Nicola is prepared to gamble ... with our future as well as her own
HAS the UK-wide vote to leave the EU given Nicola Sturgeon a second chance to deliver the independence of which she has dreamed ever since she was a teenager? Or has it set a trap that could destroy her career in much the same way as previous referendums brought down both Alex Salmond and David Cameron?
That is the dilemma the SNP leader has to resolve as she contemplates how to respond to the Brexit vote that has turned the political world upside down.
Today, it has been revealed that Miss Sturgeon is preparing to take that huge gamble by holding a second independence referendum in 2017. At first glance, her decision seems straightforward. While England and Wales voted to leave the EU, Scotland voted decisively – by 62 per cent to 38 per cent – to stay.
The result was arguably the clearest possible demonstration of the SNP’s argument that, as part of the UK, Scotland’s democratically expressed will is always at risk of being overturned by its bigger southern neighbour.
However, while many of those already in favour of independence might concur with this argument, what matters is whether those who voted No two years ago are sufficiently upset about the prospect of Brexit that they now wish to cut their ties with the UK.
ACCORDING to a recent YouGov poll, fewer than one in five (18 per cent) of those who voted No say it is more important for Scotland to be in the EU than it is for it to be part of the UK. That suggests the number of No voters who might be willing to change their minds because of the Brexit vote is rather more limited than the EU referendum result implies.
After all, polling conducted by Survation immediately after the EU referendum suggests that around a third of No voters actually voted to leave the EU. Their minds will certainly not be changed by the UK-wide vote in favour of Brexit.
Still, the SNP may not have to win over very many voters to secure a majority for independence. Even before the EU referendum, the polls suggested on average that 47 per cent backed the idea, up slightly on the 45 per cent vote in favour in September 2014.
Three polls conducted immediately after the Brexit vote suggested that just enough No voters had changed their mind in the wake of the result to create a small majority in favour independence. All found that support for independence had moved up past the 50 per cent mark, with 52 per cent to 54 per cent in favour.
But a more recent poll from YouGov, conducted after the dust had some time to settle, suggests support for independence may have already fallen back down to the 47 per cent mark.
Before the Brexit vote, the SNP promised a ‘summer offensive’ in which the party would try to win Scots over to the idea of independence – and do some rethinking of its plans for separation, not least on the question of which currency an independent Scotland should use. The polling evidence suggests that campaign will have plenty of work to do if a second independence referendum is to be won.
Moreover, it will need to start winning hearts and minds sooner rather than later if, as Miss Sturgeon envisages, becoming independent is to be a pathway to Scotland staying in the EU.
Her hope is that reaching agreement on an independent Scotland remaining part of the EU could be achieved as part of the talks between the UK and the EU that now need to take place to establish the terms and conditions of the UK’s withdrawal.
Theresa May is in no immediate hurry to start those talks – the UK Government has yet to work out what terms and conditions it would like. But they are likely to begin early next year – and when they do, they are meant to be completed within two years.
SO if there is to be any prospect of independence becoming the means by which Scotland stays in the EU, a referendum will most likely have to be held by early next autumn, before the UK/EU talks have gone too far down the track. Of course, the UK Government has very different ideas. It has promised Miss Sturgeon and the Scottish Government a role in the Brexit negotiations so that Scotland’s interests are protected. Miss Sturgeon herself has not shut the door on the idea that Scotland stays in the UK but maintains a closer relationship with the EU than the rest of Britain – if anyone can work out how that might be done.
Moreover, it is far from clear that the UK Government would allow another independence referendum to take place in the way that it did last time around.
That could see any attempt to hold an independence referendum end up in the courts.
Meanwhile, a major unknown is what stance the EU will adopt towards any attempt by Scotland to become independent and thereby secure EU membership in its own right.
In the independence referendum, the then President of the Commission, José Manuel Barroso, argued that an independent Scotland would have to apply for membership in its own right. Spain, in particular, was known to be unhappy about the prospect of an independent Scotland easily finding its way into the EU.
But the EU could now take a rather different view. It may feel keeping Scotland inside the EU would help mitigate some of the damage from the UK’s decision to leave.
The SNP will certainly hope that it does. There will be little chance of persuading No voters to change their minds in the wake of the Brexit vote if an independent Scotland could still find itself outside the EU.
Much may also rest on what the immediate consequences of the EU referendum vote prove to be. If, as those who campaigned to Remain argued would happen, the UK’s economy goes into recession, then maybe some former No voters will want to step aboard the lifeboat of independence.
However, if the Leave campaign’s claims that things will soon settle down prove correct, any impetus for independence might soon dissipate.
After all, thanks to the collapse in the oil price, the finances of an independent Scotland currently look even worse than those of the UK as a whole.
Voters may well need a lot of persuasion that independence does represent a more attractive prospect.
Yet for all the obvious risks, Ms Sturgeon may well have asked herself whether there will ever be a better chance of winning an independence referendum.
But if she goes ahead, she will be taking a big gamble with her own, let alone Scotland’s, future.