The first priority for the Scottish people is not separation but social justice
MIKE Russell was perhaps being a little too honest. The garrulous SNP minister had just been put in charge of the Nationalist Government's plans for a referendum on Scottish independence, charged with the job of persuading the Parliament's unionist p
arties to agree to back the plans.
"The bill would require a majority; where that majority comes from is far too early to say," he admitted candidly on February 22 in an interview with this newspaper. It took 10 days for Russell to have his doubts confirmed. Last week, in a vote called by the Liberal Democrats, the Scottish Parliament decided by 72 votes to 49 to oppose plans for a referendum.
This weekend the opposition parties' dawn raid appears to have ensured that a historic plebiscite on the question of Scottish independence is destined to remain a Nationalist fantasy. So long as the three Unionist parties – Labour, the Conservatives and the Lib Dems – oppose the measure, there is no chance of it going through. So are the SNP's plans dead in the water?
The sudden demise of the SNP plans last week can be traced back two weeks ago to an upmarket Edinburgh restaurant where Lib Dem leader Tavish Scott was enjoying lunch with journalists from the Daily Telegraph. Scott was seen by the SNP Government as their best chance of getting the Parliament to back plans for a referendum. When taking over as party leader, he had declared he was not "intuitively" opposed to the idea of such a vote. Meanwhile, it was well known that many within his own party – which officially supports a federal UK – were supportive of a multi-option referendum, in which voters could back plans for a more powerful Holyrood. With Scott under pressure to show that the Lib Dems were a distinct force, set apart from their former Labour coalition colleagues, SNP strategists believed they could woo Scott to their cause.
But over lunch, pushed on the referendum question, Scott made known his revised opinion. He was not prepared to countenance a referendum at a time when Scotland was struggling to cope with the recession. Politicians, he said, ought to be concentrating on relieving economic misery rather than breaking up the Union. Shortly afterwards, the Telegraph reported that Salmond's hopes for a referendum were "hanging on a thread".
Scott then decided to bring matters to a head. He proposed an amendment to a Labour-led debate at Holyrood. It called for the 2010 plebiscite to be dumped until after the next Holyrood elections in 2011. Scott had simply decided that the matter should be settled by forcing Parliament to vote down the plans for a Referendum Bill a year before it was supposed to be introduced. Mike Rumbles, the Lib Dem chief whip, sounded out senior figures in the Labour Party and Tories and it became clear they would support an anti-referendum vote.
For Labour, Scott's sudden moves were a boon. "We were more than happy for them to go ahead with it," said one senior Labour source. Racked by their own divisions over a referendum strategy – Wendy Alexander had last year declared that the SNP should "bring it on" – here was a chance for her more cautious successor, Iain Gray, to get rid of the plans, without being accused of being the principal "wrecker". Gray used an interview in The Scotsman to declare that there were "no circumstances" in which he would support the SNP's referendum bill. With the Tories falling into line as well, the result of the vote was a foregone conclusion.
For Gordon Brown, in Dundee on Friday fresh from Washington DC, the vote was a chance for him to claim the SNP's ship had hit the rocks. "I note that the Scottish Parliament has decided not to have a Scottish referendum," he said in his speech to the Scottish Labour conference. "Because most of its members understand what the SNP do not – that the first priority for the Scottish people is not separation but social justice."
The strategy of all three Unionist parties is now clear. In the teeth of a recession, they will seek to caricature the SNP as being "obsessed" by a largely irrelevant issue. Nationalist figures admit that the recession has made it hard for them to get air time to push their plans forward. The hope for Labour, the Liberals and the Tories is that voters will soon agree with them that secession in a recession is a non-starter.
But the problem for them is that the constitutional question is simply not going to go away. And the evidence suggests that not only are the SNP still capable of pushing forward their own message with clarity, but that the Unionist parties are still riven by internal splits.
In Dundee, Brown used his speech to declare that he would accept the outcomes of the forthcoming Calman Commission, the independent body set up to review Holyrood's powers, so long as they "help Scots and strengthen the Union". MSPs, including Gray, declared afterwards that the PM's words were significant, providing the clearest evidence yet that Brown was signed up to more powers for Holyrood.
But there were others in Dundee on Friday who were arguing the opposite, pointing to the caveats in Brown's speech and playing down the prospects of major change. With Calman due to report back in months, Labour's position on what to do with its recommendations remains opaque. Calman may suggest the Scottish Parliament get more borrowing powers, for example. While the party's MSPs may support the proposal, it is seen in Westminster as an attempt by Holyrood to "play with Daddy's credit card".
That uncertainty over the limited reforms likely to be put forward by Calman is reflected in the bigger question on the referendum. While Gray was delighted to have put the matter to bed last week, one figure close to the party leader was still declaring privately that "a referendum within the next few years is going to happen."
What no one quite knows yet is what Labour's position will be if, as seems increasingly likely, it loses the General Election, now almost certain to take place next year. Some Labour strategists expect Salmond to re-launch his referendum plans in the wake of that victory.
Would Scottish Labour, itself 'freed' from the need to support a Westminster Government, be quite so vehement about the benefits of the Union then? Party members, supping their pints in Dundee at the weekend, were reflecting how easy it was to imagine coming to a deal on the creation of a quasi-independent country with wet nationalists such as deputy leader Nicola Sturgeon or finance secretary John Swinney, with whom they already agree on so much. Labour's position is, to say the least, fluid.
There is uncertainty too on the Conservative side of the fence. Annabel Goldie insisted last week a referendum on independence was "not on the agenda". But with the party giving serious and painstaking thought to how it can deal with the expected Scottish backlash should it win at Westminster next year, the plebiscite is being privately discussed. There is plenty of speculation that one of David Cameron's first acts as Prime Minister might be to agree to a public vote on Scotland's future.
One senior source said: "Cameron may well feel that he has got no choice but to back a referendum. It could go either way. Say we were to win 10 seats in Scotland, he may feel sufficiently emboldened to say we can have a vote and put the issue to bed. Or if we to win, say, just one seat, he may feel that we are so weakened in Scotland that we have no choice but to accept the demands for a referendum."
Shadow cabinet members such as Shadow Defence Secretary Liam Fox are among those who have been known to privately argue for a referendum in Scotland – in order to "shoot Salmond's fox". The proviso might be that it would be a Cameron Government at Westminster, not a Salmond administration in Edinburgh, which decided to arrange it. The bottom line is, however, that it cannot be ruled out.
So while Mike Russell may be licking his wounds this weekend after the parliamentary defeat, the SNP know that with a second Holyrood victory likely in the Scottish elections in 2011, they have time on their side. Labour, their principal opponents, may soon be cast out of power. Meanwhile, both Labour and the Tories are still working out exactly how to deal with the issues they face.
In other words, everything is still to play for.
