On various blogs, I have been delighted to see how reasonable people can be when they are used to the monolithically Nationalist (even if not necessarily SNP) Scottish media, and to the astonishing way in which this cause of aristocratic and upper-middle-class cranks has somehow come to define the debate there, but suddenly find themselves confronted with a few political realities.
Such as:
1. There is simply no way that a secessionist entity could just walk away with most or all of the United Kingdom's oil revenue, and simply no comparison with anything still located in the United Kingdom, such as City revenues, or (SNP take note) gold reserves;
2. It is laughably naive to suggest that any British Government would sign any treaty which compromised its right to station any forces or weapons it liked anywhere in the UK as presently constituted, an insistence which would be backed up to the hilt by the Americans; and
3. The notion that a British Government or Parliament could expel a discernable part of Scotland (and I've listed three types before, to all of which this point applies) - or, indeed, a comparably discernable part of England, Wales or Northern Ireland - from the United Kingdom without the express consent of well over half of its electorate is positively obscene, and mercifully inconceivable politically, so think of it this way: no more Union equals no more Scotland.
To which one might add:
4. If any of the above caused talks to break down, then no country on earth would recognise Scottish UDI (even the African countries with close links to Scotland being heavily dependent on British aid, and one of them being about to get Jack McConnell has its British High Commissioner), whereas, thanks to 2 above, the US would, to say the least, back absolutely any British response to UDI, however "drastic"; and
5. No Spanish or Belgian Prime Minister would ever consider for one moment permitting the accession to the EU of a secession from an existing member-state.
Among many, many other things.
But it's all academic: the SNP has given up. It has been not just brought in, but bought in. And it seems to have recognised its cause as belonging to another age. Even Sinn Fein has realised that it has far more power (and is much better-paid) under the current arrangements than it could possibly dream of in a "United Ireland". The Irish Republic looks set to rejoin the Commonwealth. Australia has explicitly rejected becoming a republic. In Canada, New Zealand, three other Pacific countries and fully eight Caribbean ones, the issue is on the agenda hardly, if at all. None of the remaining British Overseas Territories shows the slightest desire for independence (quite the reverse, in fact). Even American popular, as distinct from traditionally Anglophile elite, opinion is now warming to Britain. And so forth.
Leaving the SNP looking like a throwback to the 1950s and 1960s. As, of course, it is. And as, of course, is Salmond. Though in an entirely different way: arise, Sir Alex!
The SNP controlled by the aristocracy and the upper middle classes - shurely shome mishtake shurely? Salmond the economist, son of two middling civil servants, John Swinney the insurance manager, Gordon Wilson the solicitor. Come on!
ReplyDeleteWhen was there a recent horney-handed son of the soil in charge of Labour post WWII-
Blair - Barrister (educated at Fettes)
Smith - Advocate
Kinnock - Lecturer
Foot - Hack
Callaghan - Tax inspector
Wilson - Academic
Gaitskill - Lecturer (educated at Winchester College)
Atlee - Solicitor
Can I name a prominent working class SNP politician. What about Jim Sillars maybe?
I think the nearest the SNP has had to aristocratic links was a flirtation by the last Duke of Argyll (who went off and joined the Liberals) and some mutterings of support by the present Duke of Hamilton. If anything the Scottish aristoracy is so Anglicised and anglocentric they are not exactly fertile ground for the SNP.
You can rant as much as you like about Scottish independence (and devolution for that matter which you do not like either). The rage of the impotent.
Looks like Holyrood will get more powers with the Tories, Lib-Dems and Labour now backing it. Along with Gordon Brown's blessing.
You talk about being backward looking? You want to recreate the British Empire! Have you not noticed what has been happening in the past few days in India and Pakistan.
Yes as I have said the Commonwealth is a very nice club of former colonies (not all of whom are members - Burma/Mynamar, Israel, Jordan, Iraq, Cameroon, Somalia, Sudan, Egypt are examples) but that is what it is, a club. It is not a political animal running around invading other countries - as you would like it to. If it was political animal then it would split on issues from apartheid to the troubles on the sub-continent. If it keeps the peace then tell that to Dehli and Islamabad which point nukes at each other!
I know you are probably in the hang Mahatma Ghandi Society (who like Nehru is unfortunately dead and cremated)incorporating the hang George Washington Society (who maybe can be hung if the sinews are intact - maybe invest in some wire to keep him together!) but the age of Palmerston is over. Kipling is dead. So is the Empire.
Interesting that you mention Australia. There is more than a touch of Bob Santamaria about you. And I write as a fellow Distributist.
ReplyDeleteBut be warned: as you no doubt know, his Democrcatic Labour Party, Industrial Groups, National Civic Council and the rest ended up being supporters of the Vietnam War and of white Rhodesia. Right-wing breakaways from left-wing parties are a phenomenon with a very unhappy history indeed.
The Aberdonian, as you know perfectly well, Scottish Nationalism was an idea first dreamt up in castles and country houses by people with nothing else to do. The story of how it became a major political force is one deserving to be told, if only as an illustration of just how far a massively unpopular and essentially demented cause can get if it has that sort of patronage.
