I didn’t write this to
say which way I will vote this Thursday; more because my interest in the debate
is around the constitutional settlement for the UK. But in that context, it’s possible to feel so uncomfortable
with the UK as it stands to vote for its effective abolition.
Perhaps the nub of it
is best described as follows: the UK was born as part of an exercise in empire
building, but it has lost its way now that the empire has gone and our
challenges are more obviously at home – inequality, poverty etc. In other words, it works better looking
outward than inward. Maybe the
other factor it hasn’t coped well with is the EU – a social, political and
economic union that many English revile as much as they support the same type
of union in the UK. What is the
point of the union as an integrated trading bloc when we are all part of an
even bigger one just over the Channel?
So, here are my three
areas where the UK makes me uncomfortable; 3 areas in which I would genuinely
welcome a commitment to change.
1.
The UK and the World
The UK prides itself
on its influence in the world.
This seems to be comprised of three elements: first, an empire formerly
spanning the globe, and the residual goodwill that exists within the ex-empire
Commonwealth nations; second, the ownership of nuclear weapons which, in the
post Second World War environment has been enough to gain an influential
position in the world (e.g. the security council of the UN has permanent
members all of whom are nuclear powers), and third the ‘special relationship’
with the USA.
There are, of course,
arguments against these positions.
It is not clear to me how possession of weapons guaranteed to end the
lives of millions is suitable qualification for conflict prevention. Even if it was, it would perhaps be
fairer if Europe had only the one seat, and another was given to a country from
a different part of the globe (either the Middle East or Africa spring to
mind). Equally, whilst there is
considerable goodwill within the Commonwealth, other UK impacts on the rest of
the world are less benign – we have now had 25 years of more or less continual
conflict in the Middle East, with no great solution in sight. Finally, the USA would like nothing
better than for the UK to be a strong voice in Europe; the UK, it seems, still
sees its close relationship with the USA as a reason not get closely involved
in Europe. These two countries
really need to have a plain conversation!
It is possible for the
UK to be a non-nuclear nation, one that provides influence in the world by the
value of its friendship, by the advice and guidance it can offer nations who
seek it. The UK has a substantial
diplomatic history behind it, which could be of benefit to others. But it doesn’t have to be delivered at
the point of a gun, and it is this aspect of our influence that seemingly
remains the strongest. Similarly,
although the UK did have an empire, so too did France, Belgium, the
Netherlands, Austro-Hungary, and Spain.
All of them have got over this and created something out of the European
Union. The UK has no reason to
stay on the sidelines.
2. UK Government and the electorate.
It is true that
nations across Europe are struggling with fairly low turn-outs for election
campaigns. Therefore, whatever is
affecting the UK is not unique to it, although the explanations for lower
turnouts are not necessarily the same everywhere, therefore there could be some
issues that are unique to the UK.
I would suggest two issues: first, the extent to which government is something
that is done to the electorate (rather than on its behalf); and second, the
lack of enthusiasm to change any of this.
Aside from the
bloodshed and anarchy that revolutions often bring, there is something to be
said for a clean break from the past every so often. England had one before most other European countries, then
took fright and reverted to its original approach. As a result, further change has been gradual, piecemeal, and
issue driven. The result of this
is that the UK has moved to welcome elements into the franchise over time – to
join the club, so to speak – rather than reflect the fact that power has been
denied them unfairly. Or put
another way, power in the UK seems to be an extension of the divine right of
kings, modernised into the divine right of government. Government derives its power from God,
not from the people. Therefore
extending the franchise is more of a benign act of graciousness, not the
correction of a mistake. The
distinction is important because it reflects how government acts – UK
government is not by the people, for the people; it is by a political elite for
its own benefit, tempered by the need to secure a mandate every few years from
the electorate.
And what sort of
mandate is given? Not a very
convincing one, in my view. Entire
governments are formed, often with large majorities, based on less than half
the available votes. Some local
elections, including for police commissioners, can attract even fewer
votes. Most of us would be
reluctant, I think, to believe we spoke on behalf of an electorate where we
could not convince one half of them to vote for us. But politicians do; for them a vote not cast is an
irrelevance. It is not surprising
that strike ballots are rarely referred to by politicians in terms of the ‘yes’
votes as a percentage of all votes (including non-voters); the charge could
equally be made in the opposite direction. I would consider it a major flaw in our current arrangements
that people cannot be persuaded to vote – it is an indicator of the lack of
engagement with our constitution as it stands, and a strong reason for reform.
