Scottish independence

Alex Salmond is within striking distance of victory. Why hasn’t England noticed?

 Edinburgh [audioplayer src=’http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_6_February_2014_v4.mp3′ title=’Alex Massie and Matthew Parris discuss why the Union is in peril’ startat=55] Listen [/audioplayer]A century ago, with Britain in peril, Lord Kitchener’s stern countenance demanded that every stout-hearted Briton do their bit for King and Country. ‘Your country needs you’ rallied hundreds of thousands to khaki and the Kaiser’s War. Today, with Britain in peril again, you could be forgiven for asking where Kitchener’s successor is. A new recruiting poster might cry: ‘Britons: Wake up! Pay attention! Your country really is at risk!’ The threat, of course, is domestic rather than foreign (for now, at least). It is beginning to be appreciated, even in London, that

The Battle for Threadneedle Street

I thought it obvious that Mark Carney’s trip to Scotland yesterday was a bad day for Alex Salmond and the Scottish nationalists. Sure, the governor of the Bank of England said, a currency union between Scotland the the rump UK could happen and be made to work but it would be fraught with difficulty and sacrifice too. Do you really want to do that? How lucky do you feel? Carney, being a Canadian and therefore a man crippled by politeness, did not add “punk”. In response the SNP were reduced to pushing a meaningless poll which found 70% of Britons favouring a currency union after independence. That is, 70% of

The right-wing case for Scottish independence

Chuckle not, it exists. Wealthy Nation, a new grouplet formed by the eminent historian Michael Fry, is making the case that Scotland can be an admirably prosperous little country after independence provided, that is, she casts off the soft-left Caledonian consensus that remains wearily orthodox thinking north of the Tweed and Solway. Fry, whose new history of Scotland from Waterloo to Mons I commend to you without reservation, set out his case in The Scotsman earlier this month. If Scotland is to be free, she must be rich and she will not be rich unless her politics moves to the right. As he put it: On blogs and websites I

Alex Massie

Alex Salmond writes a cheque – in pounds sterling – he cannot honour

As I type this, Alex Salmond and Mark Carney are chowing over porridge at Bute House, the First Minister’s official residence in Edinburgh. There is always the risk of exaggerating the importance of these things but this morning’s meeting with the Governor of the Bank of England may be the most important encounter Alex Salmond has this year. The question is simple: will an independent Scotland be able to forge a currency union with the rump United Kingdom? The answers, for all the First Minister’s bland assurances that such a union is in everyone’s interests, are not so simple. Like poker players, politicians often have a “tell”. When Salmond offers

Poll shows Yes camp are within striking distance of victory

‘It has given us a good, old-fashioned kick up the backside,’ said one member of the ‘No’ camp yesterday. He was being charitable. It could end up being an awful lot worse than that. The ‘it’ in question was the new ICM poll which, suddenly and unexpectedly, has put the Yes campaign right back in the hunt for Scottish independence. At a stroke, all those complacent certainties about the No camp wiping the floor with the Nationalists have been discarded and, this morning at Holyrood, the talk is of little else. ‘It is game on,’ said one Nationalist with a smile. Just to emphasise how important this new poll for The Scotsman

Putin’s strange intervention over Scottish independence

Is it useful to have Vladimir Putin on your side or not? One would have hoped anybody in the UK Government would have considered this question before, apparently, asking for the Russian President’s help in their battle with the Scottish nationalists over independence. Many people saw President Putin’s intervention in the Scottish independence debate on the Andrew Marr Show yesterday morning. Far fewer, however, are aware of the rather murky background to the exchange between Putin and Marr which seems to have preceded it. For the record, this is what the Russian President said in response to a question from Marr about Scottish independence: ‘It is not a matter for Russia, it is a

Europe will affect the Scots referendum, but not in the way everyone expects

With William Hague in Glasgow this morning, the Scottish independence debate has swung round to Europe once again. Europe is indeed going to be important as we head towards the referendum, but perhaps not in the way everyone expects. The Foreign Secretary spent this morning warning that Scots would be worse off if they left the UK and then joined Europe as a separate country – without the UK’s rebate. This will rumble on until the September 18 poll, with claim and counter claim from both sides and neither able to prove anything definitively. Hague’s visit, though, has overshadowed one intriguing piece of polling data which could prove to be

