Kopi Av 2 Version Disunited Kingdom

A Disunited Kingdom? (c) Richard Burgess 1

The Disunited Kingdom

Is the United Kingdom past its sell-by date?

Lecture by Richard Burgess


• I belong to the group of historical colleagues who hold that the United Kingdom was established to serve the interests of Empire and that the loss of Empire has destroyed its raison d’être.

The Isles: A History by Norman Davies


A selection of book titles from around 2000

• The Death of Britain by John Redwood

• The Abolition of Britain by Peter Hitchens

• The Day Britain Died by Andrew Marr


”Rule Britannia”

• Words written by a Scot

• James Thomson (1700-1748)

• First performed in 1740 as part of a ”masque” about Alfred the Great


When was Britain born?

1603?1707?

1746? 1922?


A. What was the glue that kept the Union together?


1. Protestantism

– The Church of England (the Anglican Church)

– The Church of Scotland (the Kirk)


”The Papist Threat”


Also a real threat

• Jacobite plots, uprisings and invasions– 1708– 1715– 1718– 1720– 1743– 1745


2. A foreign monarchy

the House of Hanover

the House of Saxe-Coburg

the House of Windsor


• HRH Michael James Alexander Stewart of Albany

– a.k.a. Michel Roger Lafosse from Belgium


3. Britain – the beleaguered island

• France – a defining factor for British identity!


The ever-changing French threat…


”The sea and the chalk cliffs are Britain’s best allies”

Lord Salisbury 1888


4. The Empire


Empire – the Union’s raison d’être

• Pre-union England – ”heretics and plunderers” (Andrew Marr)

• England’s empire –Ireland and toehold in the New World

• Scotland’s empire – the failed Darièn project in Panama


A British, not an English Empire

Thomas Cochrane: The real-life ”Hornblower” - a Scot

David Livingstone: Missionary and explorer- A Scot

Thomas Brisbane: ColonialGovernor – A Scot


The British Army and Navy

• Fighting distant natives and European neighbours

• Essential bearer of British identity


B. When the spell stops working…


”Britishness” in retreat

• Increasing American influence worldwide, but also in Britain itself

• The decline of ”King’s/Queen’s English”, the dominant dialect of Empire


• Protestantism losing its hold..– Multifaith society

– Growing secularism

– Catholic church with largest attendance


• ”Whiteness” in retreat

• British institutions undermined– British Rail– British Leyland– Royal Mail– BBC– Coal Industry


The Monarchy in Decline


The European Union

– Cooperation rather than competition– Fostering regionalism rather than nationalism– The Euro?


• The Channel Tunnel terminal at Folkestone


C. The resurgence of nationalism


1. The Dark Ages Still Matter

Loegr = England lit. ”the lost lands”


Our ancient prejudices

• Sassanach = Saxon

• To welsh/welch on someone

• Taffy was a Welshman,Taffy was a thief;Taffy came to my houseAnd stole a piece of beef.


The other languages…


2. Scottish nationalism

• Legacies of full nationhood– Law– Education– Church– Bank


National heroes…


3. Welsh nationalism

• Never achieved nationhood

• Language as symbol and vehicle of nationalism


• Y Brawd Mawr


4. Irish nationalism

• Act of Union 1800

• Trauma of civil war, partition and sectarianism

• Ulster Unionism – the last bastion of ”Britishness”


5. English nationalism- a strange beast


• [Britain is a nation of] long shadows on county cricket grounds, warm beer, invincible green suburbs, dog lovers and - as George Orwell said - old maids bicycling to Holy Communion through the morning mist. John Major


• England – in search of an identity

• Resurgence of flag of St. George

• Resentment of Scottish ”greed”

• ”West Lothian question”


• English nationalist movements

– English Democrats

– English National Party

– (UKIP)


• The Countryside Alliance

• In England’s green and pleasant land…


• An English Parliament?

• Regional Parliaments?

