Top heavy factions - the North South divide

There have been a couple of great articles recently discussing an emerging North-South divide. The Caledonian Mercury discusses a divergent Scotland and England and considers the worrying impact of Scotland “getting the cuts without the reforms”. (That synopsis doesn’t do the excellent article justice, best to just read it.) Left Foot Forward talks about academic conclusions that “Britain is tearing itself apart” with anywhere more than 2 hours from London suffering from being poorer in terms of incomes, house prices, life expectancy and educational attainment.
 
It is a debate that I am sure will grow, perhaps even dominate, during the tenure of the Liberal-Conservative coalition amidst growing speculation that the cuts will come at too high, and too imbalanced, a price. I don’t buy into the easy notion that ‘toffs’ from Eton don’t know how to govern for the benefit for the entirety of the UK but at the same time I am less than convinced by the Prime Minister’s promised respect agenda for Scotland which, presumably, also applies to Labour-dominated areas in the North of England.
 
In many ways, this Doomsday scenario which is slowly but surely becoming a reality will remain applicable if Labour wins the Holyrood election in 2011. The focus of the divergence will simply subtly switch from constitutional separation to Government’s position in society. That is, the Conservatives wanting Government to step way back from our day to day lives and Labour/SNP wanting the Government to have a greater role.
 
A perhaps unexplored area in which those north of the border may widen this North-South, left-right divide is through simple perceptions of who their main Government is. With Tony Blair reasonably popular over the entirety of his tenure in office and Gordon Brown unmistakably Scottish (and consequently unmistakably Scotland’s leader), it was easy over the past 13 years to feel governed by Westminster and have that direct link to the decisions that were taken in our name. Now, however, that link to our Prime Minister and UK Cabinet is diluted. There is as little Scottish presence in the Cabinet as there is popularity for it and dwindling reasons to be engaged with the overall process when the majority of discussions (foundation hospitals, free schools etc) do not apply to Scots. There is a risk, some would say an opportunity, that Scotland simply slips away from Westminster, engages deeper into Holyrood and everyday contact with politicians is conducted through MSPs with a clear mindset that the First Minister is the primary leader of the land.
 
The qualitative political impact this would have on the ‘United Kingdom’ could be enormous.
 
One other specific area where any North-South divide could foggy inter-UK relations is the choking, coughing elephant in the room – the urgent need to combat Climate Change. It is telling that the UK Government uses the phrase “addressing Climate Change”, as if we just need to pat it on the back and calmly turn it the other way with minimal effort.
 
The regrettable ambivalence amongst the coalition’s ranks stands in clear contrast to an SNP Government which has grasped the nettle in many key areas, though there is still substantial room for improvement. Either way, it is clear that Holyrood is more serious about playing its part in keeping emissions down and building up a new renewables infrastructure than Westminster is. There is, at least, a substantial ideological difference in whether our nations need a new wave of nuclear power stations. Looking ahead, it is difficult to ascertain how seriously Scottish Labour takes the problem without the party having been in power for four years and the issue only really taking off in that timeframe but it’s probably fair to assume that an Iain Gray-led administration would be more proactive on environmental matters than the Cameron-led administration currently is, particularly with the ranks of Climate Change sceptics that have the PM’s back.
 
A tipping point for pent-up friction on this issue may well come whenever the next Kyoto/Copenhagen Summit is held, as will surely be necessary in the next year or two. Ed Miliband put in an admirable effort to drive change and he seems to get the problem, though returned home from Denmark pretty much empty-handed. Chris Huhne would be hamstrung by his Tory coalition partners and David Cameron would perhaps even pull rank and lead the UK delegation on such a summit. However, I simply cannot envisage the Prime Minister accepting the tough decisions that will be required to reverse emissions before 2015. The gathering storm over the need for action, merely latent within the UK at the current time, could be unleashed at such a juncture.
 
The message on the environment from the experts will of course grow starker and starker as our prospects as a planet grow darker and darker. This can only drive the wedge between Holyrood and Westminster deeper, already worlds apart over the size of the state, the workings of the NHS and the universality of state education, amongst numerous other policy areas.
 
So, can a left-wing devolved Government keep pushing for its preferred policies while a right-wing coalition reduces its funding and focuses investment in the South? It seems a tough ask. To that end, particularly keeping differing opinions on the environment in mind, it will be interesting to see where the proposed £2bn Green Investment Bank is located, something that could prove to be a totemic decision by the UK Government. I agree with Rob Gibson MSP that Scotland is the ideal place to house such an entity given the massive commitment of resource in wave, tidal and wind energy from the public and private sector, north of the border. However, whenever the decision is made, if the coalition’s idea of a non-London base is somewhere in Cornwall or Kent then it will perhaps be further evidence that this new North-South, left-right divide really isn’t going to work out. Certainly the business case for wherever the Green Investment Bank ends up deserves close scrutiny.
 
So what is the answer? At the very least it is surely full fiscal autonomy for a nation that sees the world in a different way to its Governmental superiors. A policy that has all the hallmarks of Cameron’s Big Society, of Clegg’s Fairness and of Conservatives free markets, allowing Scotland to spend the money it raises (with a recharge to Westminster for ‘shared services’) is the only way to bring the UK back together again and allow left and right to happily coexist on these same shared islands.
 
Otherwise, the top-heavy structure to our country, whichever of the SNP or Labour factions heads up Holyrood, will topple over and prove unsustainable.
 
There’s a real problem here and it needs a real solution. So far the coalition appears to be falling way short and, if it’s not careful, it will fall through this north-south, left-right divide that it has helped to create.
 
 
One final thought – a clear difference in how the North wants to live and be governed with how the South wants to live and be governed could prove a difficult juggling act for Scottish Labour if it were to win next year’s Scottish Parliament elections, through either a Minority Government or in coalition with Greens/Lib Dems. Labour’s visceral loathing of countenancing any sort of mature debate on the merits of independence would sit awkwardly against an obvious imbalance in Scotland’s constitutional arrangement, with or without the relatively weak Calman proposals having been implemented. How would First Minister Iain Gray play it? Would Labour become more radical and side with the SNP on certain issues against the Conservatives or would they try to hold onto the Union at whatever cost and have to defend coalition decisions from time to time. It is a tremendously tricky strategic decision the party potentially faces, though of course the SNP may have the decency to deny them that difficulty by winning through in the elections next year.