The last thing Nicola Sturgeon wants is an independence referendum. It’s not me saying that, but it will be the conclusion from her Brexit paper today.
You wouldn’t think so if you listened to the noises off from Alex Salmond, or some of the rhetoric from Mike Russell, the Brexit minister. But the big message from the paper will not be bullying language about when a referendum might be called. It’s going to be that the SNP don’t think leaving the EU justifies repeating the independence poll at all. Instead they will be setting out ways that the UK can leave the EU without one. Can it stay in or near the single market, or at least can Scotland? Then the UK leaves Europe, but the nationalists will not be confronted with overwhelming demands for “indyref2”.
Easy enough to mock. Many, supporters and opponents alike, will say it’s fear. Maybe fear of losing — independence support is where it was in 2014. Perhaps 400,000 nationalists seem to dislike the EU as much as the UK, and might not vote to leave Britain just so we can join Europe again.
Or maybe it’s fear of winning: senior nationalists know they don’t have a plan. The takeaway message from the 2014 campaign was that the economics of independence were unsustainable. They’ve got much worse since, and Brexit adds a scary new dimension of uncertainty.
Maybe the SNP are practitioners of the double bind, sending deliberately contradictory messages to drive us all mad. Or maybe, in her own way Sturgeon is searching about for a sustainable solution for Scotland inside a post-Brexit UK.
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This cautious, pragmatic streak should be encouraged. It may stop her painting herself into the corner of a referendum she doesn’t really want. More important, it might just get the rest of us to a place where most Scots can be content with our constitutional arrangements.
“Brexit inevitably makes Holyrood much more powerful
Ms Sturgeon is right to argue that the UK should keep as close as possible to the EU single market. It is looking increasingly as if she might just get her way, at least to start with. As the Brexiteers in the UK cabinet continue to fantasise about the world of their imagination, pragmatists like the chancellor step forward. They understand the reality of deal-making with 27 impatient member states. They hear business calling out the economic self-harm from putting up barriers to the UK’s largest market. It has become clearer in the past 10 days what’s potentially on the cards: a transitional period, inside the Customs Union with single market access in some form. With it will inevitably come freedom of movement. Ms Sturgeon is also arguing for a special European deal for Scotland within the UK. Her idea is Scotland should remain in the single market even if the UK leaves. That specific proposition is simply not practical, for business or anyone else, as the Scottish government must realise. The single market is a bundle of rules regulating goods and services. Where those rules apply both can be traded freely: where they end, they can’t, and there is a barrier to trade.
Putting that barrier at Berwick would mean economic separation from the UK. England would be a different market from Scotland, and our trade, and jobs, would suffer. We know UK trade matters much more for Scotland’s economy than EU trade. That plan won’t work, and it would be a mistake for Ms Sturgeon to make it a hard test for Theresa May to fail, because there are other ways to recognise Scotland’s difference.
Brexit inevitably makes Holyrood much more powerful. It will negotiate as an equal with Westminster on things such as agriculture and fisheries. The internal balance of the UK will be shifted. It can shift more. There is no reason to deny Holyrood the power to negotiate with Brussels too — on all devolved matters. Devolution means Scotland can make different choices over things that don’t have to be reserved to Westminster. Why shouldn’t it be able to agree, say, reciprocal health deals with European countries, or access to EU studentships for young people?
Similarly, if the UK ever does move to a system of work permits to control migration, permits to live and work north of the border could be issued in Edinburgh — and the same for Belfast, or London. The Scottish government’s priority shouldn’t be repeating referendum rhetoric but helping UK ministers understand a special Scottish relationship with Europe is not just possible, but an opportunity to refashion the Scotland-UK relationship for the better. Those who want Scotland to stay in the UK should do the same.
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That’s because changes like these will profoundly alter the nature of the UK, making it more differentiated, or, as I prefer, more confederal. In truth, that’s the constitutional deal the vast majority in Scotland actually want. More independence, but not complete separation; economic and social solidarity, but the scope to make quite different choices. I suspect that at heart SNP leaders want this too. Nobody planned it this way, but Brexit makes that paradoxical phrase “independence inside the UK” more plausible than it was in 2014.
So when the first minister puts another referendum at the end of the queue of options, she disappoints her fundamentalist supporters. Hence the noises off. Maybe, like Mrs May, she’s gradually realising that what party zealots want and the country needs aren’t the same. So her opponents shouldn’t be mocking her political incoherence, but encouraging her to edge closer towards a solution the majority of Scots might sign up for.