ReplyDeleteI am tempted to say that recreating the British Empire should be attractive to the Scots, who largely ran the old one. But my point was that, long after the end of Empire, countries are now actively refusing to cut their remaining links with Britain, and in some cases seriously considering resuming them.
Or even taking them up for the first time. Mozambique, for example, has joined the Commonwealth even though it was never part of the British Empire. Expect a lot more of that, especially in Africa.
And while Commonwealth membership might not add up to much, actively choosing to retain the Queen as Head of State certainly does. And plenty of countries are doing just that.
Meanwhile, even Sinn Fein are now happily on the payroll, supporting a thirty-two-county Republic rhetorically only, for the consumption of people with nowhere else to go.
Yet there is the SNP, still ranting on like the African, Asian and West Indian independence campaigners of the '50s and '60s, or the Irish Republicans of yore: a period piece, laughably anachronistic.
Except, of course, that, certainly from Salmond, that, too, is only rhetorical, and only for the consumption of people with nowhere else to go. Salmond knows the truth about oil revenue, about gold reserves, about military bases, about America's view on miltary bases, about partition, about all of it.
But, in any case, his real agenda are domestic (and actually rather good). If mentioning independence once per conference speech keeps people voting for him so that he can implement those agenda, then he's prepared to play the game. But that really is as far as it goes.
Ah, Bob Santamaria! Flawed, of course; but no single individual deserves more credit for the fact that Australia never came under Soviet domination.
ReplyDeleteStill, I must make it clear that I am not proposing "a right-wing breakaway from a left-wing party": as much as anything else, you can't breakaway from something that no longer really exists.
Labour was a British nationalist, therefore pro-Commonwealth, and also pro-family, morally and socially conservative party when it was most committed to the Keynes-Beveridge-Attlee Settlement, opposing the Soviet Union at the same time, and on the same grounds, as it opposed apartheid South Africa and its Rhodesian satellite.
These things were, and are, connected; Labour was cut off from them at the same time and by the same people. In consequence, it took only twenty-two per cent of the eligible vote last time. There is an enormous gap to be filled, so let's fill it.
Yep Hugh McDiamid was an aristocrat alright - a man who got thrown out of the SNP for being a communist and out of the Communist Party for being a Scottish Nationalist.
ReplyDeleteThe aristocracy has always been very pro-union. Please refer to the political allegiances of its members in the Lords (before the heredrity crowd were mostly cleared out). Mostly Tories to a man.
I have to retract that comment about the last Duke of Argyll. It was the last Duke of Montrose. Remember a Gaelic programme about him when he died with Ray Michie (then Lib-Dem MP for Argyll and Bute)leading the tributes.
As I said the Commonwealth is a nice club of former colonies. But it is largely a talking shop revolving around the games and giving cash to the occasional needy member. Otherwise it is largely about Canadian embassies for example bailing out Aussies who get into trouble in parts of the world where Australia does not have diplomatic represenation.
The French have a similar if slightly downmarket version, the Francophonie which contains like the Commonwealth countries that were not even colonies. Even Romania is a member due to France's cultural influcence there!
Believe the Spanish have an even low-profile set up. Remember seeing on TV a meeting of the organisation with Juan Carlos thundering about the influence of English language films in Spanish-speaking society, particuarly Latin America. The conference I believe took place at Buenos Aires.
Concerning Salmond as I acknowledged he probably knows he will not win a referendum anytime soon. So he will go out and get more powers instead.
Today Wendy Alexander is expected to announce a call for more powers for the Scottish Parliament and government. She is also expected to call for the slackening of bonds between the Scottish and British Labour Parties.
Concerning HM, if fifteen countries in the world want her as head of state then that is up to them. Not threats of military intervention if they choose to discontinue this link!
I am neither a republican or a monarchist. I think the Queen does a good job in the UK but her dealings with the other 15 nations are infrequent and much of the time inconsequential.
Remember in a past posting about her lack of influence over the political violence in Jamaica. HM government and HM loyal opposition hiring Yardies to shoot each other. And it is still going on in the poorer parts of Kingstown (particuarly Trenchtown) where gangs affiliated to the two political parties occasionally still fight it out over street turf.
Did the Queen have much influence over the implimentation of apartheid in South Africa - which took place before it declared itself a republic and its expulsion from the Commonwealth.
Did the Scots have a lot of influence in the Empire. Yes. But that waltz is well and truely over. Last orders have been called and the ballroom is closed.
In many ways the Empire was the making and breaking of Scotland. We made a lot of money but once the natives had left the building and chose not to buy our products we went into freefall. Empire is the economics of shooting a fish in a barrel. You create a captive market, take their resources as cheaply as you can, process the resources back home and then flog it back to the captive market who are restricted from what other international competitors they can buy from. And watch the money roll in. A glorified form of poncing.
Question: would you have hung Ghandi?