Alex Salmond is impaling himself on problems of his own making

When the independence debate finally started to rumble last year, most people thought it would be the big issues which would dominate as we approached polling day – defence, foreign affairs, welfare, the future of the monarchy and so on. But here we are, just eight months out from the 18 September referendum and there are two very different issues dominating the agenda – childcare and student tuition fees. On both of them, moreover, Alex Salmond has managed to get himself impaled on problems of his own making. First, childcare: when he launched the White Paper on Independence back in November, the First Minister promised a ‘revolution’ in childcare if Scotland

David Cameron: Alistair Darling is the right man to lead the battle for Britain

Today’s Sunday Times revives reports that senior Conservatives are concerned that Alex Salmond will prevail in next year’s referendum and that David Cameron will be the last British Prime Minister. Personally, I’d be concerned if they were not concerned – Salmond is a formidable late-stage campaigner and the ‘no’ side is, in effect, being led by the parties out of whom he made mincemeat in the last Scottish Parliament election. The future of our country is at stake: now is not the time to take anything for granted. Especially at a time when unionist parties in Scotland have been collectively spanked by a formidable and well-funded SNP campaign. But what

SNP turns to God for help with independence referendum

It turns out that Alex Salmond needn’t worry too much about the re-emergence of that pesky row about advice on an independent Scotland’s membership of the European Union. He’s got arguments that are far more powerful than all that to convince Scots of the value of independence. In the latest issue of Idea, a magazine produced by the Evangelical Alliance, two Christian MSPs set out their arguments in favour of and against independence. Both accept that there isn’t one Christian position on the subject, but the SNP MSP for Glasgow Shettleston John Mason does suggest that the Bible might have some wisdom on the matter – and it’s from as far

Scottish or British? The identity debate the SNP does not want to have

Earlier on today, I was asked by Angus MacNeil, a Scottish National Party MP if I would choose a Scottish or a British passport should they win the referendum. As he knows, the choice is anathema to those of us who are proud to be both Scottish and British and don’t see any antagonism that needs to be resolved by separation. SNP politicians, in my experience, are some of the nicest people in politics on either side of the border. Moderate, friendly, intelligent, open-minded, gentle: such decent types that you can end up being blinded to their agenda. Which is to destroy Britain, to force people to choose between being Scottish or British,

What is David Cameron for?

A mischievous question, I know, but one prompted by Janan Ganesh’s latest Financial Times column. It is eight years since David Cameron became leader of the Conservative party and three and a half since he became Prime Minister. He may only have 18 months left in either post. We know – or think we know – a lot about Cameron. He is what he seems to be. Decent fellow, capable in a crisis, unruffled. A better-than-average product of his class and background. Thought he should be Prime Minister because he reckoned he’d “be good at it”. And yet the thought nags: what is he for? What is Cameron’s ministry about? As Ganesh

Charles Moore’s notes: Why Ireland fears Scottish independence

In Dublin, where I am writing this column, people are watching the Scottish referendum campaign more closely than in London. Despite the polls, they almost expect a Yes vote, but most do not want one. People fear that Yes would weaken the UK and therefore make it a less useful ally for Ireland in the EU. They also think that an independent Scotland might overtake Ireland as a cute little place for foreign investors who like the combination of kilts, bagpipes and general Celtic carry-on with tax breaks and commercial access to the Anglosphere. Finally, they worry that Scottish independence would reopen the Irish question. At present, the Republic enjoys

Alex Massie

The Dumbest Dog in the World

That’s Duggy Dug, the latest champion of the campaign for Scottish independence. For some reason Brian Cox – the actor, not the physics professor – has decided to put his voice to this cringetastic calamity. Duggy Dug (even the name is grim) is not, mercifully, part of the official Yes campaign which, given his plainly limited mental capacity, is probably just as well. His argument is so stupid – and misleading – that one wonders if Duggy Dug is actually a Unionist fifth columnist. Then again, he’s not much more embarrassing than some of the members of the Scottish parliament whose grasp of elementary concepts would be considered astonishingly weak