– Referendum 2004 on Regional Assembly for North East England

• Turnout 48%• 77.9% against


D. Towards devolution

• Devolution

– the partial transfer of powers from central to legislative and executive organs in the regions.

» Norman Davies ”The Isles”


• Kilbrandon Report 1973 recommended:– legislative assemblies in Scotland and Wales– referenda

• Referenda 1979:• Scotland 33% in favour• Wales 12% in favour


• Home rule movement spread under Thatcher

• Scotland and Wales increasingly left-wing

• Tory policies hit Wales and Scotland hard


• Labour commitment to decentralisation

• ”New Labour” devolution promise

• 1997 - All Tory MPs lost their seats in Scotland and Wales


• Referenda 1997– Scotland 71% for– Wales 50.3% for

• Scottish Parliament at Holyrood, Edinburgh

• Welsh Assembly in Cardiff


The mainland nationalist parties

• Scottish National Party

• Plaid Cymru

Alex Salmond

Dafydd Wigley


Recent SNP performances

• General election 2005– 17.7% of Scottish vote– 6 seats

• Scottish Parliament election 2007– 32.9%– 47 seats (out of 129)


Recent Plaid Cymru performances

• General Election 2005– 12.6%– 3 seats (out of 40 Welsh seats)

• Welsh Assembly election 2007– 22.4%– 15 seats (out of 60)


Northern Ireland-devolution in sectarian society

• Referendum 1973– 98.9% for Union!

• Referendum 1998 on Good Friday agreement– 71.1% for– 28.9% against a

power-sharing executive


Nationalist support in Northern Ireland Assembly 2007

• Sinn Fein– 26.2%– 28 seats in assembly (of 108)– 4 posts in Executive (of 12)

• SDLP– 15.2%– 16 seats– 1 post in Executive


New Britons

• To talk of Britain as a country of four nations “immediately excludes all of us, because those four nations have a particular history, a particular ethnicity, which doesn’t include us”. Yasmin Alibhai Brown


E. From devolution to dissolution?

• The UK never was a nation state

• Parallels to USSR, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia?

• “In those states where the imperial nation loses the citizens’ trust, the popular nations will revive, turn militant and restore their sovereign status.” Norman Davies: The Isles


A change in climate…

• Don't talk about "the nation" when you mean "the UK"… We broadcast to an audience in the nations of England, Scotland and Wales… It is better that programmes which are broadcast throughout the United Kingdom talk about things happening “across the United Kingdom” or “UK-wide”. The Changing UK, BBC, 1999

• “Revealed: the nation that dare not speak its name.” Sunday Times


Two scenarios…

1. Devolution will take the steam out of separatism

2. ”The slippery slope” – we will ”slide” into a break-up of the Union.


What do the polls say?

– 1998 62% of Scots thought Scotland would be independent in 15 years

– 2007 ”Would you approve of Scotland becoming an independent country?” 51% Yes

– ”Would you like the Union to come to an end?” 32%


Should there be an English parliament

– 61% Yes (English voters)– 51% Yes (Scottish voters)


• David Cameron: "The last thing we need is yet another parliament with separate elections and more politicians spending more money.“

• Alex Salmond: "In England, people quite rightly resent Scottish Labour MPs bossing them about on English domestic legislation. England has as much right to self government as Scotland does."


A word from our leader…

• We should remember that from 1707, the Union was founded not just on the respect for diversity that devolution recognises, but also on institutions that brought us together, from – at root – a shared monarchy, Parliament and Armed Forces to, more recently, institutions as wide ranging as the NHS, the BBC and the UK-wide pooling of pensions and unemployment risk through National Insurance.


• The new role of nation states in Europe

• The Irish example

• The future of Northern Ireland


Tricky questions for a post-Union Britain:

– Britain’s seat on UN Security Council– The British nuclear deterrent– The Monarchy– Resources– Who is Scottish, Welsh etc?


The end of the UK – So what?

• We all have multiple identities

• Mixed nationality more common

• Personally speaking…

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