I won't defend the Union anymore. Neither should you

Unionists need to get off the defensive and start celebrating the UK.

Image by Dean Moriarty from Pixabay

The Tory leadership election is putting Conservative divisions, schisms and personal beefs on display for all to see.

What it is not showing is much of an interest in the Union, which has so far come up only occasionally. 

The Union ought to be front and centre because, in the short term, it is under unprecedented threat, and, in the long term, its parameters and purposes have become muddied in ways that are constitutionally unsustainable.

The immediate problem is the devolution settlement, badly designed by Labour and recklessly expanded by the Tories, and how the Scottish Parliament and Scottish Government have become a permanent campaign for Scottish independence.

This was not the intention behind devolving powers to a legislature in Edinburgh — in fact, it is almost the perfect opposite of the plan — but the ease and pace with which the SNP upended the assumptions and assurances of the devolutionists provides a salutary lesson in the arrogance of the reformer.

Now, just 15 years since the SNP came to power at Holyrood, just eight since they lost the independence referendum, and just six since Westminster last handed them another tranche of powers, the Scottish Government is preparing to hold a referendum on secession in open defiance of Westminster.

In less than a generation, devolution has gone from ‘killing nationalism stone dead’ to finding itself cornered in the billiard room by Colonel Sturgeon with the candlestick. A political sop sold as a constitutional reform now looks distinctly like a petard.

Nicola Sturgeon’s rebel referendum will go to the Supreme Court — another dubious constitutional innovation — where UK ministers hope the necessary legislation to hold the vote will be found to be beyond the powers of Holyrood. Whatever the outcome, there is a growing realisation at Westminster that the SNP is going to keep misusing the devolved institutions to undermine the UK constitutional order and campaign for the dismantling of the British state.

This is what the SNP is, what it exists for, and unless and until ministers are prepared to legislate to tighten up the devolution settlement, it will forever be a ticking time bomb under the Union.

I have gone into depth before about the paths devolution reform could take, from new rules on the use of public resources and the duties of civil servants to legal obligations on devolved bodies and even a new Act of Union. However, there is a danger in seeing a few tweaks to the Scotland Act as the end of the matter. This would be to replace ‘devolve and forget’ with ‘reform and neglect’.

The UK would be well within its sovereign rights to legislate an indivisibility clause, a constitutional provision that inhibits or even prohibits secession. More than eight in ten countries around the world enshrine such a principle in their statutes, basic laws or constitutions.

Nationalists claim Westminster’s refusal to bend to their every demand means the Union is not ‘voluntary’. The Union is so voluntary that Parliament agreed to a referendum in 2014 to allow the Scots — and only the Scots — to decide whether to terminate the constitutional basis on which the United Kingdom rests.

The Scots voted No. It is clear that No is not enough. Not when the UK Government says it. Not when Scottish voters say it.

Without realising it, the SNP is teaching us something crucial about our Union and our relationship to it. Nationalists live, breathe, eat and sleep independence. It is their chief and, in most cases, only goal in political life. This makes them determined, disciplined and dedicated. The idea of an independent Scotland will endure because their belief in it will endure along with their resolve to turn that belief into reality.

Unionists could learn from this. While nationalist monomania is hardly to be emulated, their confidence and tenacity very much are. Generally speaking, Scottish nationalists want independence and Scottish Unionists want a quiet life. You need not be a military tactician to figure out who has the upper hand in this one-side constitutional war.

Yet Scottish Unionists can hardly be blamed for merely wanting respite from constant agitation and provocation. They have been left to shoulder the Union alone for far too long. The Union should not be the preserve of No-voting Scots. It is a matter for all people across the United Kingdom, from the prime minister on down.

The challenge for the next holder of that office is to think about the Union. To think about what it means, and not only in relation to Scotland. The Union is more than the absence of Scottish independence, it is the foundation of the constitution, the state, the whole country. A Scottish exit from the UK would not only change Scotland but change the UK, in ways historic and fundamental and yet entirely undiscussed at Westminster or UK level.

The incoming prime minister must do what most politicians either can't or don't want to: think beyond the next five years. Yes, he or she must grasp that devolution will have to be reformed but there must also be a recognition that reform is insufficient.

Britain needs more than constitutional nip'n'tuck. It needs a political class that places the Union at the nucleus of everything it does, a political system in which national unity and solidarity are central values. No more of the soft separatism in which, in their own ways, both the Scottish and UK governments act as though Scotland was effectively a separate state. The United Kingdom needs to think, look and act much more united.

I don’t know about you but I for one am fed up talking about ‘defending the Union’ and being asked by politicians on either side of the border how to ‘save the Union’. It is the most successful political, social, economic and cultural project in modern history. It doesn’t need to be defended, it needs to be celebrated.

The UK Parliament is meant to be sovereign. It shouldn’t be in the business of saving the Union, it should be in the business of enhancing it. Devolution reform is essential but there is no remedy for what ails the UK constitutionally quite like a double-strength prescription of national self-belief.

Boris Johnson’s successor should not buy into the doomsayer mindset of inevitable British decline, the self-lacerating mentality that sees no purpose for the UK beyond wallowing in post-imperial guilt, lingering in the shadow of the EU, and preparing for the inevitable departure of Scotland, then Northern Ireland and perhaps even Wales.

No more of this declinism. The Union’s best days ought to lie ahead of it and they can if the occupant of 10 Downing Street believes so and governs accordingly. Stop finding evermore innovative ways to carve up the UK’s political settlement. Instead, build new UK-wide institutions that serve Britons equally, regardless of where they live, and which subtly reinforce the ways in which the UK is a single, unified country. A new UK National Police Force would be immensely popular with voters.

Stop being so gloomy about Britain's future. Introduce a Duke-of-Edinburgh style British Youth Awards scheme for teenagers across the UK. A voluntary youth service programme promoting civic duty, solidarity, and patriotism — with employer-recognised achievement certificates. A national network of business and training hubs for school leavers currently dumped unhappily and unnecessarily in colleges and universities. Give them infrastructure and opportunities, drawing on the strengths of British businesses, to start their own firms or gain skills.  

Stop being hemmed in by a devolution settlement that never seems to hem in the SNP. The UK Government should build a UK centre of excellence in the study and treatment of cancer in Dundee. If Scottish Ministers have a problem, let them stand up at Holyrood and argue against curing cancer.

Whether it's Liz Truss or Rishi Sunak, the next prime minister should recognise the threat to the Union but not to the exclusion of its many untapped opportunities. The flaws of devolution must be confronted but once they have been, a new national mission must begin to refresh and redouble our most precious of achievements: the world's most successful Union.

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Originally published in the Scottish Daily Mail on July 25, 2022.