9th September 2014

Thinking aloud about the big society.

Today's news suggests that in nine days time, the UK might just become smaller.

Living just seven miles from the border between Scotland and England could make it more difficult to visit Scotland, no longer able to simply set out and drive to the Solway or to see a concert in Langholm or to shop in Gretna Gateway, just beyond the Blacksmith's Forge and Rory Stewart's Cairn, designed to celebrate the continuation of the Union(?).

There have been many thousands of words written about the campaign for Scottish independence.

Both for, and against.

It will be interesting when, after the vote has been counted, whether the outcome is a Yea or Nay, what the commentators and analysts will conclude?

If it is a Yes, will this be Alex Salmond's victory or David Cameron's loss?

It is certainly the case that the Prime Minister of the historic 'Unionist" Party will have, if the vote is Yes, be criticised for surrendering both the date, (2014 is the Anniversary of the Battle of Bannockburn, when the Scots won a decisive victory over the English) and extending the franchise to include young people who are over sixteen, effectively balancing the inclination of the over sixties to vote to stay within the Union.

It remains to be seen whether Mr Cameron's position will remain tenable in the face of a Yes vote.

Equally of course a No vote will also be a yes vote, but rather a yes to a fairer, more just society as outlined by various papers published under the broad title of Commonweal by the Reid Foundation, which effectively reject the role of capitalism and markets in driving the economy, which has been the effective policy of both Conservatives under Margaret Thatcher and George Osborne and which was heavily subscribed to by New Labour under the Leadership of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

My instinctive response to the debate is to hope that the outcome is Yes.

My reasons for this arise in the main because what I think I see being acted out in the campaigning and the debating is a developing vision for a better society than is currently being exploited and explored by the Con-Dems in the UK.

For how much longer can we stand by and see the NHS privatised, the growth of food banks supplying essential food parcels for those who have been sanctioned by the DWP?

How much longer can we stand by and see the poor, the disabled, the young, students and pensioners pay the price for the failure of the banks?

How much longer can we stand by and watch as the private sector is subsidised and bailed out by Government, whilst pretending that marketisation is a success?

If the vote is Yes, surely it will create a serious review of current Government policy, of austerity, of welfare reform(?) of further privatisation of utilities and transport in what is left of the UK.

The debates are beginning not only in Wales and the North of Ireland but in the regions as Northern Cities begin to challenge the domination of London and public investment in the South of the country.

This debate is happening because the question at the heart of the Yes campaign has all along been what kind of society do we want to be?

Interestingly however, if the vote is No then the debate will not simply cease, that cannot happen and won't be stopped by building a Cairn at Gretna, because both Labour in Gordon Brown and the Tories in George Osborne have begun to propose a wide re-allocation of powers to the Scottish Parliament, suggesting in part, if not entirely, that the future for the United Kingdom, if it remains United will be a form of Federal Structure.

London will still be a powerful force within such a Federation, but it will have to state its case and argue strongly that its share of the cake, or the public purse should remain disproportionately large in relation to other Kingdoms, Regions, or Cities.  

Whether the fear that the loss of Scottish Labour MP's will make it impossible for the Labour Party to form a Government in England will be realised remains to be seen but again the decline of the Liberal Party, the rise of UKIP, the emerging Little England mentality, future relations with the rest of Europe may well mean that England will also have to engage with the question of what kind of society we want to be and to become.

Certainly the Yes Campaign's commitment to increasing immigration, a commitment that may well mean a Border Post replacing Rory Stewart's Cairn at Gretna (at least the stone can be recycled as building materials), then we will begin to see just how an open, liberal, fair society can be both welcoming and successful.

It might be a small country, it might even as one commentator observed, like Greece without the Sunshine, but it stands a pretty fair chance of becoming a real big society.

And, when the border is redrawn it might be if it's a small map and broad brush pen that Carlisle somehow finds itself included in that big society.