Scotland

Nicola Sturgeon got one thing right this morning. A year on from the independence referendum, Scotland’s First Minister allowed that the plebiscite “invited us, individually and collectively, to imagine the kind of country we wanted to live in”. The answer, you may be surprised to be reminded, was Britain. Surprised, because it has since become commonplace to observe that the losers have become winners and the winners losers. Scotland, everyone agrees, is a changed place even though (almost) everyone agrees that the country would still reject independence were there another referendum next month. (The economic questions that hurt the Yes campaign so badly last year are, if anything, harder to answer

Labour MPs are in no mood to fake it. At Jeremy Corbyn’s first meeting with the Parliamentary Labour Party, there was no cheer as he entered the room, no raucous applause when he stood up to speak. Instead, all that could be heard outside in the corridor was a few rounds of mild, polite applause. For a new leader, this is quite unprecedented. Corbyn’s message was that he had three priorities as leader: housing, the elections in Scotland and Wales next year and a Labour government in 2020. He also tried to stress that he wanted to be an inclusive leader, emphasising that he didn’t want any change to party

During our annual odyssey around the Scottish Highlands, I read Tears of the Rajas, Ferdinand Mount’s eloquent indictment of imperial expansionism in India. One of Ferdy’s themes is that the British lived in the country without ever attempting to make themselves of it. How far is that true of sporting visitors to Scotland? The SNP’s persecution of landowners gains traction from the fact that guests in shooting and fishing lodges encounter only keepers, gillies, stalkers. We disport ourselves within a social archipelago utterly remote from the mainland of the society in which it lies. In our defence, however, that is what tourists do everywhere in the world, much to the

This is the Corbyn summer. From the perspective of a short holiday, my overwhelming feeling is one of despair at my own semi-trade — the political commentariat, the natterati, the salaried yacketting classes. Who among us, really, predicted that Jeremy Corbyn would be romping ahead like this? Where were the post-election columns pointing out that David Cameron’s victory would lead to a resurgent quasi-Marxist left? And that’s just the beginning: how many of the well-connected, sophisticated, numerate political writers expected Labour to be slaughtered in the general election? Not me, that’s for sure. Going further back, how many people in 1992 told us John Major was an election winner? That Parris,

No, Nicola Sturgeon does not have much reason to be worried about Jeremy Corbyn. But the rest of the country does. To borrow from the tabloids, Corbyn is The Most Dangerous Man in Britain because, though no-one in London seems to appreciate this, he could be the man whose leadership of the Labour party leads to the end of Britain as we know it. Now I know people in England have tired of Scots banging on about the constitution. And I know that some things don’t have to be viewed through the prism of the constitution. Nevertheless, it’s a much more important issue than anything anyone says about trains. Or the health

All political parties have their cultish moments but some are more cultish than others. That doesn’t mean all their supporters are kool-aid drinkers, just that, on balance, they’re more likely to be so. This is not, I should have thought, a particularly novel or controversial observation. But, for some reason, suggesting that the SNP’s followers are especially likely to be animated by what one might dub a quasi-religious fervour seems to annoy them. And yet, at other moments, they are keen to point out how the SNP is different from all the other parties. Which is kind of my point too. And, yes, the SNP’s supporters really do behave in

So here we go again. Alex Salmond, popping up on the Andrew Marr show while Nicola Sturgeon is in China, makes news without saying anything new about the circumstances in which the SNP might – or might not! – press for a second referendum on Scottish independence. David Cameron, also overseas, responds saying there’s no need for any such plebiscite at any point in this parliament. Calm down, Jock. This will, I am sure, be well-received. All of which should surprise precisely no-one. Seventy percent of SNP supporters want another referendum before the end of this parliament; 90 percent want one within ten years. In such circumstances, you can understand why Salmond thinks another

Ed Miliband – remember him? – has just told the House of Commons that the government’s proposals for so-called English votes for English laws (EVEL) are a betrayal of everything for which the Conservative party is supposed to stand. Well, that’s certainly one way of putting it. According to Miliband, EVEL is “not true to the great traditions of the Conservative and Unionist party” but since the foremost of those traditions is a keen and ruthless appreciation of the best interests of the Conservative party I suspect Miliband, not for the first time, misunderstands the Tory party. “You’re the Conservative and Unionist party”, Miliband said. “This is neither for Conservatism nor

‘Is Home Rule the only realistic alternative to independence?’ was the question posed at a Spectator debate, sponsored by Brewin Dolphin, in Edinburgh last week. In one sense the question is redundant since, no matter how much some nationalists claim otherwise, there is no reasonable or realistic scenario in which it is possible to envisage the United Kingdom government scrapping the Scottish parliament. Some measure of Home Rule, therefore, is indeed the only realistic alternative to independence? But what is Home Rule? As the panel agreed (not least since this has long been obvious) there is no agreed or even satisfactory definition of Home Rule. Is it, as the journalist

Ed Miliband believed that after the financial crisis, Britain had moved to the left. He argued that there was no need to adopt all the Blairite positions to win. The election result appears to have disproved that thesis. But, as Andy Grice argues in his column today, Blairite is still being chucked around as the insult of choice in this Labour leadership contest. As Grice points out, Labour particularly need the Blair agenda’s ability to connect with English swing voters now given what has happened in Scotland. In a world in which the swing required for Labour to win Midlothian is larger than to take Kensington, Labour will have to

Writing in the Herald this week Iain Macwhirter noted that “Any trace of ethnic nationalism, and anti-English sentiment, was expunged from the [Scottish National] party in the 1970s”.  Responding to this JK Rowling – of whom you may have heard – suggested this was “Quite a claim”, suspecting that plenty of English-born Scottish residents might take a slightly different view. This, obviously, made for great Twittering and, equally predictably, gave plenty of people enough characters with which to hang themselves. Tiresomely, they are both correct. As nationalist parties go, the SNP really is a remarkably broad church. It imposes no kind of genetic test upon its members. Many of them were not born