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I was surprised to discover this morning that Gordon Brown last night suggested the Scottish education system should be abolished and replaced by a new pan-UK curriculum and examination system. This would indeed be a bold thing to recommend three months before the independence referendum. A surprise too and the sort of thing you’d expect to be all over the news today if it weren’t, of course, the case that the press is irrevocably biased against the nationalists and determined to bury anything that might embarrass Unionists. Still, Gordon said it. He must have. Otherwise why would Kenny Gibson MSP say Gordon Brown “has endorsed the idea of a UK-wide education

If Scotland votes No on September 18th, it won’t be the end of the matter. The Unionist campaign and all three Westminster parties have all promised that more powers will pass to Holyrood if Scotland rejects independence. Cameron himself has endorsed a radical extension of the tax varying powers of the Scottish parliament. This will exacerbate the West Lothian Question, the unfairness by which Scots MPs can still vote on devolved matters at Westminster. Traditionally, the view has been that the answer to the West Lothian question is to stop asking it. But, as I say in the column this week, this position isn’t tenable with Ukip on the march.

All through this referendum campaign, there have been two battles: one has been in the open. This has generally been courteous and respectful. But the other battle has been hidden under the cloak of internet anonymity – and it has been vile, nasty and bigoted. Occasionally, these campaigns have collided and when this has happened, it has all got very messy indeed. That is exactly what happened today. Today’s tale of spin doctors, Labour activists and cyberbullying appears to be a bit of a beltway story but bear with me, it is really very important and tells us a lot about where the whole campaign is going. First, we have

In the new Scotland people may be able to count. Until then we will endure nonsense like yesterday’s hoopla claiming there were 100 days until the referendum when there were, in fact, 101. Peevishness aside, the campaign now enters its final stages. Not before time, you may think. You would not be alone in reckoning so. For every person energised by the campaign (and many folk have been) there’s at least one thirsting for it to end. Not that it will, of course. If the Yes side wins more than 40 per cent of the vote (and especially it it takes more than 45 per cent) this thing will rumble

Today’s announcement that the UK Tory party is backing the full devolution of income tax to Holyrood, and will commit to that in its 2015 manifesto, is hugely significant. It means that both coalition parties now support some tax competition between Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom. By contrast, Ed Miliband has made clear that he will never sign off on any devolution deal that allows Scotland to undercut the rest of the UK on tax. Instead, he wants a system where the Scots could only choose to have the same tax rates as the rest of the UK or higher ones. This difference raises the possibility that

Here’s the thing many people misunderstand about Scotland’s referendum on independence: it isn’t really very much to do with England. When someone starts chuntering on about Braveheart and Bannockburn you know you’re listening to a fruitcake. This is true whether the fruitcake is Scots or English. At least the latter have the excuse of ignorance, I guess. Anyway, the point is that as much as we may occasionally dislike or, more frequently, be irritated by the English they’re not the problem. The people we really hate are our fellow Scots. And with good reason. I mean, look at us. The worst part of losing the referendum (whichever side you favour) is having

Yippee! The number-crunching boffins are at war again. The UK and Scottish governments have today released rival forecasts for life in an independent Scotland. It will not surprise you that the UK government’s projections run towards the pessimistic side of the ledger while their opponents in Edinburgh take a sunnier view of Scotland’s future economic circumstances and performance. Fancy that! The Scottish government suggests there might be £5bn windfall from independence; the UK government reckons each Scot receives a ‘Union dividend’ worth something like £1,400 a year.  They can’t both be right. In fact the probability is they are both wrong. That is, Scotland’s fiscal and economic position would be

Alex Salmond and David Cameron have more in common than a shared appreciation for Andy Murray’s tennis. Not, of course, that you would ever persuade either of them to admit that. At the very least, their supporters are more alike than either man would like you to believe. A new survey commissioned by Dundee University’s Five Million Questions project confirms as much. On a range of issues SNP supporters are as close, or closer, to Tory voters as they are to Labour voters: [datawrapper chart=”http://static.spectator.co.uk/M9xAk/index.html”] This will not surprise diehard leftists, of course. If the First Minister was ever a socialist he ceased to be a comrade long ago and

In a sense it could be the political version of the law of unintended consequences. There is Nigel Farage insisting that he is a British unionist, that he opposes Scottish nationalism and does not want to see Scottish independence. Yet success for Farage and Ukip in the Euro elections this week could possibly do more to hasten the break-up of the UK than almost anything else. That is the implication of a startling new poll published in the Scotsman this morning. ICM found that almost one in five Scots were more likely to vote Yes in the independence referendum if Ukip does well this week. A total of three in five of those

