Boris Johnson and Brexit pushing Scotland to independence

• Scotland is moving towards independence from the United Kingdom after Scottish Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon promised to move forward with a referendum on the withdrawal from the European Union.
• The promise comes amid surveys showing support for the majority of Scots to leave the UK.
• Johnson has so far refused to give legal permission for another referendum, but Scotland could carry out a vote anyway.
• Visit the Business Insider home page for more stories.

Scotland is moving towards independence from the United Kingdom. This is the inevitable conclusion to be drawn from the latest opinion polls, which show an increase in support for Scottish nationalism.

The surveys, which now show consistent leadership for independence, followed a dark year for the United Kingdom, in which it suffered one of the highest coronavirus mortality rates and the worst recessions of any country in the world.

It also coincided with Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union, which a clear majority of Scots voted against.

The combination of anger against Brexit, distrust of Boris Johnson (who has a long history of offending Scots) and the chaotic management of the coronavirus pandemic by the UK government conspired to create the perfect environment for the independence movement.

With the Scottish fisherman reporting serious problems due to Brexit and wider trade with the EU under severe pressure due to new restrictions created by Brexit, the Union’s fate has never looked so poor.

Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who is also Scottish, warned on Monday that the situation was in danger of causing the UK to become a “failed state” due to growing dissatisfaction with the Westminster government in Scotland and in Northern Ireland.

On Sunday, Scottish Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon took action to capitalize on growing public dissatisfaction among Scots by publishing an 11-point plan for independence.

Crucially, Sturgeon promised to move forward with a referendum after the coronavirus pandemic, regardless of whether permission was granted by Johnson.

whatscotlandthinks.org

Johnson has so far refused to consider such a vote, pointing instead to the union’s decisive victory in the last independence referendum in 2014.

Still, in the years that followed, Brexit and the election of Johnson, who is deeply unpopular in Scotland, greatly increased the prospects for independence.

And with the upcoming Scottish parliamentary elections potentially set to deliver Sturgeon with an absolute majority on a pro-independence slate, it will be increasingly difficult for Johnson to resist another vote.

Sturgeon on Sunday accused Johnson of being “afraid of democracy”.

In a language that seemed to use Johnson’s own campaign messages in the Brexit campaign against him, Sturgeon told the BBC that the prime minister “fears the verdict and the will of the Scottish people”.

She promised to hold a “legal referendum” as soon as the pandemic passes and said the Scottish government would fight any attempt to arrest them in court.

Such a legal fight would likely be won by Johnson, since the powers to call referendums are legally reserved by the UK government.

However, any attempt to defy Johnson’s “people’s will” would only set fire to the independence campaign and make Johnson’s resistance to another referendum even more difficult to maintain in the long run.

And even if Johnson’s legal fight were successful, Sturgeon could move forward with a wild Catalan-style referendum, which she would likely win, making Johnson’s position even more untenable.

Acceptance of that reality seems to be seeping down Downing Street with journalist James Forsyth, who is the husband of Johnson’s press secretary and a close member of Johnson’s administration, writing last week that Johnson will probably only be able to delay, instead to completely prevent another referendum.

“There is a growing perception that Johnson cannot just say no,” Forsyth wrote in the Times.

Instead, Forsyth writes that Downing Street is looking forward to resisting an immediate referendum, while promising a reform of the relationship between England and Scotland.

These promises will be familiar to anyone who has followed recent British political history.

In 2013, former Prime Minister David Cameron’s tried to crush the desire for Brexit within his own party, promising to reform relations between the EU and the UK before holding a referendum.

At that time, Cameron believed that his reforms would put an end to the EU’s desire for independence and help him gain a majority to remain in Europe.

The reality was just the opposite. Cameron’s reforms were dismissed as meaningless by pro and anti-EU activists, and the anti-EU movement continued to take Britain out of Europe forever.

Johnson is likely to discover that his own attempts to prevent Scotland’s independence have a very similar ending.