Yesterday’s Sunday Times reported that the
English royal family is worried that actions by politicians are going to lose
Scotland from their realm, and is consequently deploying William and Kate to
visit Scotland more often in an attempt to woo the Scots away from independence.
The first part of that seems to be an eminently sensible conclusion to draw.
Whilst the PM has announced that ‘the union’ is to be at the heart of everything
the government does, the interpretation placed on that by some, which is that Johnson
is looking for ways to persuade the Scots and the Welsh that they are better
off in the union, is way off beam. In practice it just seems to mean looking at
every policy to determine whether it offers another opportunity for undoing the
devolution settlement and/or for plastering union flags around the place.
Scottish and Welsh sentiments are not to be accommodated or assuaged, but
overridden and rejected. The conclusion reached by the royals – that this is
likely to be counter-productive – is an obvious one to just about everybody except
the PM and his coterie.
The second part of their plan, however, is
much more problematic. “I used to support independence because of the way
the government treats Scotland, but now that our kids have been given more
opportunities to wave little plastic union flags at some younger members of a posh English family” is a thought voiced by no-one, ever. And the mindset behind
believing that more royal visits would have such an effect whilst the
government continues to trash the devolution settlement is a very strange one
indeed. Given that it is perfectly possible (and is the policy of Scottish
independentistas for the initial phase of independence at least) to retain the
union of crowns whilst ending the union of parliaments, the royal family
associating itself with the overtly political aim of maintaining both unions is
more akin to lashing themselves to the mast to make sure that they go down with
the ship than avoiding the shipwreck.
Whilst opinion polls tell us that the Windsors
are considerably more popular in Scotland than Johnson, that is a very low bar
to set. It’s entirely possible that a royal charm offensive (which may or may
not be an oxymoron) in support of the union will indeed reduce the popularity
gap between the Windsors and the Tory leader. Just not necessarily in the way they
expect.
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2 comments:
Disillusion with the Royals starts very easily. When I was pre-school, my mother marched me off to see the Queen drive through Bristol. Waited for ages and ages. Then black limo cruised up Blackboy Hill (Oh dear..) and a woman in a flowery hat swished by. Result - disillusion. The Scots have Balmoral which some Royals seems like but others don't, it being freezing. We in Wales have, er, Llwynywermod. The Royal push for the Union in Wales didn't really get out of the gate. So the Scots needn't worry.
The Royals will be the least of Scotland's problems and distractions. It is the self damaging inclination of SNP in getting too wrapped up in the dangerous fabric of gender identification that will provide its opponents with ammo. Electorates will come to see what dangers are spawned by the "gender ishoos" and turn away from a party that's seen as fostering or failing to deal with them.
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