Independence is a fringe issue in Wales. Just 12 per cent of Welsh voters support it, and that figure has been stubbornly consistent. But it is far from implausible that within a decade Wales could find itself standing alone, not through any conviction that independence is the best bet, but because the UK has marginalised Wales. Wales is in a weak negotiating position already, as the Scottish referendum campaign has shown. Take the Barnett Formula, which adjusts the amount of money received from the Treasury by Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. An expert commission, led by respected economist Gerald Holtham, pointed out that if Wales were treated on the same basis

‘Utter fucking bollocks’. In case that’s not clear enough for you, the suggestion that Alistair Darling is being replaced as the head of the Better Together campaign is, as one insider puts it, ‘absolute horseshit’. Douglas Alexander, the man replacing Darling according to the Daily Mail, was at the Better Together HQ in Glasgow earlier today and, I understand, mildly surprised to learn of his elevation. Then again, the Mail only reports that there will be ‘no formal announcement of a change’ merely a ‘secret agreement’ that Alexander should effectively supplant Darling. So secret, however, that no-one involved appears to have heard of it. James Chapman is a fine reporter but one can’t

David Cameron may well have privately resolved that there is no cause for him to step down if Scotland votes for independence in a few months’ time, as per James Chapman’s scoop today. But the problem is that it is not in the Prime Minister’s gift to make that decision. He may well say that he isn’t going to resign, but that would have no effect on the number of letters that would be sent to 1922 Committee chairman Graham Brady demanding a leadership contest. It’s not as though the Tory party will reel from the shock of Scotland leaving, then wait to see what the Prime Minister says and

One of the more striking statistics in yesterday’s Policy Exchange report on multi-ethnic Britain is the revelation that only 25 per cent of white Britons identify as British. This low figure may reflect people not wishing to fill out two boxes (that’s what Alex Massie says, anyway), but it certainly follows a noticeable trend of recent years – the decline of British identity in England. In contrast 64 per cent of white Britons in this report called themselves ‘English only’. With the arrival of post-war migrants a great deal of effort was made to make the British identity less racial, more welcoming, and rightly so. But one of the unintended,

Well some of them are anyway. Consider the tweet above. It’s since been deleted and you can see why. Gerry Adams’ arrest might not be an obvious element of the Pan-Unionist Conspiracy but if you think that you lack the imagination necessary to be the wilder kind of Scottish nationalist. Then again paranoia is a consequence of monomania and breathtaking solipsism. Of course it’s just a tweet and only a single one at that. But there are plenty others like it. And yes, for sure, there are loonies on the Unionist side too. There really are people who think Alex Salmond evil and, lord knows, there are any number of Unionists making

With apologies to John Rentoul, Can Ed Miliband save the Union? is a question to which the answer is God help us all. I admit to a blind spot vis a vis the Labour leader: Looks like Gussie Fink-Nottle, thinks like a Marxist Madeline Bassett. Clever enough in a droopy kind of way but, ultimately, a gawd-help-us kind of fellow. I wasn’t very impressed last time Mr Miliband came to Scotland and so I wasn’t inclined to be impressed by his most recent trip to Glasgow. Which is dandy because I wasn’t. I dare say Miliband’s belief that Scottish independence would be a bad idea – for Scotland and the rest of

When Ed Miliband goes to Scotland and declares that ‘It is Labour that’s got to win this referendum’ it is a statement of political reality as much as it is braggadocio. The Tories have only one MP north of the border and the Liberal Democrats are the fourth party in the Scottish parliament. If this vote is to be won, Labour—as by far the largest Unionist party—will have to get the No camp over the line. Ed Miliband’s decision to take the entire shadow Cabinet to Glasgow last week was meant to show that UK Labour is now engaging fully in this battle. Miliband himself thinks that he has come

I suspect I might be one of the Scottish journalists Iain Martin considers keen to make a melodrama from the independence referendum. Ten weeks ago I warned in this magazine that Alex Salmond could well lead Scotland to independence. Stuff and nonsense some folk said then. Well, perhaps. But nothing that has happened since has persuaded me I was wrong.  Sure, the polls still show the No side leading but the general picture is clear: the Yes side are closing the gap. Of course there’s no law demanding that current trends continue indefinitely but, nevertheless, these are nervous times for the Unionist cause. And for good reason. Consider the poster at

