torchbearer
05-07-2009, 10:42 AM
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/may/07/devolution-wales-scotland
Forcing the break-up of Britain
Labour's imminent decline means that nationalist sentiments in Scotland and Wales will be given more purpose after 2010
Once the union between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is broken, Britain no longer exists. And after Britain, England. We may very well have to wait for that point of rupture in order to imagine England as a nation. Of course, we haven't reached that point yet, but 10 years of devolution has not only pushed at the boundaries of a united kingdom, but has made devolution an irreversible process.
No mainstream political party seeks to dismantle the 1999 devolution settlement. Instead, while nationalists push for independence, elements within Labour, Tory and Liberal Democrat parties in Scotland and Wales at least want to extend the powers of their devolved legislatures.
The becoming of England is not currently being driven by a movement, or a party, for English independence. A general election in 2010 with a Cameron majority built on English seats yet minority support in Scotland and Wales will, however, create immense constitutional pressures. A year later, elections will follow to the Scottish parliament and Welsh assembly. Despite the Tories' rising fortunes under David Cameron, there is absolutely no evidence of a significant recovery of his party in either Scotland or Wales.
Labour will be reeling from the 2010 defeat. Having propped the party up with millionaire donations and turned its annual conference into a money-making corporate trade fair, Labour will struggle to hold its social and organisational fabric together. Party membership, which soared when Tony Blair became leader, has plummeted ever since, and demoralisation and disorientation will deepen. Through three consecutive general election defeats between 1979 and 1992, Labour maintained the semblance of effective opposition because for millions the promise of a Labour government remained the alternative to Thatcherism. After 2010 that prospect may not have the compelling purpose it once had, certainly not in the immediate aftermath of the wasted opportunity for change that the new Labour years will come to represent after being defeated by the Blair-lite Tories. The trade unions who, for all the glitzy rhetoric of modernisation, remain the foundation of Labour's finances and infrastructure will themselves be suffering from the impact of the recession. Many of their members will be questioning what their support for Labour has earned the unions in terms of influence.
There couldn't be a worse situation for Labour in campaigning to restrict Scotland and Wales to more or less the current devolution settlement in the 2011 elections. Nationalist fervour, fundamentally anti-Tory, will be rampant, perhaps not with the breadth to secure independence in a referendum but almost certainly a solid enough bloc to entrench the process towards that ambition. In Scotland and Wales after 2010, independence won't simply be an end in itself in place of British labourism – it will be the purpose of opposition, and thanks to Labour, the institutions to fulfil that ambition now exist.
This is an edited excerpt from Breaking Up Britain: Four Nations after a Union, published by Lawrence & Wishart. A free download of Mark Perryman's chapter, The Jigsaw Stare in Breaking Up Britain, is available as a pdf here
Forcing the break-up of Britain
Labour's imminent decline means that nationalist sentiments in Scotland and Wales will be given more purpose after 2010
Once the union between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is broken, Britain no longer exists. And after Britain, England. We may very well have to wait for that point of rupture in order to imagine England as a nation. Of course, we haven't reached that point yet, but 10 years of devolution has not only pushed at the boundaries of a united kingdom, but has made devolution an irreversible process.
No mainstream political party seeks to dismantle the 1999 devolution settlement. Instead, while nationalists push for independence, elements within Labour, Tory and Liberal Democrat parties in Scotland and Wales at least want to extend the powers of their devolved legislatures.
The becoming of England is not currently being driven by a movement, or a party, for English independence. A general election in 2010 with a Cameron majority built on English seats yet minority support in Scotland and Wales will, however, create immense constitutional pressures. A year later, elections will follow to the Scottish parliament and Welsh assembly. Despite the Tories' rising fortunes under David Cameron, there is absolutely no evidence of a significant recovery of his party in either Scotland or Wales.
Labour will be reeling from the 2010 defeat. Having propped the party up with millionaire donations and turned its annual conference into a money-making corporate trade fair, Labour will struggle to hold its social and organisational fabric together. Party membership, which soared when Tony Blair became leader, has plummeted ever since, and demoralisation and disorientation will deepen. Through three consecutive general election defeats between 1979 and 1992, Labour maintained the semblance of effective opposition because for millions the promise of a Labour government remained the alternative to Thatcherism. After 2010 that prospect may not have the compelling purpose it once had, certainly not in the immediate aftermath of the wasted opportunity for change that the new Labour years will come to represent after being defeated by the Blair-lite Tories. The trade unions who, for all the glitzy rhetoric of modernisation, remain the foundation of Labour's finances and infrastructure will themselves be suffering from the impact of the recession. Many of their members will be questioning what their support for Labour has earned the unions in terms of influence.
There couldn't be a worse situation for Labour in campaigning to restrict Scotland and Wales to more or less the current devolution settlement in the 2011 elections. Nationalist fervour, fundamentally anti-Tory, will be rampant, perhaps not with the breadth to secure independence in a referendum but almost certainly a solid enough bloc to entrench the process towards that ambition. In Scotland and Wales after 2010, independence won't simply be an end in itself in place of British labourism – it will be the purpose of opposition, and thanks to Labour, the institutions to fulfil that ambition now exist.
This is an edited excerpt from Breaking Up Britain: Four Nations after a Union, published by Lawrence & Wishart. A free download of Mark Perryman's chapter, The Jigsaw Stare in Breaking Up Britain, is available as a pdf here