Union ‘is dying’

Published on 15/10/2012 00:00

Jackie Kemp cites the English National Theatre’s production This House as an example of 
England’s growing, inward-
looking, self-obsession ( your report, 12 October).

The play, on the fall of the 1979 UK Labour government, omits post-referendum Scotland’s central role in that political drama. England’s self-obsession leaves Unionists in Scotland very much on their own.

Leading English Conservatives were recently revealed as paying lip-service only to saving the Union and as secretly happy to ditch Scotland. Three weeks ago, 30,000 people marched in Belfast to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Ulster Covenant,the high-point in Unionist history. There was No UK government involvement, no BBC network documentary, no UK commemorative postage stamp. It merited only very minor coverage in the London news and even that was trivialised into potential march flashpoints.

The English are not interested in the United Kingdom. All the signs are that Unionism as an all-UK concept is slowly dying.

Tom Johnston

Burn View

Cumbernauld