Politicians always manage to take some crumbs of comfort from opinion polls but, if you are Alistair Darling, it would be difficult to find anything positive in the dramatic new poll published by Scotland on Sunday this morning. According to the poll, by ICM, the No camp’s lead has shrunk to either three or four percentage points – depending on whether the ‘don’t knows’ are counted. Ladbrokes has responded by cutting its odds on Scottish independence to 9/4, the shortest in its history. The overall ICM/SoS figures are No 42 per cent (down four points on last month), Yes 39 per cent (unchanged on last month) and ‘don’t knows’ 19 per cent, up

First Sea Lord Admiral Sir George Zambellas has said, in the Telegraph, that the sum of the Royal Navy’s parts is not greater than its whole. Scottish independence, he says, would weaken the naval power of the nations of the British Isles. Sir George also appeals to our shared naval history – nearly a third of Nelson’s men at Trafalgar were Scottish, the Grand Fleet was stationed at Scapa Flow and the Soviet menace was monitored from bases in Scotland. The positive, emotive arguments done, Sir George issues a warning to Scottish voters. In the event of independence, Sir George says that the rump UK’s navy would be able to

Was it Philip Hammond who told the Guardian that Britain would discuss a currency union with an independent Scotland? Fleet Street is asking that question after the Defence Secretary said: ‘There will be nothing non-negotiable; everything will be on the table… You can’t go into any negotiation with things that are non-negotiable. You can go with things you intend to make your principal objectives in a negotiation and, when you have issues about which you are not prepared to be flexible, invariably you have to give way on other things in order to achieve your objectives.’ Downing Street has said that the Defence Secretary was speaking as the Defence Secretary;

There are only five months to go to the Scottish referendum and the Cabinet is becoming increasingly agitated about the state of the Unionist campaign. At Tuesday’s meeting there was a frank and realistic discussion about its problems. The government’s concern is prompted by the fact that it has fired its biggest gun, telling the Scots there’ll be no currency union after independence, but the Nationalists are still standing. Indeed, they appear to have strengthened their position. The coalition now thinks that part of the problem is that there are not enough purely Scottish voices making the case for the Union. They fear that even Scots with Westminster seats are,

Like everyone else, I’ve often been mean about the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party. I recall suggesting they were the worst, most useless political party in the world. Fushionless and quite possibly beyond redemption. But hark this shipmates, something is afoot and there are, titter ye not, modest grounds for modest optimism in Tory circles. After what was, I think it fair to say, a steep learning curve in her early days as leader Ruth Davidson is coming into her own. She has a poise and a stature that was not apparent even a year ago. The party’s recent conference in Edinburgh was a success and her speech her best

Look up complacency in the dictionary and the chances are you will find a picture of a Scottish unionist next to it. For months – no, make that years – politicians at the sharp end of the fight against Scottish Nationalism have been warning about the dangers of complacency. But they might as well have been mumbling platitudes about the weather for all the effect it has had. The unionist side has been complacent, there is no doubt about that. Many in the anti-independence camp seem to have forgotten what this cause means to Alex Salmond and the SNP. They seem to have forgotten that this is all the Nats care about. It is

If Alex Salmond gets his way, this country will be rendered asunder. Once you cross the Tweed, you’ll be in a foreign land. The fact that Salmond is so keen to suggest that even after independence there’ll still be a ‘social union’ between Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom suggests that he knows that people are disturbed by this idea. But one of the puzzles of the Scottish referendum campaign is how reluctant politicians have been to make the emotional case for the Union. Instead, Better Together and the government have chosen to concentrate on a series of technocratic argument. This is why Nick Watt’s story about a senior

Hanging. Shooting. Beheading. Defenestration. Take your pick. It doesn’t matter which method you choose but the government minister who told The Guardian’s Nick Watt that “of course” there would be a deal to be done creating a sterling zone shared by an independent Scotland and the remaining parts of the United Kingdom needs to be found, summarily tried, and executed. Game-changing moments, of course, are rarely anything of the sort. Political campaigns do not pivot on individual moments or blunders. Fundamentals matter more. And yet the fundamentals are in turn shaped by the accretion of a thousand impressions. At least in part. The campaigning matters too. Especially in a close race. So this minister

After Nick Watt’s stunning scoop this morning on an unnamed minister saying that an independent Scotland could keep the pound after all, George Osborne and Danny Alexander have released this joint statement: ‘A currency union will not work because it would not be in Scotland’s interests and would not be in the UK’s interests. Scotland would have no control over mortgage rates, and would be binding its hands on tax and funding for vital public services. The Scottish Government are proposing to divorce the rest of the UK but want to keep the joint bank account and credit card. The UK would not put its taxpayers at risk of bailing out a