Kenny Farquharson: You've misjudged us, Mr Salmond

Published on Saturday 15 May 2010 22:40

THERE'S a question I've been asking SNP-supporting friends for 20 years – a question that goes to the heart of what it means to be a Nationalist – and I don't think I've ever had a thoroughly convincing response. As we come to terms with a bracing new political landscape in Scotland after the general election, it's a question that deserves to be asked afresh.

I first asked it when I was an idealistic young reporter on this newspaper. Jim Sillars, then deputy leader of the SNP, came into the office for a boardroom lunch (a rather grand name for a few rounds of whiffy egg sandwiches and a plate of soggy Rich Tea).

You're a socialist, Jim, I said, and yet you'd rather Scotland's oil benefited Scots alone rather than the whole of the UK. What about working-class families in Wallsend or Wandsworth? Don't they deserve the benefits, too? Why does nationality trump solidarity in your politics?

Sillars' answer was more solicitous than my stroppy question deserved. There was no shortage of need in the world, he said, and all of it needed addressed. All we could do in the meantime was do right by our own country, and that country was Scotland. A good answer, expressed more eloquently than I can do justice to here. But for me it wasn't enough.

Now, as we take stock of the election result and a new government at Westminster, the question is more pertinent than ever. There is a common thread in the post-mortem reports from SNP activists who fought a frustrating general election campaign, failing to connect with the same voters who had enthusiastically chosen Alex Salmond as First Minister in 2007.

Asked to back the Nats so Scotland could use its muscle in a hung parliament to screw more money out of Westminster, the voters shuffled their feet, looked embarrassed and politely declined. Times were tough for everyone, they told the canvassers. It didn't seem right to demand – or extort – a bigger share for us here in Scotland. It offended the voters' sense of natural justice.

There are two possible explanations for the SNP's inability to find traction on this, the most pressing issue of the age. One is that the Nats underestimate people's understanding of the seriousness of the economic crisis, and their awareness that there is no easy way to duck the pain. The SNP, in other words, underestimate the voters' intelligence. That's never a clever thing for a political party to do. The other explanation is, if anything, more of a worry for the Nats. It's that Scots are becoming less nationalist-minded in their outlook.

There's a phrase for what the SNP was asking Scots to do. It is 'beggar my neighbour'. And it simply doesn't reflect what we prize about Scottish values. It takes personal selfishness – the kind of attitude associated with the toxic Thatcherite 1980s – and turns it into national selfishness. Is this really how we feel as a nation, outwith the rump of SNP support? Would the SNP's famous slogan from the 1970s – "It's Scotland's Oil" – work as well today? I suggest not.

I'm not saying that 11 years of devolution means we no longer feel antagonistic to our southern neighbours. Where Scotland has been wronged we will stand up for ourselves and demand justice. But only when this is justified. It is no longer a reflex. The button can no longer be guaranteed to work when Nationalist politicians press it. That's the lesson of this election.

All of which poses an interesting dilemma for Alex Salmond. My friend and colleague Duncan Hamilton, in his column on the page opposite, believes the general election result has energised the First Minister. I'm not so sure.

When he gave his press conference after David Cameron's visitation on Friday, Salmond looked like somebody had pinched his scone. This, after all, is not how the script was meant to go. According to Nationalist orthodoxy, the merest whiff of Old Etonian Tory rule would be the cue for the Scots to get out the woad and flock to the SNP's standard to defend the nation from our natural enemy.

The reality is more prosaic. The mandate issue is a deid duck. What confronts Salmond is a coalition of two parties that together won 35.7 per cent of the Scottish vote. Compare that with the 31 per cent of the vote Salmond won in the 2007 contest that swept him to power. The coalition allows Scotland to be represented in Cabinet by a Lib Dem, not a Tory. And this coalition looks set to implement, in full, the recommendations of the Calman Commission; recommendations, incidentally, that command comfortable majority support in the Scottish Parliament. When implemented, these will free up the Scottish Government to raise tax to offset some of the cuts in public spending planned by the Treasury. If voters give their assent, of course.

Scotland in general – and the SNP in particular – is being love-bombed by a Prime Minister who seems to think he's the romantic lead in a Richard Curtis movie (Coalition, Actually perhaps?). This is not going to let up. It looks like Cameron will agree to free up the 180 million due to Scotland from the fossil fuel levy. I wouldn't be surprised if he also agreed to the Barnett consequentials from East London redevelopment work linked to the 2012 Olympics. A small price to pay to keep Scotland sweet and the SNP off-balance.

With the Tories not playing ball, and the Scottish voters not playing ball, Salmond's game is a bogey.