Unionism is indivisible so Scots Tories must make their choice

Former leader Ruth Davidson’s PR job being seen as ‘perfectly acceptable’ is just another moral failure, says Brian Monteith

Whatever happened to the Scottish Conservatives’ moral compass? The unravelling of the Prime Minister’s proposed withdrawal treaty continues unabated, indeed it picks up speed the more often any curious mind chooses to read it.

If the prime minister finally manages this week to get the general election he desires and which the country desperately needs he may find that rather than focusing on the blame game of who stopped him delivering Brexit by 31 October the public is waking up to just how bad a “deal” it actually is.

I explained to readers last week how the proposed border for customs and most single market regulations down the Irish Sea was going to require paperwork to be completed before “exporting” goods from Great Britain to the province. Now, thanks to House of Commons Library research, we also know that to achieve the level playing field the EU desires across the whole of Ireland it is probable that Northern Ireland businesses shall have to adopt VAT rates on the items they are applied to.

Yes, tax rates – and not any old tax rate, but one of the most important that affects peoples’ everyday lives – could be set for Northern Ireland’s people by politicians in the south who will not be accountable to those in the north for their decisions. Rarely has “no taxation without representation” been likely to mean as much since the American War of independence.

Yet again the ratchet toward Irish unification is turned, and in full breach of the Good Friday Agreement that requires consent before such institutional changes can happen. Funny how Taoiseach Varadkar and the EU’S Michael Barnier are not rushing to cast up the articles of the Good Friday Agreement now.

Imagine the uproar there would be if to establish a level playing field with the rest of the EU that the SNP claims it desires, Scotland’s VAT rate and the items it would be applied to were decided in Brussels without any say by the Scottish people. Yet there is silence in Scotland, not just from nationalists but from those that call themselves unionists.

On top of sacrificing the UK’S democratic and constitutional arrangements comes the news that British exporters could also be expected to give proof of origin of the goods they send to Northern Ireland. These requirements are made when trade deals are established to ensure any benefits of receiving low or zero tariffs are given only to goods having a minimum content made in the country they depart from. Without this assurance goods from say, China, could simply be imported here and then passed off as British and sold into the EU via Ireland. Requiring such additional paperwork that involves the whole supply chain could mean some manufacturers deciding it is not worth the effort and ending sales to the province. Again the ratchet turns.

While this abandoning of the Union’s institutional foundations by a government desperate to save its own hide comes as no surprise to me I am genuinely taken aback that no one in the Scottish Conservative & Unionist Party identifies with their unionist brothers and sisters across the water.

Unionism is indivisible. Allowing the bonds with Northern Ireland to be unpicked will have serious ramifications for the similar bonds that tie Scotland with the rest of the UK. Instead of one or more of the Scottish Tory MPS saying the government is putting Unionism at risk, the silence from the Scottish Con