THE public in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland are beginning
to wake up to the fact that a General Election is taking place on
18 September - and that they are not invited into the polling
booths. The mistake, an understandable one in the circumstances,
has been to consider Scottish devolution as a constitutional issue.
At the heart of the complacency of the "No" lobby has been the view
that: (a) nobody can possibly get excited enough actually to vote
about constitutional matters; and (b) Scotland, with its own
Parliament and representation in Westminster, has no burning reason
to secede. What we have seen, however, is a straightforward
political contest between a right-wing Westminster Government -
projected endlessly into the future in many Scottish minds - and a
largely left-wing majority north of the border. Given that
Westminster is campaigning by proxy, it is no surprise that the Yes
campaign has been gaining ground.
There is an element of 1066 And All That in the way the
two sides have been presented: the independents "Wrong but
Wromantic", the Unionists "Right but Repulsive". But the closeness
of the polls of late has had the effect of removing the knock-about
element from the contest. Anniversaries of ancient battles have no
place in a debate about nations that share the same land mass,
language, culture, and 300 years of history. Arguments about
economics are a sideshow to the potential wrangling about foreign
relationships and global identity.
The Churches are right to hold themselves aloof from the
campaigns in order to concentrate on life after the polls close. If
the majority votes for independence, there will be an immense
feeling of loss and confusion among a minority in Scotland and the
majority south of the border. If the majority votes for the status
quo, the energy generated by the campaign will dissipate, and is
unlikely to attach itself to anything to do with Westminster for a
good while. Whichever side wins, the closeness of the vote means
that the losing side can argue that, taken with those who failed to
vote, it actually formed the majority. This is, of course, one of
the central planks of the independence argument: that a majority in
Scotland still has to bow to the will of Westminster. Tearing up
the political map is no solution, however: large conurbations will
always vote differently from rural areas, the Lowlands from the
Highlands. Viewed in this light, the Scottish vote is, indeed,
constitutional, but touches on far bigger issues than the
relationship between Holyrood and Westminster. Voters - or rather
non-voters - will remain disengaged from politics as long as they
see no link between their wishes and the actions of the political
classes. A Yes vote in Scotland would create a political crisis; it
might be a crisis that UK politics needs.