If it was the case that Labour were simply saying that winning a majority in Scotland at the next general election would constitute a mandate to block an independence referendum, that might just about be a defensible position. (It would still be wrong, incidentally, because a Holyrood election is the appropriate arena to seek constitutional mandates. But at least it would be an acknowledgement that a Scottish mandate is required.) What they instead appear to be saying is that they will seek a Britain-wide “mandate” to block an indyref, and even if Scotland comprehensively rejects Labour for a third consecutive general election, the wishes of voters south of the border will be imposed in Scotland, and the wishes of voters who actually live in Scotland will be contemptuously disregarded.
That isn’t democracy. That’s a hostage situation. Labour have today embraced the logic of colonialism – indeed, it’s precisely the same logic that has fuelled the persecution of the Catalan independence movement. Incredibly, Labour have looked at what the Spanish government did and thought “wow, that’s a template we must copy”. We used to think the idea of a British government seeking the imprisonment of SNP ministers was totally unthinkable…but then the idea that a major UK party would oppose Scotland’s right to self-determination was unthinkable until very recently. Who knows what the future might hold.
There is a very clear lesson here for the SNP. Attaining a referendum via a Section 30 order is now a non-starter regardless of whether there is a Tory or Labour government. So from this moment on we shouldn’t hear any more about how the SNP leadership are temperamentally opposed to a referendum held without Westminster’s consent. Of course a Section 30 would have been preferable, but you can only choose an option that is actually open to you. If you will the ends, you have to will the means. That leads us inescapably to one of two possibilities – either a consultative referendum held without a Section 30 order (which would probably have to be defended at the Supreme Court), or the seeking of an outright mandate for independence at the next Holyrood election.
As for Corbyn’s motivation for abandoning his long-standing and principled opposition to colonialism, I can only assume that it must be a cynical electoral calculation aimed at winning back voters who were won over by the moronic simplicity of the Tories’ “No to Indyref 2” message in June 2017. If so, it’s an enormous gamble, because there were Yes voters who backed Corbyn last year, but for whom voting for a party explicitly seeking a mandate to block an indyref will be a step too far. The penny seems to have finally dropped today for Cat Boyd, for example.
