As an American, I can see that there’s what appears to be a vocal minority in Scotland pushing for independence, but I genuinely have no understanding of how likely that is to ever actually happen. Is it at least in the realm of possibility, or is it more of a “The South shall rise again” type thing? (No offense intended to either side of the debate, just genuinely curious.)
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There was an independence referendum in 2014, No won with 55% of the vote. There have been some theories that if brexit happened earlier then yes would have won. So yes it’s definitely possible.
I don’t live in Scotland, but I can’t even imagine what it must’ve been like to have that close referendum followed by Brexit only a couple of years later.
What I’m wondering about right now though is Irish unification? That seems to be building up some serious momentum from everything I’ve been reading.
The SNP said Brexit would happen and England would make Boris Johnson prime minister. They were mocked by the media for both predictions.
The Unionists promised Scotland would receive more powers if they voted no. The day after the referendum David Cameron announced English votes for English laws. A policy that would remove Scottish MPs from the sovereign capabilities of Parliament.
There’s a meme going around in the Star Trek comminutes showing Data referencing the Irish Reunification of 2024, it’s crazy that that’s happening!
Careful celebrating. It also predicted WWIII in 2026…
Only a couple of months until the Bell riots
That is concerningly possible.
If I understand correctly, for a referendum to happen, the UK prime minister must agree and allow it to happen, as David Cameron did before. The big question it, will there be another PM that stupid?
It seems inevitable, sadly just not immediately inevitable.
Disclaimer: am American so I only see from outside, but I think the longer the UK is out of the EU the more likely another independence referendum becomes. Also a labour government taking over from the tories would be preferable to the Scottish people, I feel.
A Labour government is, of course, preferable to the Tories. However they too are a Unionist party and not likely to agree to another referendum from Holyrood.
They’d be better to chip away at the two main cases for Scottish independence: 1) Closer and closer ties to the EU if not rejoining in some form (EEA membership for example) 2) hatred of the English by being more collaborative with Scotland in the running of the UK.
These two things might weaken the case for another referendum.
Not from UK but is it true that Scotland is one of the main constituencies that allows Labour to win elections?
If so, from a practical point of view English Labour are probably even more opposed to Scottish independnce than the Tory party.
This isn’t true at all. Since ww2 Scotland has voted Labour up until very recently. Every election the largest party in England formed the government. Scotland’s vote hasn’t mattered much. Scotland has never voted Tory, but they have by far spent the most time in government.
Scotland was full of Labour safe seats, so they did make up a big contingent of the Labour party. But Labour has lost all talent in Scotland. The SNPs success has caused Scottish Labour to churn through leaders till they accepted their fate of 2nd place - currently 3rd.
If you think hatred of the English is a factor in Scottish independence your badly informed. In Scotland the most intolerant people tend to be unionists, so intolerant they were told not to campaign against independence by the unionist parties.
The way I see it, it’s 50/50.
Either they become independent or they don’t.
I like those odds!
