10
The Way Ahead
WE SHOULD BE having a debate on a new world view built on membership of the EU as a source of prosperity, peace, solidarity and security. These are the benefits of British membership of the EU which isolationists, economic nationalists and the deluded right of British politics can’t stomach. Instead, the Government wants us to build on our relationship with the US and pretend that leaving the EU is our salvation. Europe is our future. The challenges and opportunities of continental Europe have everything to do with us. The spectacle of the Conservative party tearing itself apart over Europe only serves to illustrate how far Britain, and in particular the right wing of the Conservative party, has lost its way in world affairs and political honesty.
This is an opportunity for Britain to re-order international and domestic priorities where we work with our European neighbours. This is about sharing sovereignty and ambition. We need to get over much of our history and have a new sense of identity and purpose in this new century.
It’s also time for the Labour party to move on. The political alliance of party membership, parliamentary Labour party and the people, must be reconstructed and respected. Abraham Lincoln, in a speech in June, 1858, said, ‘A house divided against itself cannot stand’.
But there is more to be done. This requires a public philosophy to compete and contest the market philosophy of the Tories. A series of unifying political themes that in tough times can hold the party together; a political creed, without which people remain confused and mistrustful of what we stand for. An embrace of not only policies but the action required to achieve them, commitment to the equal worth of everyone which combines aspiration and equality and puts citizens before consumers.
The UK needs federalism, but time is running out. Federalism is complex, has many forms, requires leadership and vision and is a tough constitutional alternative. Embracing and promoting federalism could provide Scots with a real choice and a positive alternative to Independence. No one should be in any doubt however that the path to a federal UK is strewn with political land mines, massive obstacles, and constitutional inertia. The history factor, centuries of ‘ruling the waves’ and empire have created a delusional Westminster, which resists change. For the SNP, interdependence in the EU will become the rallying call out of one Union but into, for them, a much more attractive, more welcoming and more prosperous other Union.
A new written constitution would be a check on Westminster’s powers and confirmation that federalism was, for the first time giving, power to people and their nations and taking it away from Westminster.
A new debate is needed. Parties must reach out to the whole country.
A different approach to Brexit is needed. A binding vote in Parliament at the outcome of the negotiations and/or possibly a referendum or the inclusion of commitment to Remain in the manifestos of progressive parties are all possible outcomes. Defeating the EU legislation in the House of Commons over the net two years is another option. From now on, there must be a campaign in the country to highlight the dangers of Brexit. In politics you must stand for something. Brexit is a sell-out of Britain’s interests and a life changing catastrophe for the country. In this, the people must take the lead and head for a day of reckoning with the cheap patriots of the Conservative right who are trying to dismantle Britain and impose further austerity and a market run society.
The public has never been more distrustful, disconnected and disillusioned with democracy and governance. Trust between people and politicians has broken down. A quiet revolution simmers. Long term outcomes are unclear and uncertain. A great deal of bewilderment, fragility and anger has settled on our politics, democracy and governance. The word citizen is fast disappearing as market speak further entangles areas of public and social interest far removed from economic interests. The citizen must now become the most important building block in transforming our politics.
In this rapidly changing world there will be far reaching consequences for how we organise our lives and shape our politics, democracy and governance. Certainties that we have taken for granted are being demolished. While, in the eyes of some, this recalibration was long overdue, for others there are now stark and unsettling choices to be made about how we want to live in the 21st century and what kind of society we want to build.
We are approaching the point where British people need to be protected from the excesses of governments between elections. With no consent other than a mention in a manifesto, a referendum on the EU is pushed through the House of Commons; the public interest plays second fiddle to the interest of the party.
We are fast becoming political subjects, engaged in elections but excluded from ongoing involvement because there is no constitution to reflect the importance of the public will and the important role the citizen has to play in a modern society. The Conservatives want subjects and consumers, but Britain needs citizens.
