How on earth have we fallen for the Tories’ EU myths?
DOUG Marr (“Happy days are here again... or maybe not”, The Herald, December 28), highlights how the 11th-hour Brexit deal is likely to be a “victory for our very own dictatorship of the privileged”, and how bankers, speculators and the variety of spivs who cosy up to the Tories in their “chumocracy” are the ones who will benefit. How have we got here?
The success of the Brexit movement, riding the crest of the Tories’ dominance in recent years, has been rendered possible by skilful manipulation of political realities. We are all embedded, in our personal and public lives, in the construction and constitution of knowledge and the “reality” that lies out there. Our beliefs and attitudes develop through the community of ideas to which we are exposed, in a kind of marketplace of propositions. Politicians seek to shape and create their own preferred reality in order to be elected and to be able to pursue their preferred objectives.
So, in the case of the Tories, we end up with myths like “taking back control” and “sovereignty”, and the imagined threats of being swamped by immigrants. In creating this version of reality and supposed threats to our “freedoms”, one has to acknowledge how effective the Tories have been, with the assistance of social media and the right-wing press – not least as evidenced in their large majority in the last election. They were able to persuade the populace that the years of austerity were a necessity and not a political choice, and people voted for them in huge numbers, and, significantly, in traditionally Labour-voting areas in England, dogged by years of poverty and inequality. Yet we discover, in the Government’s response to the coronavirus crisis, that eye-watering sums of money can be magicked out of thin air, when there are other perceived priorities.
The more fundamental trick magicked by the Tories is to have persuaded us that a group of selfserving elitists will really, truly, look after our interests. Sadly, mired as we are in a society devoted to cap-doffing deference, that is what we seem willing to swallow. The Tories have shown us clearly: reality is what you can get away with.
Dr Angus Macmillan, Dumfries.
Erasmus promise is worthless
WITH the announcement in the Brexit deal that the UK is to withdraw from the Erasmus European student exchange scheme, Boris Johnson has broken yet another of his promises. As always, he tries to pull the wool over our eyes by announcing a new half-baked and underfunded UK student exchange scheme named after the computer pioneer, Alan Turing, a man who was persecuted and prosecuted by a previous Tory government for his sexuality. Northern Ireland will continue to participate in the Erasmus scheme. As a nation which also voted to remain in the EU, why not Scotland?
As a former student participant in Erasmus who spent two enlightening but challenging years at a German university, I can state without hesitation that this experience did much for my confidence. I also got a feel for how a genuine European social democracy operated. I found a country facing its difficult recent history with courage, humility and obvious determination. Crucially, it was (and is) an enthusiastic team player in the European scene. Additionally, I discovered that most Germans have great affection for the UK, even if this is not reciprocated. However, that bank of goodwill has now been carelessly squandered by Brexit.
It is abundantly clear by now that Boris Johnson and his Tory chums are not content to be team players in the European or any other scene. English exceptionalism rules. Even my English friends are conscious of – and somewhat embarrassed by – this “master race” mentality. The clue lies in Mr Johnson’s constant references to “world-beating” plans of one kind or another. However, I think we have learned by now that this hyperbole is usually a prelude to the complete opposite, the stumbling and partially-effective UK track and trace system being a perfect example.
Scottish voters have already been betrayed by the promise of the Better Together campaign in 2014 that the UK would continue as a member of the EU if the No side won. Now Mr Johnson has done exactly the same with his worthless Erasmus promise. Is any more evidence required that Scotland will continue to be treated as a “junior” member of the UK unless it seizes the opportunity to follow its own destiny by becoming independent? That independence, I trust, will be one of equal partnership with other nations and a sharing of mutual respect. The world-beating myth can be left to what remains of the United Kingdom.
Dave Stewart, Glasgow G11.