If there wasn’t enough excitement over Brexit, we’ve
had an opinion poll suggesting that support for Scottish independence has
increased and that a Labour Government would allow a second poll on Scottish
independence.
It baffles me frankly why anyone pays any attention at
all to opinion polls any more. I understand that opinion pollsters telephone
what they hope to be a representative sample of the population. They don’t just present the data they get, but
rather adjust it and manipulate it to make it more accurately representative. If
520 out of 1000 Scots say they want Scottish independence then the SNP get to
say that they have a 2% lead, but there might in fact have been only 480 saying
they want independence only the polling company thought it necessary to adjust
the data. We might as well use chicken entrails as a method of judging what is
going to happen in future elections. Everyone got the result of the 2016 EU
election wrong. Remainers thought they had won right up until the moment they
lost. Better by far to simply ignore all polls whether you find them to be
favourable or unfavourable. Use reason and experience instead.
The whole Brexit strategy against the SNP, is the
realisation that Scottish nationalism depends on the UK as a whole remaining a
member of the EU. It isn’t love for the EU that makes the SNP angry about
Brexit. It’s the fact that Brexit fatally undermines their “independence in
Europe” strategy. Independence movements across the EU have grasped that, for
example, if only Catalonia and Spain can both remain in the EU then Catalan independence
will not hinder the trade relationship between Spain and Catalonia, Catalans
will have exactly the same rights as they do at present and the border will
remain just as it is. It is the prospect of continued EU membership after independence
that guarantees that life will go on more or less the same. It is for this reason
that the EU has become the condition for the possibility of sub-nation
nationalism. Outside the EU, no-one in their right mind would argue for the
independence of Flanders, Veneto, Catalonia or indeed Scotland. Once you grasp
this simple fact, then the argument for leaving the EU as a means of thwarting
Scottish independence becomes obvious.
But the Brexit strategy recognises that in the short
term it will make Scottish nationalists very angry. We saw this in 2016.
Various polls suggested support for independence had increased. Some people
blamed me for my strategy, but a few months later we found that anger had
subsided, the reality of Scottish independence after Brexit had been realised
and during the 2017 General Election the SNP lost seats.
A “no deal” Brexit will likewise cause some anger in
Scotland. But we still need to think strategically. A soft Brexit like Theresa
May’s deal or no Brexit at all, which is what the Remainers in Parliament
really want, will appease the SNP. Nicola Sturgeon will be very happy indeed
that the UK has either left in name only or not left at all. But she will still
want independence. A little down the line she will find another reason to ask
for a second independence referendum. At this point there would probably be a
Labour Government in some sort of deal with the SNP. We now know that this
Labour Government would say “Go ahead have your referendum”. Strategically what
would remaining have achieved? It would have stopped Scottish anger in the short
term, but we would have lost the best argument and the best strategy.
Something odd has happened to Britain. Many English
commentators are willing to concede defeat because of one poll suggesting Scottish
independence might have increased. They want to give Scotland federalism, or
more money or pretty much whatever Nicola Sturgeon wants when she wants it. Some
English nationalists would happily give up Scotland, Northern Ireland and
perhaps even Wales, just because they find the whole debate tiresome. Which other
nation state in the world is so blithe about losing territory? Everyone else
would go to war to protect an uninhabited island from being lost.
We have lost the ability to think long term. Doing the
right thing strategically and doing what is necessary to keep our country
intact may in the past have required effort, struggle and sacrifice over the
course of decades. This is something that all of us understood throughout our
long history. Compared to the struggles of the past leaving the EU even without
a deal is as nothing. All we are doing is reverting to how we were prior to
1972. We are becoming a country like Australia or New Zealand. Prior generations
would not even have been able to see anything scary about a “no deal” Brexit.
Yet our snowflakes melt at the prospect of their prosecco getting a little more
expensive.
There has been an opinion poll. So, what. Just ignore
it. But don’t ignore that Labour has ceased to be a Pro UK party. The Hard Left’s
hatred of Britain knows no bounds. It would delight in giving the IRA victory by
uniting Ireland and partitioning Britain. Now is the time for patriotic British
citizens to get behind Britain. Brexit will bring us unity and will defeat a
Scottish and Irish nationalism that has become one and the same threat.