But herein lies a
paradox. Again, to take England as
the case study (it will become clear below), there have been three recent attempts
to modernise the constitution – directly elected mayors, replacement of the
‘first past the post’ system, and elected regional government. Voters at the polls have rejected all
three. Therefore, proposals to
change the system have met with the same negative reaction from which the
current system of elected government also suffers.
It is hard to explain
this – if the system is so rotten, why don’t we change it? The rejection of the regional assembly
proposal for the north-east seems largely to have been a rejection of the
political class (i.e. it would create another layer of unpopular
politicians). So maybe it is just
that these proposals have not been radical enough. Perhaps also as a nation, we are more content to criticise
and complain than participate – the closer that government gets to us, the less
excuse we have for it. Perhaps,
even, our ability to turn this complaint into humour – in particular satire –
blunts any energy to do anything with it.
As Will Self recently observed, when we start laughing about something,
every other emotion is blocked out.
So as soon as we find humour in this, all the anger that we should
rightfully feel about our political system is dissipated, and nothing changes. If our politicians have learnt to laugh
along with us, then nothing will ever change.
3. UK economic geography
In recent decades,
there has been a persistent trend in UK economic geography: a burgeoning
services sector (primarily financial services) located in London. The result has been that the longer
term drift of the population to the south-east corner of the UK has
persisted. This has, to some
extent, been amplified by the loss of manufacturing jobs elsewhere that has
‘unbalanced’ the UK economy. One
consequence of that is that a majority of the country now live in a relatively
small part of it, engaged in activities that (broadly) are not typical of the
rest of the country.
The problem is that
the activity in London is generating a lot of tax revenue. Therefore, to maximise tax revenue, the
financial services sector in the south-east is encouraged. The difficulty this generates is that
we cannot all live in the south-east, still less all work in financial
services. Growth of this sector in
one part of the country puts immense strain on its infrastructure, including
transport, power, sewage/water, and housing. This creates a double-whammy: first, improvements to any of
these systems tend to be very expensive (think Crossrail, the Thames Tunnel, Thameslink);
second, there is no clear policy in place for what should happen in the rest of
the country. Transport
improvements tend not to change this situation radically, because they all have
a start or finish in London (think HS2); and the reason this happens is because
the status quo is already so loaded that business cases that do not involve
London are hard to make work.
Unfortunately, we know
we cannot carry on over-loading the south-east; so we must use more imagination
in how we prioritise our spending. Important though financial services are, we
are in danger of splitting the country into two, and creating a small state
around London and the south-east.
As it is, economic policy is too often geared to the needs of the
south-east (think interest rate policy and the influence of London house prices
rather than north-east manufacturing).
The problem is that where economic policy goes, politics will
follow. Already it is the
south-east that holds the whip hand in terms of national elections (resulting
in the situation Scots know well, of rarely voting in the party in power); and
if the south-east does not want, say, electoral reform, then it will not
happen. But why would the
south-east want any different, when government economic policy is already
geared towards it? When all of our
leading cultural institutions are based there? When it is the centre of government?
It will take a brave
politician to admit that we have got ourselves into a mess; yet this is the
truth of it, and one reason why, whatever the result of the referendum in
Scotland, the problem will not go away.
The only way to save the UK in the long term is to rebalance the
population; and the only way to do this is to rebalance our economic
priorities. Government talks of
this; yet at the same time the last Labour government was encouraging the north
of England to close the productivity gap with the south-east through some
improvements to Manchester’s rail network, it was sanctioning Crossrail and
Thameslink in London. The current
government talks about developing Liverpool as an international port; yet it
has already spent money improving connectivity to Felixstowe, and has placed
Southampton at the base of its ‘electric spine’ rail freight network. The next government will almost
certainly approve airport expansion in the south-east. And the government after that will be
cutting the ribbon at Euston for High Speed 2. London and the south-east will benefit from all of
this. It will take decades for the
rest of the country to neutralise the advantage that the south-east will gain
from this, still longer to reverse it and hold an advantage itself. At present, the south-west of England
is simply pleading for a railway line that is open all year; in Scotland,
having a dual track link between Perth and Inverness would be a major step
forward. Whilst London is
introducing trains now that will be replaced within a matter of years, rolling
stock over 30 years old is regularly in use in northern England.
If there is a yes
vote, I hope Scotland will learn from this. I hope Scotland will begin to think differently about its
constitution, its relationship with its voters, and its place in the
world. And when it has done this,
I hope it recognises the flaws in how the UK has been governed, and sees that
centralization of resources in one part of the country (say, Edinburgh), is a
ticking time-bomb. In other words,
that it values the entire country, not just the bit it finds on its doorstep,
and easiest to deal with.
