2014年09月18日——New Yorker——Can Great Britain Survive a Scottish “No” Vote.doc

Can Great Britain Survive a Scottish No Vote BY JOHN CASSIDY CREDITPHOTOGRAPH BY ROB STOTHARD The obvious question about the referendum on Scottish independence is Will the secessionists win The answer looks likely to be no Of all the opinion polls carried out in the run up to the vote only one has shown the pro independence side in the lead and that survey was taken almost two weeks ago The vast majority of the polls show the no side narrowly ahead two published on Wednesday gave the unionists fifty two per cent and the yes side forty eight per cent though both found a fair number of undecideds I wouldn t rule out a last minute swing toward independence Some of the scare tactics employed by the British government and its allies over the past couple of weeks have been crude and clumsy it s always possible that the Scots a proud and obstinate people will react against them But assuming that the polls are accurate the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland will escape intact But for how long That is the really interesting question arising out of the vote For although the unionist side seems likely to win this round in the longer term the impact of the referendum could well be disastrous for those who want to maintain the status quo About the best they can hope for is a federalized Great Britain that retains the word United in its name but is for most intents and purposes two separate countries And even that outcome may prove to be unsustainable Indeed the English who today are lamenting the possible dissolution of their beloved union may well end up kicking the Scots out of it To understand why you need to recall a bit of history Thursday s vote didn t come out of nowhere Scottish nationalism has been growing in strength since the seventies and eighties when Mrs Thatcher s brand of free market economics and militarism alienated many of those north of the border In a 1999 referendum the Scots voted for devolution of power to a Scottish Parliament which came into existence two years later Initially the Scottish Labour Party held power But since 2007 the pro independence Scottish National Party has been the biggest party And since 2011 it has held power alone Already the Scottish government has the authority to set its own policies inmany areas of domestic policy such as education housing and health care And it has started to exercise this power In the rest of the United Kingdom students now pay for their college degrees In Scotland a university education is still free In the rest of the United Kingdom people pay for medical prescriptions In Scotland they don t At the moment the Parliament at Westminster still sets most tax rates and the level of state benefits such as old age pensions for the entire country But that is also changing Beginning in 2016 the Scottish Parliament will be able to alter income tax rates by up to ten pence in the pound Scotland is also altering the way in which it taxes property sales to make its methods more progressive and it is taking over the setting of laws relating to speed limits and drunk driving That is only the beginning Last week in a desperate effort to persuade the Scots to reject independence the three major parties in England the Conservatives the Liberal Democrats and Labour came together and promised them another big dose of devolution in exchange for a no vote In making this offer Gordon Brown the former Prime Minister who is Scottish described it as nothing less than a modern form of Home Rule for Scotland Since then the British government has made clear that this so called devo max policy would including granting the Scottish government more powers to raise taxes and borrow money as well as the right to change some benefits and guarantee spending levels for the National Health Service in Scotland The writ of Westminster which would still have a full contingent of Scottish M P s would be largely confined to defense and foreign policy immigration energy and business regulation Many Scots might be content with such an outcome But what about the English the Welsh and the Northern Irish Going forward would they be content to allow Scottish M P s to vote on policy measures in Westminster that shape their lives when their own representatives aren t allowed to vote on similar issues involving Scotland because those get decided in Edinburgh This question was first posed in 1977 by Tam Dalyell who was then the Labour M P for West Lothian For many years the West Lothian question as it became known was regarded as an interesting but hypothetical puzzler But as more and more powers are devolved to the Scottish Parliament it is one that takes on great urgency Eventually it could lead to the breakup of Great Britain Imagine what will happen if there s a no vote and over the next few years devo max is enacted At that point Janan Ganesh a columnist for theFinancial Times notes MPs representing Scottish seats at Westminster who are overwhelmingly Labour will be voting on legislation that scarcely affects their constituents Anybody who thinks this will be allowed to stand does not talk to enough Tory MPs many of whose private views on Scottish independence already range from insouciance to glee Alternatively Ganesh might have added talk to some Englishmen down the local pub Traditionally the English have taken a phlegmatic approach to Scottish devolution If the Jocks want to set their own school examinations and speed limits let them get on with it that s been the general view But things are changing Like Scottish nationalism English nationalism is on the rise and in some quarters it s starting to be directed at the restive Scots Nigel Farage the leader of the jingoistic U K Independence Party which wants to pull Britain out of Europe has accused the S N P of stirring up anti English hatred and has described some of its supporters as hoodlums out to intimidate no voters On Wednesday Farage said that Alex Salmond the S N P s leader was fueling vitriol and aberrant behavior that could lead to riots on voting day Farage represents an extreme view but he has a knack for capturing popular sentiments and prejudices An opinion poll quoted in this week s issue of The Economist showed that a majority of English voters already think Scottish M P s shouldn t be allowed to vote on laws affecting England As more power gets devolved to Edinburgh this sort of sentiment will only grow stronger And Farage and other English politicians will be there to exploit it To be sure there are ways of addressing the West Lothian question short of booting the Scots from Westminster and ensuring the breakup of Great Britain Historically pragmatism and flexibility have been two of Britain s strengths Last year a parliamentary commission led by William McKay the former clerk of the House of Commons suggested introducing a requirement that laws affecting England alone obtain the backing of a majority of English M P s More radical ideas have also been floated including the setting up of an English Parliament which would have powers similar to the Scottish one But what then would be the point of retaining Westmin