British Union has always been about amplifying England

Letter to the Editor
The Scotsman

11/02/2013

Dear Sir/Madam,

If the UK state is legally the same without the Scots in it as the British Government is now claiming then this proves that Britain (Britannia?) has always been a 'greater England' and not an equal union at all.

Jack Straw MP said in an interview with the BBC that "Historically, England called the shots to achieve a union because the union was seen as a way, among others things, of amplifying England's power worldwide." *

Not only has Scotland been effectively internationally invisible within the union we are now told that every action by the UK Government and every treaty organised by it had nothing to do with us at all!

What this means logically is that Scotland has never been part of any true union just a convenient fiction which has justified England claiming a larger international profile than it deserves.

Ending the union will mean for the first time that our flag will fly at the United Nations and the Olympic Games. I suspect the European Union will be desperate to keep us within it but if they do not want us then we could easily join EFTA and still have a trading relationship with Europe.

Why should we stay a part of Britain when Westminster officially says we are an irrelevance to its continuing status?

 Unionists say that Scotland and England are equal within the union but the reality is that we are no more equal than the UK would be if it was attached to a larger nation like China or Russia or the USA.

Scotland can do better. Independence is normality for almost every other nation and there is no country that has been unable to negotiate independence. Britain seems to officially imagine that Scotland is uniquely incapable of either ruling our own affairs or of negotiating independence.

Any Scot who supports such a dismal view of their own country should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

Yours faithfully,

Joe Middleton

* full interview with Jack Straw is here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/5388078.stm