From the beginning I have used the subtitle of Scott’s
Waverley to reflect on the years passing from the independence referendum. It
is becoming more appropriate as the parallels become clearer. The defeat of the
Jacobites in 1746 was a decisive moment in Scottish history. There would be no
further rebellions. It is for this reason that it was so appropriate yet
peculiar that Scottish nationalists called themselves “the 45”. It not least
showed their inability to count. They won 44.7% of the vote. Worse it showed
their identification with another lost cause mentality for indeed the cause was
lost ten years ago. It just took us ten years to find this out.
Scottish nationalism’s best chance was in 2014, but it
wasn’t ready, and the referendum came too soon.
It was entirely unexpected that Alex Salmond should
win the absolute majority in 2011 that David Cameron considered necessary to
reward with an independence referendum. Both Salmond and Cameron were surprised
and in their own ways not ready.
Of course it was not necessary for Cameron to grant a
referendum. An absolute majority in a devolved parliament cannot logically give
the SNP a mandate over a reserved matter that is outside the remit of that
parliament. The SNP could not use that majority to abolish nuclear weapons even
if it was in its manifesto, because defence is reserved. So why could the SNP
use its majority to abolish the United Kingdom even it was in its manifesto?
But Cameron was unwilling to use this argument. It had
been traditional in British politics to suppose that secession was the right of
any part of the UK if a majority wished it and few at the time questioned this.
It took the independence referendum to change this view, which meant that after
losing the SNP found the task suddenly much harder. There would be no more
David Camerons and the attitude of British politics to secession would
decisively change after getting a shock in 2014.
While both sides were not ready, the SNP had the
advantage of having two first rate politicians working together. Alex Salmond
was close to his peak in the years leading up to the referendum. Nicola
Sturgeon’s peak arrived slightly later when she became First Minister, but the
advantage the SNP had in the years leading up to the referendum was that
Salmond and Sturgeon were working together as indeed was the independence
movement.
There were no splits in 2014. There was no Alba.
Writers like Stuart Campbell who developed the popular Wings over Scotland site
did not differ from the SNP and were not as now opponents.
There was no Pro UK equivalent of Wings over Scotland,
and this was a disadvantage. Most of the grassroots campaigning was on the Yes
side. People who were happy to remain in the UK were initially complacent and
until almost too late largely uninterested. Like Cameron they thought the SNP
would be easily defeated. They were very nearly wrong.
Cameron goes down in history as one of the great fools
of British politics. He thought he could defeat the independence cause easily
and so gave the SNP control over the timing of the referendum and the question.
His government then proceeded to campaign badly and came quite close to losing
in September 2014.
He repeated the same “Project Fear” method in 2016 and
actually did lose the referendum on EU membership. We are quite fortunate that
this did not happen two years earlier.
If Cameron was set on granting Salmond a referendum,
he should have made clear that it was to happen almost immediately and with a
neutral question that did not involve Yes/No.
A question such as “Should Scotland leave the UK or
remain in the UK?” given to Scots soon after Salmond won his majority would
have seen a decisive victory for the Pro UK argument.
Instead, we had a very long campaign indeed, which the
SNP used cleverly to build support from around 25% to nearly 45%.
The UK government stupidly allowed itself to appear
negative by absolutely denying an independent Scotland a currency union, when
it ought to have said that these matters were uncertain and would depend on the
negotiations.
There was no need to deny Scotland anything, much of
which just got Scottish nationalists angry. Uncertainty would have done the job
just as well as saying No with far less rancour.
For instance, the British government might have argued
that an independent Scotland might have to begin life outside of the EU, in
which case it might not be possible to maintain a currency union as EU laws
would not allow there to be a currency union between a member state and a
non-member state. This would have been true, but would have involved the EU
saying No. It would have pointed out that leaving the UK would mean Scotland’s
leaving the EU and that leaving would involve all the issues with borders and
trade deals that we have learned about since 2016.
