Scotland

It’s less than two months until the referendum on Scottish independence. Two months to decide the future of two (or, if you prefer, four) countries. No pressure and it’s not a small thing at all. Sensible Unionists (the qualification is, alas, eternally required) can, indeed do, acknowledge that something was lost in 1707 and that this something mattered. They might also agree that independence in 2014 would bring some benefits. Something real would be recaptured, if you like. In any case, the sky would not fall; some things would probably improve. We should expect them to. Only a dolt assumes everything must be worse after independence. (There are some dolts

There really isn’t much time left. From today, there are just nine and a half weeks until we go to the polls in the independence referendum. Also today, we have the latest ICM poll for Scotland on Sunday. The main figures are: Yes 34 per cent (down two points), No 45 per cent (up two) and don’t know 21 per cent (unchanged). If the don’t knows are excluded, the figures are Yes 43 per cent (down two), No 57 per cent (up two). [datawrapper chart=”http://static.spectator.co.uk/Z2duc/index.html”] Suddenly, that nine-and-a-half week window looks pretty small for the Yes camp. It means that Alex Salmond and his colleagues have just 66 days to

If Scotland did leave, it would be a disaster for the rump UK that would be left behind, I argue in the magazine this week. We would go from Great Britain to little Britain. Every time the Prime Minister of the rUK raised his voice on the world stage, he would be met by a mocking chorus of ‘you couldn’t even keep your own country together’. Beyond this, there are the slew of practical problems that Scottish independence would raise. Where would Trident be based? In the best case scenario you would end up with the submarines in Devon while the actual nuclear weapons were stored three hours’ drive away

There are many reasons for this but let’s begin with the first and simplest: it is the British Broadcasting Corporation. Who could have imagined that an organisation that, rightly or not, sees itself as both creator and guardian of much of modern Britain’s identity and culture might think itself threatened by a movement hell-bent on destroying, or at least significantly changing, that identity and culture? I know, me neither. Now of course the BBC is not consciously or deliberately biased against the SNP and against Scottish independence. It is scrupulous about ensuring ‘No’ voices are balanced by ‘Yes’ voices just as, in other areas and debates it does its best to be

Listen: listen to ‘Spectator debate: independence is the greatest threat to Edinburgh’ on Audioboo

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

It’s a constant theme of this column that today’s young need to stop whingeing about their prospects and get on with making their own future. But a quick north-of-the-border tour as official campaigning kicks off for the Scottish referendum persuades me that the pessimism of the generation about to enter the world of work is for once well justified — and may play a key role in averting the potential economic disaster of independence. When SNP leader Alex Salmond chose to give 16- and 17-year-olds a say in September’s poll, he must have presumed that teenage Scots — if they could be bothered to vote at all — would be

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