This article written by our Editor Ben Philips aims to bring together the various views on Scottish Independence and begins with these words:
"Every so often, an issue arises which is so fundamental to the national interest that we feel honour-bound at BringItBack to contribute to the debate itself.
One such issue is the State of the Union between England and Scotland and whether there is anything that can be done at this critical moment to safeguard it. As an emotional and instinctive Unionist, I argue that we should do all we can to preserve it in the belief that we are immeasurably stronger together than we are apart.
Viewed historically it is next to impossible to extrapolate an interpretation of the Union’s success which is exclusive to either the Scots or the English. At its best, it has been a brilliant synthesis of both, of equal partners coming together in a common cause for mutual self-interest and vastly increasing the power and standing of Great Britain throughout the world.
This coincidence of interests reached its zenith during the period of Empire, where commercial, industrial and imperial opportunities worked to the benefit of both and it is to that sense of common purpose that those of us who support the Union should appeal.
Reasons for the deterioration in current relations are many and varied. Some, like Linda Colley point to a divergence in mutual self-interest after the dissolution of Empire; others like the BBC’s Alan Little, assess the damaging fallout in relations between the two countries during the 1980’s in his excellent television documentary ‘Thatcher and the Scots.’
Professor Robert Tombs of Cambridge University has taken the argument on a stage further and argues that the financial protection afforded to smaller countries by the EU has provided perfect cover for the Scottish National Party to campaign for independence, free from what they see as the small-minded nationalism of the English and the self-harm of extricating us from a Single Market which the English themselves had helped to create."
For the full article, please clck on this link:
In addition to the above article we recommend that you read this article from the Telegraph by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard:
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