It's all a wicked plot by the Tories and the SNP

Some of Britain's more bruised politicians, surveying the broadcasting coverage of Alex Salmond's appearance before his party faithful at Aviemore, must have wondered what the Scottish First Minister had that they didn't, for no cloud was permitted by the BBC or anyone else to cross the saltire sky.

Part of it was novelty, of course; Salmond in power is new, even if the impulses he represents are as old as any Cairngorm cave. Some of it was the particular and material appeal that Salmondism possesses for the journalistic classes, gesturing left while acting right. Who benefits from dropping all prescription charges and all student fee contributions, given that the poor were already exempt? What could be nicer than congratulating yourself on your public virtue while pocketing the state's largesse?

So the man got the benefit of the doubt and not a word did I hear questioning the constant tone of national chauvinism running through the Aviemore speeches. Allow me to parse one of them for you. “People,” predicted Mr Salmond, “will look askance at the budget squeeze on Scotland when this morning's price of Brent crude is $86 a barrel... and the revenues from Scotland's North Sea resources flood into the Chancellor's coffers.” So, if the minority SNP administration finds it cannot afford to subsidise Scotland's middle classes to the extent it has promised, it will be the fault of the English who have stolen the oil revenues. Or, as John Swinney, the SNP finance minister, said, creating an image that politics could have done without: “Our black gold is filling the Chancellor's self-inflicted black hole.”

I worry about the SNP because I hate this scapegoating business. “The London way,” said Mr Swinney, “means taxes on small businesses go up and a squeeze on Scotland's public services takes an effect.” The London Way. Or, at other times in other places, the Irish Way, the Jewish Way, the Way of the Other.

It may be that some of our commentators have got it into their heads that the SNP has given up on all that separatist stuff and is mellowing with government into something that has the cardinal virtue of being (a) in power and (b) not Labour. I prefer to take Mr Salmond at his word, however, when he made it clear that independence is still the goal. I even do him the courtesy of perceiving how his tactics of constantly blaming his limitations on Westminster fit in with his longer-term strategy of winning an independence referendum.

Even so, the full separatist Monty will be uncomfortable act to perform. Though more than 60 per cent of Scots could envisage one day endorsing independence, support in Scotland currently runs at less than a quarter. And it isn't hard to see why. Though polls for the Scottish Parliament put Labour and the SNP level at 32 per cent each, at the Westminster level Labour gets 40 per cent compared with the SNP's 31 per cent and Gordon Brown is given a higher approval rating than Mr Salmond.

This lack of enthusiasm for separation also comes before any real consideration of how any referendum would be framed or governed. Who will be allowed to vote? All Scots in England and Wales? Would the English and Welsh electorates be given the opportunity similarly to vote on any proposed settlement between their countries and Scotland? The more you think about it, the worse it gets. It reminds me of the Australian referendum on getting rid of the Queen, where the majority had originally wanted a different head of state, but no one could agree who that should be.

But if the Scots could not be relied upon by the SNP to show the necessary militancy, what might not be achieved if the English, fired by resentment, were to provoke them? And, as though dispatched by a tartan deity, along comes the veteran Tory Sir Malcolm Rifkind with proposals that may have that exact effect.

Sir Malcolm, whom I suspect of possessing a sense of humour, was a Cabinet Minister and the pro-devolution MP for Edinburgh Pentlands. Swept away in the Blairite tsunami of 1997, he finally fetched up sodden, far to the south on the coast of Kensington like something out of Shakespeare, where he replaced Michael Portillo.

It is this second Rifkind who has rediscovered the venerable West Lothian Question, which posits the notion that it is terminally unfair for English MPs not to be able to vote on Scottish matters, while Scots can and do vote on English ones. “When the House of Commons is purely discussing English housing or English health or English transport,” asks Sir Malcolm, “then why should that not just be left to the English Members of Parliament to decide upon?” Well, the main reason is that such a limitation would mean that it would be more or less impossible for an MP representing a Scottish constituency ever again to become Prime Minister, party leader, Chancellor of the Exchequer or to head a big spending ministry. There would be no more Browns, Ming Campbells, Charlie Kennedys, Alistair Darlings, Alec Douglas-Homes or Scottish Rifkinds (though London Rifkinds would be allowed). You could not be a credible candidate for high office if you were not able to discuss the affairs of that 80 per cent of the UK population that lives in England.

The snag is that the idea of fairness suggested by the West Lothian Question is essentially childish. It was a big, big problem that a House of Commons in which English MPs outnumbered Scottish ones by eight to one (it is now ten to one) could decide all domestic policies for Scotland. It is not, under almost all foreseeable circumstances, a comparably big problem that 59 Scottish MPs might vote on English matters, given that there are 533 English MPs. The English cannot be outvoted by the Scots, period.

Of course there is an anomaly, and it arises from the very different sizes of the component nations of the United Kingdom. But we either live with that anomaly, or else we iron it out and the Union with it. For what Scot would want to remain in the UK for five minutes if told that the premiership and the main office-holders would, of constitutional necessity, be English MPs?

Meanwhile, if I were a blackmailer I'd leave the minor royals alone and set up watch on Alex Salmond's Edinburgh domicile to see if, one chilly dawn, I couldn't snap a lean Tory Scot exiting with a wicked smile. Really, it's the only explanation.

Comments

[Disgusted]

Yes, that's right, Dave. Scottish nationalism equals anti-semitism. You really can be a pathetic fool when it comes to the Scots.

[Kenny]

I wonder if anyone has any theories as to why David Aaranovitch is such a sad, twisted and embittered individual.