{"id":105310,"date":"2021-08-10T08:04:07","date_gmt":"2021-08-10T07:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/politicscouk.wpengine.com\/?p=105310"},"modified":"2022-06-13T13:11:05","modified_gmt":"2022-06-13T12:11:05","slug":"the-settled-will-scottish-sovereignty-in-an-age-of-unthinking-unionism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politics.co.uk\/comment\/2021\/08\/10\/the-settled-will-scottish-sovereignty-in-an-age-of-unthinking-unionism\/","title":{"rendered":"‘The settled will’: Scottish sovereignty in an age of unthinking unionism"},"content":{"rendered":"

After a strictly provisional ceasefire, the \u201cScottish question\u201d looms large over our politics once again. A crisis of unionist identity is fast becoming one of survival \u2013 and our leaders know it. In recent days, both Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer have ventured north of the border. They held meetings with their respective Scottish Party leaders \u2013 plotting, surely, for the battles to come.<\/span><\/p>\n

Outsiders have noticed a cautious but growing optimism in the unionist camp. The very fact that Johnson is visiting Scotland \u2013 for the first time since January \u2013 suggests the worries that his subterranean Scottish polling levels will sink the union have subsided.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This newfound optimism in the unionist camp is also exemplified by Michael Gove\u2019s recent comments to the Scottish <\/span>Sunday Mail. <\/span><\/i>Gove, who just a month ago said that Westminster had ruled out a second referendum before 2024, told the paper: if the people of Scotland develop a \u201csettled will in favour of a referendum, then one would occur\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gove\u2019s acceptance that Scotland has the right to decide on \u201cindyref2\u201d is an about-face from a government that has long-insisted on the supremacy of Westminster as an abiding constitutional principle. The government has invested much time and faith in this doctrine. It has been affirmed and reaffirmed \u2013 most significantly in the 2019 EU Withdrawal Agreement \u2013 that \u201cthe Parliament of the United Kingdom is sovereign\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the issue of sovereignty is still far from resolved in Scotland. And Gove\u2019s recent intervention is but the latest example of government self-contradiction.<\/span><\/p>\n

When the SNP\u2019s Ian Blackford moved that \u201cthis House endorses the principles of the \u2018Claim of Right\u2019 for Scotland\u201d back in 2018, MPs voiced no objections. The Scottish \u201cClaim of Right\u201d(1989) is a document that declares the \u201csovereign right of the Scottish people to determine the form of Government best suited to their needs\u201d. Despite this being a clear front to Conservative unionist \u201cthought\u201d, no opposition was raised.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the government\u2019s \u201cunthinking unionism\u201d isn\u2019t the key story here. Rather, Gove\u2019s comments also remind us of the path not taken \u2013 of the forgotten \u201cthinking unionism\u201d now sadly consigned to the past.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe settled will\u201d of the Scottish people was a phrase first invoked by Labour\u2019s John Smith at a meeting of the Scottish Constitutional Convention (SCC) in 1990. The SCC was convened to articulate a common vision for a Scottish Parliament. And it succeeded. The SCC\u2019s report, published in 1995, formed the basis of the 1997 Scotland Act.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the convention also served another, more important, purpose. In the face of an increasingly self-confident Scottish nationalism, it aimed to reform and thus galvanise unionism at large. As part of this assignment, the SCC\u2019s conveners penned the historic \u201cClaim of Right\u201d, the same document that Westminster endorsed anew in 2018.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A fervent and enthusiastic devolutionist, John Smith was crucial in this attempt to reinvigorate unionism. His declaration that devolution was \u201cthe settled will of the Scottish people\u201d was drafted to acknowledge both the political reality of Scottish sovereignty and the need for a Scottish parliament to accommodate and buttress it.<\/span><\/p>\n

So while Gove might appropriate Smith\u2019s vocabulary, he manifestly does not share his vision. His remarks on Scotland\u2019s \u201csettled will\u201d is belied by the devo-sceptic English nationalism which has long instructed government policy north of the border.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our PM and self-styled \u201cMinister for the Union\u201d has described Scottish devolution as a \u201cdisaster\u201d. Gove himself has said that the UK\u2019s constitution is \u201cnot fit for purpose\u201d. And Jacob Rees-Mogg has remarked that New Labour\u2019s \u201cconstitutional tinkering \u2026 weakened our parliament and helped to divide the United Kingdom\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Smith\u2019s unionism was defined by its ability to accommodate Scottish sub-nationality. But, for this government, the concept that things work differently in Scotland and unevenly across the \u201cfour nations\u201d is an outrageous slight on British unity.<\/span><\/p>\n

Before the 2014 referendum, Scottish poet Kathleen Jamie observed that \u201cUnionism has no new songs\u201d. Now, 7 years on, Johnson and his administration prove Jamie right at every turn. The Anglo-Scottish union has lasted for 314-years because of the ability of leading figures to innovate in the face of challenge \u2013 but this government has neither the capacity nor creativity for change. Conservative intransigence is now the greatest threat to the integrity of the United Kingdom.<\/span><\/p>\n

As of last week, the SNP has compiled a list of Boris Johnson\u2019s many \u201clies and broken promises\u201d relating to Scotland. Included are Johnson\u2019s failed record on workers’ rights, \u201cbetrayal\u201d of the Scottish fishing industry, attempts at NHS privatisation, the \u201cpower grab\u201d of the internal market bill and much more. Clearly, the SNP believe that Johnson is an argument for independence in and of himself.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So for all the rhetorical flourish of Gove\u2019s comments, we have no reason to believe that this government can listen to the people of Scotland \u2013 be their will settled or not. Our government has no intention of acknowledging Scottish sovereignty; to the blinkered \u201cunthinking unionists\u201d in government, such an admission would insult the very foundation of British unity. Johnson believes that uniform British nationalism is the only legitimate form of patriotism.<\/span><\/p>\n

With a second Scottish independence referendum increasingly on the cards, a hypothetical \u2018No\u2019 campaign will \u2013 in all probability \u2013 adopt the government\u2019s ascendant muscular unionism. And so Scotland will remain in constitutional and political stasis \u2013 trapped between Sturgeon\u2019s vision of independence and Johnson\u2019s intransigent, take-it-or-leave-it unionism.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the middle, somewhere, there remains a case to be made for the union. But as of now \u2013 much to the UK\u2019s peril \u2013 no party is willing to make it.<\/span><\/p>\n

IndyRef2<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n