MAGNUS DAVIDSON: Case for independence stacks up just as well for the Highlands and Islands
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
We are getting another referendum, apparently. The chance of a yes or no vote rests on a Supreme Court decision and, if that fails, it’s a ‘de facto referendum’ via a general election – which feels a bit anticlimactic, and will no doubt produce a result no side is happy with.
Countless newspaper pages will be set aside to these issues over the coming years, and I don’t want to bore you with more, but I will approach the question from a different angle.
Why not independence for the Highlands and Islands?
The Highlands and Islands region is home to eight per cent of Scotland’s population and half of the land mass of Scotland. In the context of the UK, Scotland accounts for eight per cent of population but only one third of land mass.
The majority, by some way, of Scotland’s Exclusive Economic Zone is found off the coast of the Highlands and Islands. The population consideration is the same as Scotland in the UK but the case for the Highlands and Islands benefits from proportionally more land and sea resource.
Industries and exports synonymous with Scotland such as salmon, seafood, whisky and energy are predominantly produced in the Highlands and Islands or off our coast. In my last column I reported that the region produces four times as much electricity as consumed, all from renewable sources. When it comes to tree planting and peatland restoration for achieving net-zero, we have most of the land resource for that too. Inverness has life sciences, and the Cromarty Firth has industry.
If you believe in the economic case for an independent Scotland, you can only look on with admiration at the case to be made for the north. The same challenges for an independent Scotland, on issues like currency and pensions, of course will still exist, and others on taxation and public spending would be even more challenging.
But if you fundamentally believe in the success of a small northern European country rich with resources, you can respect the proposal. Too small a population? The country would be home to more people than Iceland and 28 other countries across the globe.
In a historical context there was what was in effect, at one point of time, an independent Highlands and Islands composed of the Earldom of Orkney and the Lordship of the Isles, before being conquered by an expansionist Scottish state centred in Edinburgh. Not that we should dwell too much on the past, rather look to the future.
Across the region Norse, Gaelic, Scots and other cultural capital could be celebrated on an equal basis with Caithness being an obvious cultural centre. Despite drawing a new border somewhere around the Highland Line, the case made should be civic and inclusive.
Delineation is a difficult question, but existing boundaries such as the crofting counties or the EU derived NUM definition currently used to outline the region are deficient in not encompassing parts of the Highlands beyond the Highland region itself. Arran will have to secede from North Ayrshire Council.
Organisations such as Highlands and Islands Enterprise and the University of the Highlands and Islands already exist across the region. Could the Convention of the Highlands and Islands offer a glimpse of future governance with potential devolved regions in its councils, health boards, and a quasi-civil service?
The obvious risk of centralisation to Inverness and the Highland ‘central belt’ of the Inner Moray Firth could be alleviated by decentralisation of government and civil service across the region, going well beyond bigger towns such as Wick, Kirkwall, Oban, Lerwick, Stornoway and Fort William.
One friend has suggested that an ever travelling ‘floating parliament’ would ensure that coastal and island communities would be at the centre of government thinking. To avoid delays to the new floating parliament it should be built at Nigg rather than on the Clyde.
Could the threat of independence make the case to an Edinburgh government for further devolution beyond Holyrood? A population with less difference in opinion on international affairs with Bute House than Downing Street, suggestions of full fiscal autonomy or ‘devo-max’ for the region could certainly be agreeable for many.
Unlike the Scottish case, there is currently no political movement towards an independence campaign for the Highlands and Islands, but the idea offers an interesting alternative to the constitutional ‘Caledonian Antisyzygy’ we have been living through the last decade.
- Magnus Davidson is a researcher based in Thurso.
- What do you think? Send your letters to editor@nosn.co.uk
