Eddie Barnes: The financial disaster that's shaking Greece has implications for the Scottish independence debate

Published on Tuesday 21 June 2011 20:41

THE oldest political truism in the book is that events have a habit of changing politicians' best laid plans. The unfolding economic catastrophe facing Greece is one such event.

This week, EU taxpayers look set to provide a fresh transfusion of cash to the stricken country, so that it can be bled dry for a few more months. Greece is bust. The farce led to predictions from Jack Straw earlier this week that the euro was now doomed. "Is it not better that it happens quickly rather than a slow death?" he argued.

These seismic shifts come as the SNP government gears up to ask Scots to back independence in four years time – on a promise to put Scotland in the EU, initially with the pound, prior to a referendum on joining the single currency. Leaving aside whether Scotland would have the luxury of choice in this regard, how might the current turmoil in Greece – and Ireland, Spain and Portugal for that matter – affect those plans?

Despite Mr Straw's warning, and leaving aside the fact that the UK Government has begun planning for the euro's end, the expectation among analysts is that the single currency will survive this crisis – perhaps after having undergone the necessary amputation of its gangrenous Greek limb.

However, the experience looks set to change the EU for good. Greek profligacy over the last decade has persuaded Brussels that countries can no longer be allowed to enjoy such licence to do as they please. As a result, more power over tax and regulation could be going to the centre in order to prevent another country from screwing up.

For Eurosceptics this is nothing less than a further land grab from power-hungry Eurocrats, using the current mess as a way of seizing yet more power over nation states. Ironically, then, Scotland may start its debate about the merits of national independence, at the very moment when Europe is being accused of taking it all away.

This scenario may present some opportunities for the Nationalists' opponents. In a re-run of what is an ancient political argument, they can be sure to ask why Scotland should go through all the hassle of independence, if only to hand political control from London to Brussels. They can also be sure to point out that at least Britain has blocked some of the EU's centralising tendencies at the English Channel.

But SNP Euro-enthusiasts are undaunted. A referendum gives Scots a choice over the currency issue, they claim. Independence would ensure that Scotland would get proper representation at that more powerful Brussels table. Furthermore, they believe fundamentally Scotland would be more at home in a Europe influenced by German and Nordic politics, rather than in a Union built on the creeds of Empire.

Either way, the political earthquake in Greece could yet have a major impact on the independence debate – even if the after-shocks here are still to be felt.