After the last General Election many political pundits were predicting a period of calm and stability. Logic would suggest that a government with a large working majority would be able to manage that.
But politics within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is never as simple as that. The clue is in the name. Uniting isn’t always easy and it isn’t always the right thing to do. Uniting Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and England has been contentious for centuries, and the fact that Norther Ireland was created by partitioning off the six north eastern counties from Ireland compounds the difficulties. If you had asked me where the acrimony would first manifest itself after Brexit, I would not have suspected drugs policy but it has. The Scottish Government announce they plan to host a drugs forum and the UK Government rush in and do the same but don’t engage with the Scottish Government first. The U.K. Government jealously protect their interests, putting them before all others. Then Glasgow was chosen to host COP26 and the UK Instantly shut out the Scottish Government’s involvement and tried to come between them by using the platform for the Prime Minister to flirt with his green credentials. They continue to act like the biggest, worst behaved kid in a kindergarten grabbing toys from other children and discarding them just as quickly. They don’t know what they want but they know they want all of it. With the latest opinion polls in Scotland showing over 50% for independence and with the incredible rise of Sinn Fein in last week’s Irish elections the U.K. Government would do well to start building bridges and I don’t mean the one from Portpatrick to Larne. The proposed £5 million love bombing of Scotland will need to be incredibly successful if we are to stay in this relationship. But I can’t imagine that any amount of cards, flowers, champagne and poetry can pull the wool over Scotland’s eyes this time.
Labour are unionists, Tories are too,
I love Scotland, How about you?
Ronnie Cowan MP 