A new constitution would safeguard our membership of the EU by creating a proper constitutional court, as in Germany and the US, and put the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights and the protections of the European Convention on Human Rights beyond the reach of partisan politics.
We need an informed electorate and progressive politics that reflect change; a Labour party that has a philosophy and effectively exposes the Right in British politics; a party that has a vision for the world we live in and a serious view on how we can be a positive part of change; a party that understands and respects its citizens. We need a party that sees the moral limits and excesses of markets; a party that can articulate the benefits of Government intervention. Above all else, we need a party that both understands and promotes the common good, where an equal society is built around the idea of the equal worth of every child, young person and adult in our country. Tackling inequality must be the major objective.
Scotland has choices in the current political upheaval. Why shouldn’t we be like Scandinavia or Germany or other parts of Europe? We are global and European. We have arguments from the right about merely being British, isolated and disconnected from a world, and a Europe, that needs to be more integrated, united and equal. At every turn, right wing politics is in danger of isolating Britain. This is the enemy within. Brexit is an example of the right running amok, on permanent license from weak and spineless Conservative party leadership, who sometimes act as recklessly as those within their party causing most harm. An offer of the past, from the past by the past. There are victories to be won, but progressive politics can’t seem to see the opportunities presented to them.
The level of political or public literacy and civic awareness is dangerously low. This allows the right leaning press to promote a party like the Conservatives who are doing enormous damage to Britain.
The UK is not alone in facing these challenges. Throughout Europe and the US, profound social, economic, demographic and technological changes are taking place, holding out the prospect of consequences for our politics, constitutional structures, democracies and governance. For some, this offers an overdue shake up of our remote political process. For others, however, there are concerns about a retreat into a darker place where respect for tolerance, difference, inclusion, internationalism and multiculturalism, is replaced by authoritarianism, isolationism and a trickle-down form of racism and nationalism.
A new battle of ideas is certainly underway but with little consensus as to where this might end up. Regardless of the consequences and outcomes, which will vary by country and continent, the role of people as ‘citizens’ will undoubtedly be boosted and emerge as the key to understanding what is taking place and then to build a different kind of politics and society. The political landscape is complex.
Understanding the meaning and significance of change – separating the signals from the noise – is a vital part of this reawakening.
This is a vast agenda with a bewildering array of challenges, opportunities and problems to address.
The scale of change, in our politics and society, is breathtaking: Brexit 2016 for Britain and Scotland; the new era, post-2008 global crash, globalisation and neoliberal austerity; the politics of anger, the decline of leadership and a divided Britain; the rise of populism, nationalism and nativism; disillusionment with the politics and parties and the disintegration of traditional loyalties and allegiances; the idea that something is profoundly wrong with the way we live today as the market closes in on every aspect of society and capitalism remains far from managed; a disunited kingdom where sharp differences of race, ethnicity, religion and geography, a ‘them and us’, are undermining national cohesion, stability and solidarity in Britain; people, in a deeper, spiritual and more philosophical sense, searching for more meaning in their lives, increasingly dominated by materialism, money and the excesses of the market; the distribution of wealth, income and opportunity creating grotesque levels of inequality and injustice; national identity and xenophobia (especially in England) replacing social class and economic solidarity as the drivers of political change and instability; computers, technology and social media redefining our ideas of community and relationships and revolutionising protest, social action and political organisation in ways barely imagined just a few years ago.
People around the world have become disillusioned with traditional politics, disconnected from democratic institutions and despairing of the ability of political parties to tackle and solve their concerns. The stuttering arrival of ‘four nation’ politics in the UK, the stirring of England, the rise of national identity as an important political influence and the decision to leave the EU are destined to shake up the constitutional structure of the UK.
We need to radically reshape our thinking and ideas. There is an exciting agenda to be tackled:
On politics, by defending its importance in terms of its relevance to the modern age, what needs to be done to strengthen and enhance, and to counter the growing disillusionment of people with their politicians and political parties.
