22.07.1999
Stoking the fire
Tories play English nationalist card
Patriotism is proverbially the last refuge of a scoundrel. Small wonder, therefore, that Tory leader William Hague - increasingly desperate to seize upon some stick with which to beat New Labour - should have decided to play the English nationalist card.
The move had long been mooted and finally took the form of ‘Strengthening the union after devolution’, a keynote speech delivered to the Centre for Policy Studies on July 15. Draping himself simultaneously in the union jack and the flag of St George, Hague gave a schizophrenic address: on the one hand, he sought to extol the virtues of the union; on the other, he treated his audience to a hypocritical jeremiad on the “ugly and dangerous” phenomenon of English nationalism.
Attacking Blair for his refusal to tackle the “unfair position of England” in the light of Scottish and Welsh devolution, Hague referred to the “sea of red and white flags and the painted faces at last year’s world cup” as “just one sign of an emerging national consciousness ... Try to ignore this English consciousness or bottle it up and it will turn into a more dangerous English nationalism that can threaten the future of the United Kingdom ... recognise its value, and it actually strengthens our common British identity” (Daily Mail July 16). Hague maintained that the “the drums of English nationalism are already beating”, that “doing nothing is not an option” and that anomalies created by New Labour’s devolution represented a “ticking time bomb beneath the British constitution” that threatens to create an “an English nationalist backlash that could tear the union apart”.
The slogan ‘English votes on English laws’ encapsulates the proximate cause of Hague’s histrionics: in the aftermath of devolution, the situation has arisen in which members of the House of Commons from Scottish and Welsh constituencies retain the right to vote on bills pertaining to England, whereas their English counterparts have no such right in relation to Scotland or Wales. They are even debarred from asking questions about Scottish and Welsh affairs.
To remedy this ‘inequitable’ situation, Hague outlined four possible solutions: first, strengthening English local government, something of which he is in favour, but which is “not enough”; secondly, reducing the number of Scottish MPs by bringing the size of Scottish constituencies into line with those in England - a move he also supports, but again one which does not deal with the fundamental problem; thirdly, the creation of a separate English parliament, something Hague claims he does not want, but which he warned could nonetheless happen; finally, his preferred solution, whereby Scots and Welsh MPs would be debarred from voting on measures relating exclusively to England, which would, according to Hague, “get the balance right”.
Reactions to Hague’s speech from the Labour front bench were entirely predictable. Leader of the Commons Margaret Beckett accused Hague of “playing an extremely dangerous and stupid game” and of being “crass, stupid and insensitive” to raise such issues in the light of the failed Ulster peace talks: “The Tories, for short-term political expediency, are seeking to pit the people of Britain against each other”. Scottish secretary John Reid, an almost redundant figure since devolution, said that Hague was “fanning the flames of English nationalism” and “undermining the UK and Scottish ties to it”.
Press reaction was mixed. From The Daily Telegraph there was a predictably encouraging response. The Times gave the story little attention. With its characteristic complacent liberalism, The Guardian, organ of the metropolitan intelligentsia, simply brushed Hague aside, averring that we should “do things the British way; live with the anomalies that riddle our system and wave aside Mr Hague’s silly talk of time bombs and drumbeats” (July 17).
What should we, as communists, make of the business? The first thing which must be said is that it is Blair himself - with his plan to remould the British constitution from above - who has forced the Tories to react and created the preconditions for Hague’s attempt to conjure up the forces of English nationalism. Through devolution, reform of the Lords, proportional representation, etc, Blair is attempting to redraw the political map of the United Kingdom. He is seeking a new consensus for the more efficient operation of capital under which New Labour will be centre stage and the Tories consigned to permanent opposition.
In these circumstances, the silence of the left is positively deafening. Leaving aside the occasional pious nod in the direction of devolution’s supposed extension of ‘democracy’ to Scotland and Wales - in reality a Blairite sop intended to buy off the legitimate national aspirations of the Scots and Welsh (the CPGB called for parliaments with full powers: nothing less), the left press has left the whole question unaddressed.
Let us be clear. Far from speaking out against the “drum” of nationalism, Hague is assiduously beating it himself. We should, however, not blind ourselves to the fact that his appeal to the most basic kind of English nationalism could achieve some resonance among the English working class. Of course, his project is regressive and to a large extent incoherent; of course, in reality the Tories have no workable alternative vision for society. But it should be obvious to anybody that, given the failure of ‘official communism’ and socialism’s headlong ideological retreat in the ensuing period of reaction, the allure of national pride and national resentment retain a power that only a fool would disregard.
If we want to understand the possible ramifications of this fact for our class, we need to look not at the broadsheets, but at The Sun, for whose anti-European, little-Englander politics Hague’s diatribe was a gift from the gods. Witness its columnist Richard Littlejohn, the paper’s interpreter of vox populi - since many of our readers are unlikely to have seen the article in question, we shall quote at some length:
“Let’s get one thing straight. The Scots and Welsh voted for devolution. The English weren’t even consulted, let alone given a chance to vote in a referendum on such an important constitutional matter ... Nevertheless the vast majority of us have gone along with it ... There hasn’t even been much bridling at the fact that the English have to keep picking up billions of pounds worth of bills for substantially higher public spending in Scotland and Wales ... You might have thought that Scottish and Welsh politicians would be happy ... but they’re not content ... They want to run England too ... They want to interfere in schools, transport, health and suchlike. Frankly, none of this is any of their damn business any more. They opted out, not us ... And slowly but surely the English are beginning to stir. Frankly we are beginning to tire of the racist abuse and ‘extremist’ jibes being levelled at us. And the fact that English taxpayers are seen as mug punters north and west of the border” (July 16).
Easy though it may be to dismiss these remarks as reactionary garbage, we need to take account of them, if only to clarify in our own minds the fact that English nationalism is not just “silly talk”, but a potentially important factor in the politics that lie ahead. How soon, for example, will it be before The Sun mounts the bandwagon of support for an English parliament within the UK’s constitutional monarchy system? Here again, much of the left has simply ignored the question. Hague claims not to want it - under conditions of proportional representation it is highly unlikely that the Tories would emerge with an absolute majority. But what do we, as communists think about the problem?
There is, of course, a difference in the content of the demands for Scottish and Welsh parliaments with full powers, compared with a call for an English parliament. Under the UK constitutional monarchy the Scots and Welsh have no right to self-determination. The same cannot be said for the English - the overriding majority. Nevertheless our call for the abolition of the monarchy system and a federal republic includes a parliament for England too. Communists in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have a duty to champion republicanism and democracy for the English.
Communists are certainly not anti-English. The English have a long and proud history of class struggle. The peasant revolt of 1381, the Lollards of the 15th century, the Levellers of the Commonwealth revolution, the London Correspondence Society, the world’s first working class party - the Chartists, Owenite communism, mass trade unionism and the Tolpuddle martyrs.
It is our task to educate today’s generation in that combative and internationalist spirit and consign all nationalism to the scrapheap of history.
Michael Malkin