I’m not actually supposed to be writing, I’m supposed to be packing. In fact, my broadband connection was supposed to be cancelled, so I’m not even supposed to be able to blog.
However, a Scout is always prepared, and as a treat, read on for an article wot I wrote over the Summer (originally intended for Iain Dale’s Guest Posts, incidentally) on the problems with appealing to British patriotism as a way of talking down calls for Scottish independence:
Talk has begun to spread about the real possibility of the 300-year-old union between England and Scotland breaking apart. The prevailing wisdom suggests that many Scottish people will, at the next general election, vote for the Scottish National Party as a protest against Labour. With a Conservative government in Westminster looking likely, many of them will feel that they are not being represented, and will be tempted to vote for independence in the promised referendum.
Of course, speculation on the end of the union may be just blowing smoke in the breeze, but it is it is increasingly clear that we need to begin looking at the underlying reasons for the cultural divergence we are seeing between the two countries. Many English people have gradually become resentful of the differences in healthcare and education between England and Scotland since devolution began. In turn, some Scots have seen these differences as evidence that Scotland can govern itself and no longer need be ‘ruled by’ the English.
After hundreds of years of oppression, war and finally union with England, interest in Scotland’s separate culture and history has been going through a resurgence of interest in the last few decades. Much of the rest of the world sees ‘English’ as synonymous with ‘British’, since England has the greater population and the more public face, but the Scottish stand apart from this.
I doubt that I am alone in being able to claim a heritage from every part of this island. Having been born in Scotland to English parents I would be applying for dual citizenship if Scotland ever became an independent country. I consider myself British, English and Scottish, with Welsh ancestry to boot. I expect such mixed backgrounds are more common than not amongst British citizens. On this basis, it would surely be a terrible thing to break up our countries. So how can it be avoided?
Suggestions of saving the union by waving the Union Flag around or celebrating a ‘British Day’ fall decidedly flat. Presumably we would all take the day off work so that the English can complain about the Scots, the Scots can complain about the English, and the two can come together to complain about the weather. These ideas are an attempt to appeal to our patriotic pride in the Union, but this enforced patriotism in post-imperial Britain is largely looked upon with suspicion.
British buses do not have slogans like Greyhound’s “Proud to Serve America” painted on them. British politicians do not expect the words “God Bless the United Kingdom” to carry the hearts and votes of the public. The pride the Chinese obviously have in their Olympics forms a stark contrast with the cynicism which surrounds the prospect of the London Games. And yet it is to these same emotions – pride and honour for one’s country and its achievements – that the words of Alex Salmond and the other Scottish Nationalists are pitched. It is the pride of many Scots in their own culture and heritage, their patriotic belief in their country’s right and capability to stand alone, that has started us talking about separation.
Rather than meeting this divergence of cultures head-on, the idea which is gradually gaining ground is of a federal Britain, where English, Scottish, Welsh and presumably Northern Irish governments co-exist under the umbrella of a common military, currency and foreign policy. This would certainly allow us to ‘celebrate our differences’, but it could equally increase our sense of separation and form the next stage of the slippery slope, further vindication of the view that devolution was simply the ‘thin end of the wedge’ towards separation.
Whichever course of action we eventually decide upon, we should remember that while patriotism may be the force which saves the United Kingdom, it is also the force which has gone so far in pulling it apart.