The people of Scotland may have voted NO to independence in yesterday's referendum, but the UK will never be the same again, thanks to the panicked promises of additional devolution that Westminster-based politicians made in the final days of the campaign. As a very articulate Tory MP told Canada's news channel before the results were announced, the outcome of a NO vote stands to be much messier for the whole UK than a YES would ever have been.
As a veteran of two referenda in Quebec and one-time resident of the UK (and partner of a half-Scottish wife), I've blogged a number of times about the similarities between the Quebec and Scottish separatist movements. However, to understand why yesterday's vote will make things so complicated for the UK in the future, we need to look at the differences between the two cases.
The driving force behind the Quebec and Scottish nationalist movements is very different. In Quebec, it's all about ethnicity. Oh sure, the Parti Quebecois was once broadly left-leaning, but those days are gone. The recent Quebec provincial election, which the PQ hoped would set the stage for a third referendum, saw the party adopt a thoroughly nasty stance toward English Canada and the Province's own non-francophone minorities. Mercifully, this was soundly repudiated by the voters. In truth, however, the mean-spirited tone was nothing new: recall former PQ leader Jacques Parizeau's somewhat inebriated concession speech after the 1995 referendum, which began "Yes, it's true that we lost, but to what? To money and the ethnic vote".
In contrast, although there's obviously an ethnic underpinning to Scottish nationalism, the movement as it presently stands is much more about different ways of viewing the economy and society. Scots see themselves as much more collectively-minded than their neighbours to the South. There was a telling campaign placard that copped up late in the day: "Vote YES and be rid of the Tories for ever". Pro-YES supporters included groups like "South Asians for Scottish independence", something that could never be imagined in modern Quebec.
This is both good news and bad news for the UK government as it tries to deal with the post-referendum situation. In Quebec, ethnicity will always be a divisive issue, which is why the "neverendum" nightmare of repeated sovereignty votes remains a real possibility. In Scotland, it should in principle be possible to forestall a rerun of Thursday's vote by devolving the powers that Scotland needs in order to achieve the kind of society it wants, without overweening interference from London.
Here, however, we run up against the second key difference between the two cases: Canada is now and has always been a confederal state: its ten Provinces have broad-ranging powers which are jealously protected from interference by the Federal government. The UK has, until recently, been mostly a unitary state. The devolution of power over the last two decades has awarded vastly different degrees of autonomy to assemblies in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, with no comparable level of self-rule for England, which is by far the dominant entity, in terms of population and economic clout, within the UK.
One of the ways that Canadian federal governments have sought to combat Quebec nationalism has been to give the provincial government there additional powers that help to address the ethnic grievances of the francophone population. Thus Quebec is allowed to have its own language laws giving priority to the use of French; it has a degree of control over immigration to the Province; and its legal system is still based on the Code Napoleon rather than the English common law-based system in the rest of Canada. These rights -- characterized as Quebec's "distinct society" -- are largely cost-free for the rest of Canada, and do not threaten the basis of the federal system.
This would be all but impossible to reproduce in the UK without far-reaching reforms of the nation's entire governance. The powers devolved in the past to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have already led to stirrings of discontent in the English regions. If, as now seems likely, Scotland gets a whole host of new taxing powers and control over social programs, this discontent can only grow. To take but one example, Scotland is likely to get the right to set its own corporate tax rate. Politicians in the north of England have already voiced concern that this will place them at a serious disadvantage in attracting new businesses or retaining existing ones.
Whatever specific powers are agreed for Scotland in the next few weeks, it's all but certain that Wales and Northern Ireland will also want the same for themselves. This would potentially leave England, while still the dominant partner in the Union, in a weakened position, unless a way is found to devolve similar powers to some form of English assembly. But how would that work? London's dominance of the national economy means that an assembly for the whole of England would be all but useless. London can fend for itself against all comers; Liverpool, Hull and Newcastle, not so much.
And then there's what's known as the "West Lothian question". As Scotland has acquired more powers, there has been a lively debate about whether Scottish MPs at Westminster should be allowed to vote on matters that only affect England. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has already said that this issue needs to be addressed as part of the next round of devolution. If all three of England's Celtic partners in the UK wind up with greater powers, answering the West Lothian question will become even more of a priority.
We've recently been learning in Canada, courtesy of the excellent Chantal Hebert, just how unprepared the Federal government was for the possibility of a YES vote in the 1995 Quebec referendum. Scotland may have voted NO this week, but it remains to be seen whether David Cameron's government is any better prepared to deal with the vastly changed world that it now faces.
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