On democracy (from the Greeks, power of the people), why it matters and what needs to be done to resist the intrusion of market principles and thinking into public policy, and to counter, forces that seek to undermine the whole basis upon which we make decisions in the public interest, to help create, at every level of democratic engagement a more informed public and a modern electoral system.
On our constitutional set up in the UK, where a lack of a written, codified and accessible constitution allows Westminster and politicians to take major decisions based on narrow political considerations rather than in the public interest and where the sovereignty of the people and the national interest should be the priorities; the House of Commons is an ‘elected dictatorship’. The recent EU Referendum was conceived and executed by the Prime Minister without any reference to any other body of opinion or knowledge, appropriate safeguards or whether in the circumstances this was the appropriate or the right thing to do. The sovereignty of Westminster is fundamentally undemocratic and at odds with the idea of a modern constitution.
On governance, where outdated practices, archaic procedures and declining public support are the result of institutions, such as Westminster, being prisoners of history, suffocated by inertia and destined by arrogance and elitism to resist change and share sovereignty. Brexit has exposed the lack of leadership in the aftermath of the result.
On what is next for the UK after the decision to leave the EU, and the prospects of Scotland once again revisiting the idea of leaving the UK (Scexit) and the Scottish Government contemplating a second independence referendum leading to independence or ‘interdependence in Europe’.
On what a vision for an Independent Scotland could look like. Can there ever be a significant and decisive majority for terminating our membership of the UK, or can a thin majority suffice in taking such a major constitutional step or is a much bigger effort needed to widen the debate and win over more converts? If so, what needs to be done to argue a more credible case for those who are not ‘independence at any price’ or ‘be a nation again’ nationalists? There are huge issues to be discussed. What models can we look at? What is the experience of other small nations in Eastern Europe and the Nordic countries within the EU? How long can we go on discussing Scotland’s constitutional future?
On an alternative way forward for Scotland. Only one solution will satisfy the SNP but are there other options that could satisfy other parties and command a majority of the people? Or, is this constitutional war of attrition going to exhaust voter interest and prevent political energies being focussed on more immediate issues and policies of concern to the public. Federalism is an idea whose time has come.
On a reinvented Labour party, leading a progressive alternative to the Conservative party and establishing a wider coalition of interest that puts citizens at the heart of a new politics.
On the growing divergence of Scottish and English politics, the widening chasm of understanding of the different political and constitutional issues now dividing the Union and leading to profound splits in public opinion.
On whether the UK, Westminster and the British Conservatives and Labour parties, could ever break free from institutional inertia and democratic centralism to conceive and ultimately deliver an alternative constitutional settlement, federalism, for an old Union which could offer a viable, attractive and sustainable four nation alternative to Independence and which concedes real sovereignty and power.
On the possibility that the Brexit result may never be implemented as the lies and dishonesty of cheap patriots are exposed and the scale of the consequences of leaving the EU are better understood.
On the challenging idea of the citizen to change our political culture.
At its core, Citizens United acknowledges and prioritises the importance of people as citizens. The powerful idea of the citizen remains the driving force behind the goals of creating more fulfilling lives for people, building better societies and tackling a growing agenda of global and local problems, issues and opportunities. The meaning, use and significance of the word citizen has largely been lost. It has been buried under an avalanche of labels – consumers, customers, sellers, buyers and investors – to describe people in their various roles in a society now dominated by market considerations. Citizenship is a more noble idea than the more market driven descriptions that are now given to people. It is about people as human beings. Monarchy required people as subjects, markets want consumers, but democracy demands citizens.
We need to build a new concept of citizen to give meaning to the ideas of political engagement and democratic involvement. The second volume of this book will look in detail at how this can be achieved in a Britain of unparalleled opportunity, but, as a result of history and decisions like Brexit, going backwards instead of moving confidently forward.
Citizens need to reclaim a role in determining their own destiny and happiness; a society in which citizens participate as equals in transforming their own lives, in a democracy where the odds are not stacked against them and the political system is not rigged to their continuing disadvantage.