James Forsyth

James Forsyth: Insurgents are remaking British politics

Next year will decide the fate of the United Kingdom. The Scottish independence referendum on the 18th of September could destroy the Union, and when we sit down to Christmas lunch in 2014, it could be to the background of independence negotiations. We may all be waiting to see what the Queen says about the end of the Union in her Christmas message. Too much of England is still struggling to take the prospect seriously. The Scottish government’s independence white paper struggled to make it onto the front pages of the next day’s London papers. Why? Because there is an assumption — based on remarkably steady opinion polls — that

Scottish Nationalism’s Dangerous Cult of Victimhood

Danny Finkelstein’s column in the Times today is characteristically elegant and incisive. In politics as in life he writes, “whatever apparent power and temptation lies with the adoption of the identity of victimhood it is ultimately destructive”. Since Finkelstein is pondering lessons that may be drawn from the life of Nelson Mandela it may not be immediately obvious that the conclusion he reaches has some relevance to the campaign for Scottish independence. I better elaborate, then. Much has been said about how and why Unionists need a better “narrative” when making the case for Scotland as part of the United Kingdom. This is true. There is a need for a positive, optimistic,

If Scotland leaves, will we be left with FUK?

In Whitehall, there is a phrase for the entity which would be left if Scotland were to vote Yes to independence next year. The acronym is rUK, which stands for ‘the rest of the United Kingdom’. This device of referring to a country’s altered state in its name has a precedent. After Macedonia broke away from Yugoslavia in 1991, it could only prevent Greece from blocking its UN entry by being admitted as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM). Obviously, it would be embarrassing for the Former UK (FUK) to highlight its initials, but the nomenclature is a real problem. The reduced entity could not accurately be called Great

Charles Moore: What would we call what’s left of the country if Scotland leaves? Obviously Former UK (FUK) won’t do…

Boris Johnson’s Margaret Thatcher Lecture to the Centre for Policy Studies attracted attention for its remarks about IQ, but the media ignored its central thesis. The speech is against equality, eloquently so. I date the mental collapse of the Conservatives from the moment in 1995 when Labour’s newish leader, Tony Blair, jumped up in Parliament and asked the Prime Minister, John Major, whether he accepted it ‘as a responsibility of government to reduce inequality’. Mr Major’s simple answer was ‘Yes’. It shut Mr Blair up that afternoon, but it gave him the advantage ever after. If both parties say government must create equality then the one which promotes more state

A choice for Tories: Goldman Sachs or UKIP?

Hats-off to James Kirkup for noticing that Goldman Sachs have suggested they would “drastically” cut their UK workforce (and operations) should Britain decide to leave the European Union. That is the view of Michael Sherwood, the fellow responsible for running Goldman’s european operations. I am sure eurosceptics will dismiss this as the usual scaremongering just as Scottish nationalists dismiss warnings that some businesses (RBS?) might shift their operations south in the event Scotland votes for independence next year. This is but one of the many ways in which the european and Scottish questions overlap or dovetail with one another. Perhaps it is only scaremongering! But what if it isn’t? In any case, the Tory High Command

Alex Massie

Tory attacks on Alistair Darling show that WMD Unionism is MAD

I don’t really understand why politicians spend so much time talking to journalists. Most of the time little good can come from doing so. Of course, from a personal or professional perspective, this is fine and adds greatly to the gaiety of trade and nation. Nevertheless… Take, for instance, the reports in today’s Financial Times and Daily Mail in which “senior” government sources stick their shivs into Alistair Darling. The leader of the Unionist campaign fighting next year’s referendum on Scottish independence is, we are informed, “comatose most of the time”. A different (I think) Downing Street figure complains that Darling is a “dreary figurehead”. Meanwhile in the Mail, Gerri Peev finds