she has it in the bag. Pivoting to a re-join position, while courting the affections of wokelings and confused teenagers, brings about a broad coalition. Self-styled progressives will join forces with Scottish ethno-nationalists.
I’m still not sure I care either way. Scottish Independence is a largely self-defeating enterprise, and it’s Scots in the main who have to live with it, and like the ultra Brexiteers, they will find that independence does not stretch as far as their self-delusions.
It does, however, have the potential benefit of bringing down the entire British establishment, and forcing a political re-ordering in Westminster that likely wouldn’t happen otherwise. Free of the economic, political and cultural deadweight Scotland has become, the rump-UK can forge ahead without the SNP ball and chain in the same way that the EU is now free to integrate itself into oblivion without the UK.
In fact, when I put it like that, the prospect takes on a certain appeal. Particularly as we get to watch it turn into ash in the mouths of the SNP, who face a number of political humiliations from London and Brussels.
I have a hunch though, that the process will get so bogged down in complexity, that there will be a second referendum of some sort that the SNP will lose, putting the process into political purgatory, particularly if the EU is not racing to the rescue. It may then require a constitutional conference to rebuild the Union along new lines. That may not be a bad thing. It’s a shame we can’t skip all this acrimony and get straight to that point.
That, of course, is all on the assumption that we even get as far as a Scottish independence referendum, which is presently in doubt. The SNP is mulling a wildcat referendum but I think it’s a bluff. There would be a widespread boycott of it so it would lack legitimacy and London is not in any way obliged to come to terms over it.
In any case, Sturgeon has to make her move before the SNP bubble pops. Sooner or later it will, partially if the nest of corruption she’s sitting on comes to light. One suspects that if you cut off the head, the body will die. For the time being, London just has to hold the line and let them huff and puff til it runs out of steam.
For the moment the issue is only getting an airing as we count the consequences of Brexit, or rather the complete mess we’ve made of it. Soon enough, though, Brexit will have more tangible consequences felt by many more people at which point the Scottish noisemakers will be competing with more acute priorities, and the media will cease to care.
It will then become the sole obsession of FBPE remainers on Twitter and SNP grunters. And the one mistake twitterers continue to make is to assume Twitter is more important and influential than it actually is. Events may yet overtake them.
