In tackling coronavirus, Scotland asserts its separateness from England
EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND» There was nothing particularly festive about Nicola Sturgeon’s recent visit to the Cold Town House, a newly reopened Edinburgh pub, but maybe that was the point. Sipping coffee and surveying plexiglass dividers, Sturgeon, the leader of Scotland’s government, warned customers not to expect the jolly, sweaty intimacy of nightlife before the coronavirus pandemic.
“No beer garden or cafe should feel the same as it did before,” she said as a drenching rain fell, obscuring the stony ramparts of Edinburgh Castle that tower above this onceteeming establishment.
As Scotland emerges from a three-month lockdown, it is moving more carefully than neighboring England, a divergence that owes a lot to Sturgeon’s cautious style and her conviction that England, under its more freewheeling leader, Boris Johnson, is taking too many risks in a headlong rush to resume public life.
For now, Scotland’s approach has made it a bright spot in coronavirus-ravaged Britain. New cases have dwindled to a handful a day and deaths to a trickle. If Scotland maintains this progress — a big if, given its open border — it could stamp out the epidemic by the fall, public health experts say. Such a goal seems fanciful in England, which is still reporting hundreds of new cases and dozens of deaths every day.
But what happens in England inevitably spills over into Scotland. In the case of the virus, the stark contrast in daily numbers has reanimated old grievances for the Scots, who voted against leaving the United Kingdom in 2014 but overwhelmingly rejected Britain’s vote to leave the European Union two years later.
Nationalist sentiment has surged during the pandemic: About 55% of Scots now favor independence, according to a recent poll — a solid majority that analysts said reflected a perception that Scotland’s nationalist-led government has handled the crisis better than Johnson and his pro-brexit ministers have.
Scotland imposed its lockdown March 23, the same day as England did, but has lifted the restrictions more selectively. It kept pubs closed a few days longer. It requires people to wear face masks in shops, which England does not. And unlike England, it left Spain, a popular holiday destination, off a list of countries to which Scots can travel without isolating themselves when they return.
“We’re quite stubborn and steadfast because Nicola has handled it elegantly, and we’ve seen how England is flapping around,” said Katy Koren, artistic director of Gilded Balloon, a company that stages outdoor performances during the Edinburgh Festival, which has been canceled this summer.
So far, she said, Scots have given Sturgeon, 49, the benefit of the doubt because she has been willing to make tough decisions and has convinced people that her overriding goal is the public health. Her no-nonsense briefings have become a reassuring daily ritual, even providing grist for comedians.
Sturgeon’s fans liken her to New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, who has come closer than perhaps any other leader to stamping out the virus. The unspoken contrast is to
Johnson, who has been all over the map in his response and has often seemed reluctant to deliver bad news.
“Men like to be popular,” said Koren’s mother, Karen, who runs the festival company with her daughter. “For women, it’s not about ego.”
But it is, inescapably, about politics. Sturgeon’s Scottish National Party is committed to independence and a return to the European Union. As she has diverged from the British government — a process that broke into the open in late May when she stuck with the slogan “Stay Home” and rejected Johnson’s more permissive “Stay Alert” — she is building a powerful new case for Scotland’s ability to go it alone.
Under the terms of limited self-government in the United Kingdom, Scottish authorities are responsible for matters such as health and education, while the British government handles immigration, foreign policy and, crucially, the fiscal rescue packages to protect those who lost their jobs in the lockdown.
That has enabled Sturgeon to slow-walk Johnson’s steps to ease the lockdown, which she complains are often foisted on her without advance notice. She clucked over pictures of revelers jamming the streets of Soho in London after he opened pubs — a spectacle that she avoided by scheduling Scotland’s reopening for a Monday rather than a Saturday.
To some, particularly those who do not share her nationalist politics or are eager to get their businesses running again, there is more than a whiff of pointscoring.
“She is a fantastic politician,” said Nic Wood, owner of the Cold Town House, who invited her to visit his pub. “But a lot of what she now does is all about getting independence. Her talents would be better used if she could just lead the country.”
Hotel and restaurant owners were alarmed when Sturgeon declined to rule out a quarantine for visitors from England after Johnson lifted a 14-day quarantine for people traveling to and from 59 countries. She expressed concern that visitors could carry the virus into Scotland from third countries.
“We can’t afford any inference that the English aren’t welcome in Scotland,” said Marc Crothall, chief executive of the Scottish Tourism Alliance, who noted that 70% of Scotland’s tourism revenue comes from visitors within the United Kingdom.