Like the battle of Waterloo, the battle for Scotland was a damn close-run thing. The effects of Thursday’s no vote are enormous – though not as massive as the consequences of a yes would have been.
The vote against independence means, above all, that the 307-year Union survives. It therefore means that the UK remains a G7 economic power and a member of the UN security council. It means Scotland will get more devolution. It means David Cameron will not be forced out. It means any Ed Miliband-led government elected next May has the chance to serve a full term, not find itself without a majority in 2016, when the Scots would have left. It means the pollsters got it right, Madrid will sleep a little more easily, and it means the banks will open on Friday morning as usual.
But the battlefield is still full of resonant lessons. The win, though close, was decisive. It looks like a 54%-46% or thereabouts. That’s not as good as it looked like being a couple of months ago. But it’s a lot more decisive than the recent polls had hinted. Second, it was women who saved the union. In the polls, men were decisively in favour of yes. The yes campaign was in some sense a guy thing. Men wanted to make a break with the Scotland they inhabit. Women didn’t. Third, this was to a significant degree a class vote too. Richer Scotland stuck with the union — so no did very well in a lot of traditonal SNP areas. Poorer Scotland, Labour Scotland, slipped towards yes, handing Glasgow, Dundee and North Lanarkshire to the independence camp. Gordon Brown stopped the slippage from becoming a rout, perhaps, but the questions for Labour — and for left politics more broadly — are profound.
For Scots, the no vote means relief for some, despair for others, both on the grand scale. For those who dreamed that a yes vote would take Scots on a journey to a land of milk, oil and honey, the mood this morning will be grim. Something that thousands of Scots wanted to be wonderful or merely just to witness has disappeared. The anticlimax will be cruel and crushing. For others, the majority, there will be thankfulness above all but uneasiness too. Thursday’s vote exposed a Scotland divided down the middle and against itself. Healing that hurt will not be easy or quick. It’s time to put away all flags.
The immediate political question now suddenly moves to London. Gordon Brown promised last week that work will start on Friday on drawing up the terms of a new devolution settlement. That may be a promise too far after the red-eyed adrenalin-pumping exhaustion of the past few days. But the deal needs to be on the table by the end of next month. It will not be easy to reconcile all the interests – Scots, English, Welsh, Northern Irish and local. But it is an epochal opportunity. The plan, like the banks, is too big to fail.
Alex Salmond and the SNP are not going anywhere. They will still govern Scotland until 2016. There will be speculation about Salmond’s position, and the SNP will need to decide whether to run in 2016 on a second referendum pledge. More immediately, the SNP will have to decide whether to go all-out win to more Westminster seats in the 2015 general election, in order to hold the next government’s feet to the fire over the promised devo-max settlement. Independence campaigners will feel gutted this morning. But they came within a whisker of ending the United Kingdom on Thursday. One day, perhaps soon, they will surely be back.
(Artículo de Martin Kettle, publicado en "The Guardian" el 19 de septiembre de 2014)
12 comentarios:
Buena falta les hace a las comarcas, salvo que a estas les acompañe una inmerecida leyenda negra.
¿Vamos del mundo a la comarca y de la comarca al mundo?
¡La asociación comienza a ser citada en prensa! Creo que el cerco al que incomprensiblemente la trató de someter el Gobierno de Aragón ha fracasado completamente. ¿Quién aconsejaría una estrategia tan absurda y tan poco democrática? Algún alto cargo, sin duda.
Sería estupendo que las comarcas diesen un ejemplo a las demás administraciones en este tema. No hay que descartarlo.
Me parece estupenda la insistencia, ante todas las administraciones, de que se ocupen mínimamente de plasmar los principios de gestión y criterios de conducta a observar por quienes las dirigen y representan.
Creo, no obstante, que hay que hacer un esfuerzo suplementario, de descender a cuestiones más concretas, más prácticas, más fácilmente comprensibles por la gente. Algo que se visualice perfectamente, y que permita comprender a todos el valor de lo que se está proponiendo.
Mi enhorabuena, aunque algo tardía, por el acto del pasado martes sobre la convención contra la corrupción, que me resultó de enorme interés y me permitió descubrir que el trabajo por la honestidad en el servicio público tiene una dimensión universal, en la que trabajan las propias naciones unidas. Mi felicitación por el acierto de organizar un acto como el celebrado.
Cada día me topo con esta asociacion en más lugares de la blogosfera. Todo va calando ...
Sobre todo si se mantiene el empuje actual, que puede no ser mucho en sí mismo, pero lo es en relación con el panorama general existente.
Tal vez el mensaje termine por llegar a todos los rincones.
¿Qué se sabe de la queja que tramitaba el Justicia por la falta de respuesta de los titulares de las Secretarías Generales Técnicas a los escritos de petición de la Asociación? ¿Ha avanzado algo la tramitación o se encuentra estancada?
El artículo de Lasmarías apunta líneas de debate, como el número y actividad de los liberados de los sindicatos en las administraciones, que bien podría impulsar esa asocíación, para no centrarlo todo en los responsables políticos.
Esto tiene un futuro indudable.
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