Don’t read too much into latest independence polls – Alex Cole-Hamilton

There will be a lot of sore heads in Paris today. The time-honoured and nationwide hangover that follows the 14th of July celebrations will be more vivid after a Bastille Day made all the merrier after 100 days of lockdown. US independence day was just 10 days before, so July is a month for revolutions and, with polls suggesting support for independence cresting 50 per cent, Scottish nationalists are hoping that ours is in the post. But I wouldn’t bet against the survival of the UK quite yet.

I’ve resisted writing about the constitution in this column for four solid months because I didn’t think it appropriate while Scots were dying of Covid-19, sometimes in their dozens, every single day. But with lockdown easing, fatalities becoming much rarer and life returning to something approaching normality, it’s hard not to notice and comment on this worrying shift in Scottish politics.

How substantial that shift is remains to be seen. Polls conducted midway through lockdown suggested a steady state in attitudes towards separation. It’s only since perceptions have shifted around the relative handling of the crisis by our two governments that we’ve seen an upward drift in support of independence.

The gap between the governments in terms of pandemic response is not huge and is one of presentation rather than competence. Scottish mortality rates have largely kept pace with the rest of the UK. The Scottish Government has adopted the same public health measures and made similar mistakes to the UK Government, such as the disastrous decision to move hundreds of patients out of hospitals and into care homes without testing to establish if they would take the virus with them. But when it comes to presentation, there’s no question that the Scottish Government’s PR operation has wiped the floor with that of the UK Government. While Boris Johnson did press-ups and bumbled along, Nicola Sturgeon stood at her podium day-after-day and went for solemn managerialism. It’s crystal clear which the public preferred.

Furthermore, independence isn’t a real proposition right now. People are being asked about it in the abstract and in the same breath as they are being asked to compare Boris and Nicola. Nobody’s thinking about currency questions, whether a fledgling independent Scotland could have afforded furlough, or how Scotland would service its share of a national debt that is now planetary in scale because of the extraordinary levels of support and intervention that have been required to cope with both the virus and its economic fallout. In truth, this boils down to a fleeting popularity contest and as such any uptick for independence is likely to be built on sand.

The comparison of those personalities has shifted the needle of public opinion so watch as nationalist grandees seek to tie their argument to personalities more and more. For as long as we’ve got that shower running things at Westminster, it’s the strongest suit they have. Long-time independence campaigner and columnist Ruth Wishart wrote recently that one big benefit of independence was that we would never have to listen to the likes of Boris Johnson and Rees-Mogg, ever again. But junking a union that has endured 300 years or more because you don’t like the personalities of the day is a like bulldozing your family home because your teenage children trashed it in a house party. Personalities come and go, so do political ideologies.

If anything, this emergency has consolidated my personal support for the Union. Pooling and sharing our resources across this family of nations has given us a strength to withstand the unforeseeable. The broad shoulders of the UK economy have allowed the government to create and extend support packages that have saved hundreds of thousands of jobs and prevented countless businesses from going under.

We aren’t oppressed by tyrants. Our people are not persecuted. The taxes we pay afford us representation in not just one but two parliaments. In having control at Holyrood over education and health, among many other hugely powerful levers, we have the power to make lives better, were they to be used to be used to the full effect.

Nationalists may look wistfully at France or America and dream of storming their own Bastille or delivering a Scottish version of the victory at Yorktown but in reality the ‘freedom’ they seek is utterly incomparable and to my mind, wholly undesirable.

Alex Cole-Hamilton is the Lib Dem MSP for Edinburgh Western

A message from the Editor:

Thank you for reading this article on our website. While I have your attention, I also have an important request to make of you.

The dramatic events of 2020 are having a major impact on many of our advertisers - and consequently the revenue we receive. We are now more reliant than ever on you taking out a digital subscription to support our journalism.

Subscribe to the Edinburgh Evening News online and enjoy unlimited access to trusted, fact-checked news and sport from Edinburgh and the Lothians. Visit www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/subscriptions now to sign up.

By supporting us, we are able to support you in providing trusted, fact-checked content for this website.

Joy Yates

Editorial Director