“Better Together”? Doubts grow
David Donnison, who some months ago sent us his reasons for being unable to join the Yes campaign, writes now about his further considerations. David is an Emeritus Professor of Urban Studies at Glasgow University.
Some days ago I found myself in a seminar with old friends and colleagues at the London School of Economics – one of the best teams of economists and social scientists you can find working on problems of social policy anywhere in the world. Most of them had long experience of advising Governments and senior politicians.
As our discussion dissolved into informal chat I found myself surrounded by Professors asking me how the Scots will vote on independence, and how I shall vote. Most of them were baffled to know why any intelligent Scot would be voting for independence, and I was compelled to clarify my own thinking. What matters most, I said, is not how an independent Scotland will fare, but what kind of a country its rulers want to make of the U.K.; and whether we in Scotland want to be part of it.
The most important question facing Scotland, whether independent or not, is whether we can enable people living in Britain’s greatest concentrations of poverty – mainly in the central belt and around the Clyde – to share in the opportunities every Scot should have. I used to think that remaining in the U.K. and sharing its resources would be the best answer, but I am not sure now that it has much interest in that question. Even the relics of its Labour Movement seem indifferent.
The current issue of the Fabian Journal, produced by the U.K’s most venerable political think-tank, begins with an analysis of the votes Labour will have to attract if they are to win a majority in the Westminster Parliament. The approach is statistical. How many will be new voters? Former abstainers? Ex-Lib-Dems? Ex-Conservatives? In which marginal constituencies will they be found? This analysis is followed by chapters written by leading politicians and commentators of the Left, laying out policy proposals that may win these votes for Labour. These mention the economy, immigration, education, housing and crime, but say hardly a word about poverty, social justice and inequality, thought these are the traditional concerns of radicals.
Professor John Curtice of Strathclyde University holds that average Scottish voters are no more egalitarian or radical than their English counterparts. As a leader in his field, I cannot challenge him. But a political culture is not always fully expressed through simple questions in a mass survey. Thinking Scots tend to take it for granted that proposals for new policies should help to create a fairer and more equal society. They assume that proposals for solving social problems should be prepared in consultation with the people who have these problems. Though the achievements do not always live up to the aims, it is assumed that they will be generally accepted by Scottish central and local governments and by a wide range of “opinion formers”, regardless of which party is in power. None of that can be said of the English political class.
At a press conference launching the independence White Paper, a correspondent from the Daily Telegraph asked Alex Salmond how, in a country with high rates of unemployment and high proportions of pensioners, he expected to pay for the envisaged developments. The First Minister replied, “An independent Scotland will attract more young workers to this country”. The Telegraph man, as though asking the killer question, said, “You mean more immigrants?” “Yes” said Salmond calmly, “they make an important and creative contribution to our society and we need more of them.” I doubt whether any serious English politician could have said this. And if it had been said, would it have passed unnoticed, as it did in Scotland?
The referendum will be eight months before the next Westminster election, so we will have to make what guesses we can at England’s political trends. Some of the current indications make me feel I would rather get out, whatever the hazards of independence. Staying in the U.K. may mean living in a country that leaves the European Union. Almost certainly it will impose increasingly punitive and humiliating sanctions on its poorest citizens, and Labour spokespersons seem determined to show they will be even more brutal than the Tories. The present Home Secretary promises to repeal the Human Rights Act. Ideally, we need a White Paper, agreed by all main political parties, on the future plans and problems, not of Scotland but of the rest of the U.K..
The U.K. is rapidly becoming the most centralised government in the Western world, strangling local governments and killing off civic leadership. If this continues, and if our armed forces go on acting as mercenary outriders supporting American foreign policy, I want no part of it.
