Let’s begin with a small thought experiment. Let us suppose that another European Union state — France, say — had held a referendum to determine whether or not it remained a member of the EU. Let us further allow that France decided, for better or worse, to leave the EU. And then let us suppose that, say, Corsica voted to retain France’s EU membership. Buoyed by this, let us then imagine Corsican nationalists proposing that even if France left the EU, there was no need for Corsica to do so. Corsica could have its own deal guaranteeing continued membership of the European single market even as the rest of France left. According to the Corsicans this would all be “challenging”, but it could be done.
You see, when you put it in those terms the Scottish government’s position on life after Brexit begins to look, well, fairly fanciful. Can you imagine the EU having any interest, to continue the thought experiment, in giving plucky little Corsica what it wanted? More to the point, can you imagine Paris accepting that Corsica was entitled to negotiate its own arrangements? If you can then I salute the strength, courage and indefatigability of your imagination.
Yet for six months now the Scottish government has insisted that Scotland could enjoy just the kind of privileges ascribed to Corsica in our little thought experiment. It might be a nice idea, it might even be in Scotland’s interest, but neither of those things bring it a single step closer to reality. It is not, I am afraid, on. And nor, in fact, was it ever a practical possibility. I can, if I squint hard enough, see what’s in it for Scotland but I’m lost as to what might be in it for anyone else.
Nothing contained in the Scottish government’s plan for life after Brexit changes that. Huge chunks of the document published by Nicola Sturgeon’s government yesterday amounted to little more than wishful thinking. It might be nice if the world was arranged differently — and more agreeably — but politics, in the end, has to be a reality-based business. And try as I might I cannot envisage a scenario in which the UK government agrees that Scotland should be able to run its own immigration policy — as proposed by Ms Sturgeon — while remaining a part of the UK. As Theresa May drily observed, the Scottish government’s ideas “may be proposals that are impractical”.
Reality is unforgiving. It begins with the appreciation that the United Kingdom — not “England and Wales” as the SNP routinely describes it — voted to leave the EU. The Scottish government’s paper talks as though Scotland and the UK are already two wholly distinct entities and that Scotland is an independent country in everything but name. But they are not. The UK, whether the nationalists like it or not, is a real thing. Which rather makes a mockery of the government’s suggestion that there is “in effect a customs union at present between Scotland and the rest of the UK”. Well of course there is, Scotland and England being part of the same country.
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If the UK is an actual, observable, reality then so, however regrettably, is Brexit. I think it is worth remembering, however, that in terms of raw votes, Brexit is almost as popular as the SNP. In May, 1,059,897 voters cast their ballots for the SNP and six weeks later 1,018,322 voters in Scotland endorsed leaving the EU. Ms Sturgeon speaks for her party and her government; she does not necessarily speak for all Scots.
“Independence was on the table three hours after the referendum result was announced and, lo, there it has remained ever since
Reading the government’s paper I was struck by Ms Sturgeon’s suggestion that it was a document produced in “good faith”. It seems telling that the first minister felt the need to stress the honesty of her intentions. It was as if she was forced to say: no, these past six months have not been spent constructing a series of tests for the UK government that are designed to be failed, not passed, and I regret any suggestion that this might ever have been the case.
Sure enough, Ms Sturgeon reminded journalists that “the option of independence must remain on the table”. In other words, the ball is in Theresa May’s court and it is up to her to determine whether or not there are fresh grounds for another referendum on independence. Independence was on the table three hours after the referendum result was announced and, lo, there it has remained ever since.
But when Ms Sturgeon said that the UK’s response to her proposals would “tell us everything about whether the UK is a partnership of equals” I could not suppress the thought that this is something about which she has already made up her mind. The only way the UK government can pass Ms Sturgeon’s test is by giving her everything she asks for. Were that to happen then, with piquant irony, Ms Sturgeon’s point would be proved in reverse: bespoke privileges for Scotland would indeed demonstrate that the UK is not a “partnership of equals”. For that matter, arguing that the UK is that kind of partnership while threatening to leave it if you don’t always get everything you want is a strange way to run that partnership.
Nevertheless, I agree with Ms Sturgeon that since Brexit is going to happen it would be best if it ended with an arrangement as close to the status quo as possible. Membership of the European Economic Area (EEA) — or, more probably, something mimicking EEA status — is in Britain’s interests and, via that, in Scotland’s interests too.
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On this, Ms Sturgeon’s approach and, indeed, her analysis of Scotland’s interests (at least as long as the country remains a part of the UK) does not differ very much from Ruth Davidson’s preferences for the softest, most open Brexit possible. Ms Sturgeon wants to minimise disruption because she appreciates that a hard Brexit makes the practical mechanics of independence more difficult; Ms Davidson wants to minimise disruption because she appreciates that a hard Brexit makes the political case for independence more appealing. They may travel from different directions, but Ms Sturgeon and Ms Davidson have reached the same destination.
Here again, however, we can perceive that Brexit is a proxy war for the other, still bigger and still unresolved, constitutional argument that still defines Scottish politics. Everything might change but some things remain constant, and will do so until such time as the question is put to the people once again. Deep in their hearts the Unionists and Nationalists, Leavers and Remainers, all know that.