The problem is that no one had yet arrived at these
arguments. The fact that leaving the UK would mean leaving the EU and beginning
negotiations with the EU from scratch upon becoming independent was never fully
accepted by either side. The assumption was that Scotland would somehow be able
to negotiate EU membership while negotiating leaving the EU. It’s only later
because of our experience of Brexit that we have discovered the full falsity of
that argument at least in theory.
In practice of course we don’t really know what would
have happened if Yes had won in 2014. It would have had the cooperation of the
British government, and that government might have considered for financial
reasons that it was best for everyone to cooperate closely with Scotland. If
the failure of a few banks could bring down the world economy in 2008 it would
have been in no one’s interest for either the Scottish or the former UK economy
to be damaged seriously. There might have been deals with the EU. The Americans
would have put pressure on Scotland to allow nuclear weapons to remain in
Scotland. After a few years there might have been a close and friendly relation
between Scotland and the former UK like between Austria and Germany.
This was the prize on offer in 2014 for Scottish
nationalism and this prize was never available afterwards.
The difference in 2014 was this promised cooperation
from the British government. Securing the agreement with the British government
over a legal referendum and the promise that the British government would help
implement the result, was precisely what the SNP lacked in all its subsequent
arguments in the years since.
The British government discovered in the years
following 2016 that it could quite happily say No to the SNP when it asked for
a second referendum and there was not a thing the SNP could do. Cameron of
course could have done the same.
It’s one thing to argue for Yes when the British
government has promised to cooperate, it’s quite another when a referendum
would be unofficial, or a de facto referendum or a unilateral declaration of
independence. At this point there would be rather less cooperation and the sort
of deals that might have happened in 2014 were much less likely to happen.
The SNP’s best chance was in 2014. The Better Together
campaign was disadvantaged by conceding the timing, the question and indeed the
argument. The concept of being Better Together involves us being separate at
least to some extent. A man and wife might be better together, but only because
they are separate people with the possibility of divorcing if they decide it’s
better to be apart. So, the Better Together argument already conceded
separatism, all that was left was some lurid threats if Scotland chose to
divorce and some bribes if it didn’t. Such an argument deserves to lose and so
almost did.
In the years since 2014 Scottish nationalism reached
its absolute peak in 2015 when it won nearly all the seats at the General
Election. The votes for Scottish independence in 2015 would have won in 2014,
which goes to show that the referendum was too early for the SNP. But it’s also
one thing to vote for Scottish independence in theory another to vote for it
when if you win, it will actually happen.
The biggest mistake that the SNP made was the split
with Alex Salmond. Without any inside knowledge my impression is that
everything that has happened to Salmond was unnecessary. The SNP and Nicola
Sturgeon in particular destroyed themselves by going after Salmond and for no
real reason.
There were not going to be any complaints to the
police let alone a court case against Salmond because of whatever he did or did
not do while living in Bute House. If he had won in 2014 there is no way at all
that anyone was going to dig up such issues.
It was Nicola Sturgeon’s decision to attack Salmond
with the full force of the Scottish government. It is astonishing that Salmond
survived.
Imagine a possible world in which Nicola Sturgeon and
Alex Salmond were still friends. He would be an elder statesman giving welcome
and useful advice. He might have a seat in Westminster or a role in the
Scottish government. Scottish nationalism in that case would still be like it
was in 2014. It would be united.
Instead, we have rival pro-independence parties we had
the resignation of Nicola Sturgeon, the uselessness of Humza Yousaf and the
dullness of John Swinney and finally the decisive defeat of Scottish
nationalism at the General Election in July.
What is the source of this division? The fallout
between Salmond and Sturgeon. Everything follows from this, even if we don’t
know all the details.
This is the tragedy of the SNP. In all the years that
the SNP has existed it has produced really only two first rate politicians.
They came together in 2014 and came quite close to winning.
Since then, gradually and then suddenly the goodwill
and trust that gave the Yes campaign a grassroots movement has gone. It has
gone because first Sturgeon attacked Salmond and then she thought she could get
away with anything. It is a classic tale of power turning the head of wee
lassie who would have been nothing whatsoever if Alex Salmond had not found her
amongst the dregs of Dreghorn.
If there were to have been a second chance for
Scottish nationalism it would have to have been in 2016.
I realised that the best chance of stopping Scottish
nationalism was for the UK to leave the EU. Gradually the argument became clear
to everyone that the UK’s leaving the EU made Scottish independence impossible.
That is one of the reasons that we are where we are now. The SNP has never
properly addressed the consequences of Brexit for its argument.
But in the summer of 2016, there was much anger in
Scotland over Brexit. If Sturgeon had organised a referendum or even if she had
used the Scottish parliament to unilaterally declare independence like
Catalonia, there is a reasonable chance she would have succeeded. If she had
gained EU support for such a move, then she might have achieved both the
cooperation she needed and the support of Remainers who might have used such a
move to keep the former UK in the EU as part of the deal.
I think that was the moment of maximum danger, but
Sturgeon was too cowardly to do more than bluster. If Salmond had remained
First Minister, he might have gone for it. He is a gambler after all.
You don’t need a referendum to become independent, few
countries have become independent in this way. You need to seize an opportunity
and a moment like the Bolsheviks did.
I think Sturgeon realised that the moment had passed
for which reason she campaigned for independence without seriously thinking it
would happen. But the pretence involved in this became dishonest when she
encouraged money to be raised for an independence campaign when she already
knew there would not be one. From there everything that subsequently happened
follows.
We are left with might have beens. What if we had
continued on from Derby towards London? No one will ever know. We can speculate
about counterfactuals but that is all it will ever be.
The UK was lucky in 2014. It was certainly the closest
it has been to ceasing to exist. If the referendum had happened in 2015, we
might have lost. Negative campaigning and conceding the SNP’s argument almost
did.
Scottish nationalism has many advantages. Most Scots
feel much more Scottish than they do British. Nearly all Scots think that
Scotland is a country like France. These are decisive winning arguments in
favour of independence nearly everywhere geographically and historically. And
yet Scottish nationalism now looks like an historical blip. We are very near to
the time when we were children when Scottish nationalism amounted to breaking
the goal posts at Wembley and not much more than wearing tartan fringes on our
trousers.
Despite our separate identity, we don’t quite feel
separate from our fellow countrymen. While Better Together conceded the SNP’s
argument, the SNP conceded the Pro UK argument by arguing that it wanted in
reality independence within the UK. Salmond didn’t want to lose anything connected
with being in the UK because Scots liked lots about being in the UK and was
unwilling to concede that anything really would really change for the worse and
that anything would be lost. But this is to argue for staying in the UK.
Scottish nationalism is a very odd form of nationalism
indeed. We feel separate from the other parts of the UK and are desperate to
emphasise our difference even to the extent of dressing up in clothes we don’t
normally wear so that everyone knows we are Scottish and so that the French
ladies go “Ooh la la” he’s got nothing under his kilt. But our separatism is
not serious. The least disadvantage of leaving will see us stay.
No other independence movement in the world has ever
worried about currency or pensions or indeed borders.
In 1745 we fought for the divine right of kings
because it was our duty to do so, having lost we settled into the smug
prosperity of the Scottish enlightenment and sixty years later Scott wrote
about the romanticism of the Jacobites. But everyone was secretly glad that the
Stuarts lost while still putting their fingers oer the water as they toasted
the king.
We will repeat this until fifty years from now someone
will write a novel called Indyref; or tis sixty years since and perhaps only in
fiction will we discover what really happened in the years that led up to and
the years that follows that brief moment in September 2014 when “in our youth
our hearts were touched with fire.”
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